An Allen & Heath dLive mixing system set the rink alight for one of the most successful ice-skating gala events in the world, Art on Ice, which celebrated its 25th anniversary this month with a series of shows taking place across Zurich, Lausanne, Basel and Davos.
Combining live performances from internationally acclaimed artists, world-class dancers and figure-skaters, including the 2018 Gold Olympic medallist Alina Zagitova, Art on Ice offers a unique and immersive storytelling experience.
Produced by Swiss AV production company, Habegger AG (and with Session Pro helping to supply gear), the full setup featured a dLive S7000 paired with a DM64 MixRack, fitted with a superMADI card for multi-track recording and a Waves V3 card for external plugins.
Operated by long-time A&H user and FOH engineer, Sascha Kohl, dLive was used to handle all sources including the musicians, vocalists, presenter and playback. The nature of the venues presented some challenges, as Kohl explains, “As the main part of the hall is a very large, highly reflective sheet of ice, I was never able to get into a really good listening position, which made getting the mix perfect a little tricky at times. As the PA was set up for the crowd, having the possibility to do the VSC on my laptop, via dLive Director, and walk around the venue was absolutely essential.”
Kohl is also quick to praise dLive’s easy scene management, including the simple to use ‘relative’ and ‘absolute’ update functions, and the MCA control introduced in firmware V1.8, which allowed Kohl to easily run the entire show via one surface.
“The music, video playback, band, singers and presenter work seamlessly together and it’s great to have one system that can handle anything thrown at it,” Kohl adds. “I’ve been using dLive since the very beginning and before that I was a long-time user of iLive, so I’m totally into A&H consoles. dLive’s workflow is just quick and easy to use, and I love the additional DEEP processing available, such as the OptTronik, 16VU and 16T.”
