With Meyer Sound, AIDA Cruises Ensures Accurate Translation from Rehearsals to Stage

With nearly 500 Meyer Sound loudspeakers already installed aboard its ships, AIDA Cruises of Rostock, Germany has recently added Meyer Sound UPA-1P loudspeaker systems in four performance rehearsal spaces in Hamburg. In addition to exceptional sound quality and reliability, the design team has named accurate sonic translation as a primary reason for the system choice.

“Since Meyer Sound’s goal with all products is neutrality, performers will hear the same sound on the shipboard stage as they hear in rehearsals,” says system designer Malte Polli-Holstein of Hamburg-based Three-in-One Entertainment & Consulting. “Also, all of AIDA’s ships have Meyer Sound systems in their theatres, so it only makes sense to build the rehearsal systems to offer the same high level of sound quality.”

The largest rehearsal room, AIDA 1, features four UPA-1P loudspeakers, two CQ-1 and four UPM‑1P loudspeakers, two 600-HP subwoofers, and four UM-100P stage monitors. The AIDA 2 and 3 rooms each feature four UPA-1P loudspeakers, while the lofty, 10-meter high AIDA 4 space uses eight UPA-1P loudspeakers. All rooms have Galileo loudspeaker management systems, with one Galileo 616 processor in AIDA 1 and one Galileo 408 processor in each of the other rooms. Hamburg-based Amptown System Company supplied and installed the systems.

Logistics and reliability also played a role in loudspeaker selection, according to Polli-Holstein. “The self-powered Meyer systems eliminated the need to place equipment racks in the rehearsal spaces, since there was no available equipment room,” he says. “The robustness and reliability of the systems was critical as well. The loudspeakers are running 10 hours per day, six days a week, and any downtime would disrupt the tight rehearsal schedules.”

Meyer Sound systems are used throughout AIDA Cruises’ new Sphinx class ships, most notably in the extravagant “Theatriums.” These theatre atriums feature main systems of M1D line array loudspeakers and 700-HP subwoofers, extended by MM-4 and UPM-1P loudspeakers and M1D-Sub subwoofers for fills and delays on the various deck levels. Theatres in the Cara class ships feature CQ-1 and UPM-1P loudspeakers along with 500-HP subwoofers. The AIDAcara ship uses the legacy UPA-1C conventionally powered loudspeakers installed in 1996.