WOMAD Festival 2023 – a Case Study

WOMAD Festival (World of Music, Arts and Dance) brings together artists from all over the globe every July in Charlton Park, Wiltshire. A collaboration between WOMAD founder Peter Gabriel’s Real World Records, d&b audiotechnik GB and SFL, saw SFL deliver all lighting, audio and rigging for the d&b Soundscape live stage.

The Challenge

The 900 sq.m d&b Soundscape stage is designed to enhance the sound experience at the festival for both the audience and artists alike.

This year, the stage’s line-up featured artists from Kenya, Greece, Israel, Germany, France, Ukraine, South Africa and beyond. Many of the artists aren’t regularly touring, so SFL’s George Veys and d&b audiotechnik’s Jack Page managed artist relations, ensuring that everyone could fully utilise the Soundscape system’s capabilities.

A series of pre-production sessions with bands, artists and festival engineers were conducted at SFL’s Reading-based Studio 14. This ensured seamless delivery onsite and enabled rapid turnround between acts as the programme required.

The Solution

SFL were engaged by Judgeday Ltd and working alongside Solid State Logic for the audio solution, delivering a 360-degree immersive sound system, drawing on d&b Soundscape to provide a revolutionary listening experience. SFL also partnered with DPA to fulfil the extensive equipment specification.

A comprehensive lighting package, designed and installed by SFL, supported by Ambersphere Solutions, and inventory from sister d&b solutions company White Light, enhanced the diverse line-up of performances. Over the festival’s three days, this ranged from interactive workshops and exercise classes to DJs, soloists and bands, so the solution required an intricate approach to achieving multi-purpose lighting states.

An important part of delivering the immersive experience was being able to track the performers in real time. With support from Ambersphere, SFL deployed the new zactrack mini system for key musicians on stage, which sent positional data to both the DS100 Signal Engine and the Chamsys lighting control. Alongside this, a Stage Precision Core system was deployed to ingest the tracking data along with OSC from the SSL Front of House console. This allowed the engineers to manipulate and scale the tracking data, as well as create abstract movements for effects.

CLICK HERE for an in-depth WOMAD feature in LSi Online!