Derrick Zieba

Brit Awards

"What's on the PM1D's side is proven technology and the fact that they're utterly, utterly reliable." "Right now my favourite desk is the PM5D, Yamaha have come so far with the head amps and the EQ, and the way it stores and records are much more instinctive than the 1D. I know touring engineers who've learned on the PM1D who now find the PM5D a fabulous desk. So, in terms of the essential technology, for shows like these there's nothing really lacking. It's the way it's operated, if they concentrate in that area - and I'm sure they will - then it can only get better."

Alessandro Roseo

Monitor engineer, Zelig Circus

"At Zelig, the same mics were often used for both speech and singing, so we ‘doubled them up', giving them two different equalizations - one equivalent to conventional ‘lavalier' settings, the other with reverb, compressor, etc. for singing - all this is really easy with the PM1D."

"Even if the songs were always different, I started out with a basic memory, on which I carried out the necessary changes each time. I think that this sort of work could only be done so quickly with this console. The choice of the PM1D was essentially a winner, because before the shows started we didn't know what the finished product would be - at the end, I found myself with 30 outputs to cope with and the forty channels at the start finished up as sixty!"

Marcello Mannini

FOH engineer, Zelig Circus

"I'd already used the first version of the PM1D, so knew it well, and on Zelig I based the majority of the work on the matrices - I put the music on the stereo matrix and speech on an Aux, in order to EQ them differently before sending the mixdown to the PA, which consisted in a main system and seven delay lines. It was the first time I'd made such in-depth use of the matrices and I must say the results were excellent."

"I always put a gate on every speech mic, as - being digital - they're very fast, which enables me to keep the sound very ‘precise' - they closed as soon as the comedian stopped talking and re-opened immediately he started again - they're imperceptible, ensure a really clean sound and I would have been lost without them. The few effects I used were all on-board - they are sufficient and good quality and the dynamics work well even if used with somebody who shouts."

"As far as I'm concerned, managing to achieve a detailed sound like I had on Zelig - where you could distinguish every touch of the drummer's cymbals and every ‘ghost note' on his snare - is only possible with the precision of a console of this type."

John Ryan

FOH engineer, i-Tim tour

"We had thirty seconds' changeover time between bands, so while one played, the next did a line check. One of the big advantages of using the PM1D in this specific case - but also generally speaking - is the great visibility, and therefore its extreme immediacy. Then there the excellent ‘inboards' - and it sounds fantastic too!"

Marco Della Torre

Monitor engineer, i-Tim tour

"I kept the monitor feeds all on the same layer, so didn't need to switch between layers. While one band was playing, the stage manager called me, I changed over to the other ‘pattern' and ran a line check for the next group. With any other desk, I wouldn't have been able to do the gig by myself - the PM1D's immediacy is fantastic!"

Kevin Pruce

FOH engineer, Madonna tour

"I'd been using a PM1D since the Vespertine tour with Björk and I thought in a Madonna show there would be lots of inputs and outputs. I know the console well and knew it could handle these tasks with ease and as a digital console, it's proved to me, to be versatile, easy to use and very reliable."
"In arenas like we're playing the biggest battle is always the room, there are so many variables to deal with, but having the show programmed on a console such as the PM1D, allows me to concentrate on those variables."