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| Sennheiser Equips the Eurovision Song Contest with Top Technology |
February 2001 – Sennheiser, the Wedemark/Hanover electro-acoustics company, will be providing first-class sound not only in some of the national preliminaries but also in the final of the Eurovision Song Contest
to be held in Copenhagen on May 12, 2001. In cooperation with the engineers of the Danish Broadcasting Company and with the Danish Sennheiser partner Kinovox A/S, Sennheiser has found a first-class sound
transmission solution for the specially rebuilt Parken Stadium – no wires, no cables! The Eurovision Song Contest is the biggest yet and will, with Sennheiser’s help, set new standards in sound. This is the 16th occasion that
Sennheiser has provided its successful service under the special conditions of the contest, and this year is the fifth in a row that Sennheiser has been entrusted with the responsibility for its success.
The organizers of the national preliminaries have also put their trust in the quality and ingenuity of Sennheiser. Its electro-acoustics specialists and the Danish partner Kinovox are providing the microphone and transmission
equipment for the Hanover preliminary on March 2 and its Danish counterpart on February 17 in Copenhagen.
Rolf Meyer, President of Marketing and Sales at Sennheiser, says of the company’s achievement: “As a company with a long tradition, we are once again proud to have won the trust of this year’s organizers.” He added: “These
occasions have always been great challenges for us. We have met those challenges, because our team has had the technology and, most prized of all, the experience.” Steen Peitersen, the managing director of Kinovox,
comments: “May I say that it is a challenge and an honor for our company to cooperate with the worldwide leader in radio microphones. Together with the team from the Danish Broadcasting Company and Sennheiser we will do
our very best to ensure the success of the contest.”
The Eurovision Song Contest in Copenhagen will, for the first time ever, take place under a huge, specially built glass roof in the “Parken Stadium” sports arena. About 30,000 spectators will witness this spectacle live, and
another 300 million people in 23 countries will be able to watch it on television. The event in Denmark will be the biggest in the history of the Grand Prix.
The Sennheiser specialists are faced with the task of combining the sound experience of the people in the stadium with the expectation of a first-class live broadcast for the TV audience. The signal transmission from the
stage technicians to the broadcasting stations, and then on via satellite to the viewers’ TV sets, must work without any interference.
There is a further challenge that has to be faced – the stage in Copenhagen is almost 30 meters wide and will be twice the size of those in previous years. The artists will be able to include more show elements in their
performance – which will lead to even higher expectations of the acoustics specialists backstage. Sennheiser will be equipping the artists with so-called in-ear monitors and bodypack receivers. They will replace the loudspeaker
monitors on stage, by which the artists can hear themselves and their fellow artists.
Sennheiser will be using 16 in-ear systems and 48 radio microphones; accordingly, 64 channels will be reserved for the transmission from the stage to the sound mixer. To cope with the special “open-air” situation in
Copenhagen, Sennheiser will use high quality directional microphones: they pin-point the sound source and suppress any background noise.
The 5000-series wireless radio frequency system transmits the microphone signals to the receivers backstage; from there the signals go to the broadcasting stations. Among experts the 5000 series is held in the highest
regard; this series really is the cutting edge. The system makes use of flexible PLL technology which reliably avoids any interference.
During the performance, the complete logistics team, security and other service providers communicate per mobil
e phone. The frequencies of all those participating must be coordinated during the one-month run-in period,
so that they do not interfere with one another. In comparison to the preliminaries, the technicians in Copenhagen will have fewer frequencies at their disposal.
As the world's leading manufacturer of microphones, headphones and wireless transmission systems, the Sennheiser Group, which is based in Wedemark near Hanover, Germany, registered a sales revenue of more than DM 380 million in the year 2000. The export share is approx. 80%. Sennheiser has a total workforce of approx. 1,300 employees, 800 of them in Germany. Sennheiser is active world-wide with subsidiaries in France, the UK, Belgium, the Netherlands, China, Singapore, Canada, Mexico and the USA, as well as independent
distributors in many other countries.
For further information, please contact:
Sennheiser electronic GmbH & Co. KG
Pressereferat • Edelgard Marquardt
Am Labor 1 • 30900 Wedemark
Fon: +49 (5130) 600-329
Fax: +49 (5130) 600-295
e-Mail: marquare@sennheiser.com
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