When Steve Palmer was faced with the prospect of providing audio for California Governor Gray Davis’ Swearing In Ceremony and Inaugural Ball, the good news was the importance of the event and its impact on his company’s growth; the not-so-good news was the fact that both events were being held in older, traditional venues distinguished by a cavernous, reverberant sound.

Sacramento Production Services, Palmer’s successful production and hire company, had to ensure that every word spoken during the Governor’s Swearing In Ceremony at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium was clear and intelligible. Then he and his staff had to reproduce more speeches along with dance music at the Inaugural Ball that evening.

The 3,855-seat capacity Auditorium has three seating levels with a sloped main floor and two balconies.

With the emphasis on articulation and coverage to counteract the less than perfect audio environment for the Swearing In ceremonies, Palmer, eng-ineer Scott Prentice and tech, Ryan Cornelius, chose 16 Martin W8L loud-speakers, eight a side, and four Martin WT2 speakers.

Combining Martin Audio’s premier line array system with its superlative compact theatre system provided typically smooth, and dynamic full-frequency performance with exceptional articulation. Palmer needed the intelligibility and impact of the W8L’s “they kick like a mule,” he remarked and appreciated the fast set-up and break-down times, considering there were
four events that day.
A spokesman for the governor’s office pro-nounced the sound simply as “great,” with the Sacramento Production Services staff impressed with the clarity, audio quality and impact of the audio throughout the event.

Later that day — January 6th, 2003 — the Governor’s Ball was held at the Sacramento Convention Center, located in the heart of downtown. This occasion would involve both speech and music reproduction, with the popular swing band Big Bad Voodoo Daddies (who first gained acclaim in the modern Hollywood fable Swingers) providing the music.

In order to provide adequate SPLs without compromising clarity, balance and coverage throughout the room, Loudsound combined 12 of Martin Audio’s flagship, award-winning W8C loudspeakers with eight ground-stacked Martin Wavefront WSX folded-horn subwoofers.

The W8C’s can be rigged quickly to deliver outstanding power and performance from very compact configurations. More importantly, as a well-known professional sound engineer who’s toured with the Wavefront has noted, “You can really pump it up and never get near its threshold. The sound is warm and full with a very natural voice.”

For monitoring, Loudsound used 12 Martin LE12J’s, a Martin WS2A (drum sub), and two Martin S218’s (sidefill subs) among the configuration.

With company engineers Scott Prentice, Chris O’Brien and Ryan Cornelius at the helm and Martin Audio systems delivering the impact with traditional flair and accuracy, Governor Davis’ newest tour of duty was truly off to a flying start.