Derrick Zieba

Sound Design, Engineering & Project Management

36 Top House rise, Chingford, London E4 7EE.
Tel: +44(0)20 8529 3562 Fax: +44 (0)705 0801509
Mob: +44 (0)7775 884 968 E-Mail: dzieba@mac.com

Derrick Zieba reviews the past and looks at the year 2002.........

The year is 2002. Spring is passing into Summer (except for the weather!) what have we done?…

JANUARY

This was dominated by my first visit to Saudi Arabia, at the request of TV sound engineer & sound producer for the event Andy Rose, and I was ably assisted by Huw Richards. I provided the design for a surround sound playback system (supplied by Britannia Row Productions) for the central show on the Jahandria festival.

FEBRUARY

February was Award Show Month!! Although it kicked off first with another leg of the Davis Cup Tennis tournament, this time against Sweden. Yes, we lost, but only just. Next came the Brit awards 2002 from Earl’s Court 2 Arena, followed by the BAFTA’s from the Odeon in Leicester Square (now made famous for Russell Crowe’s little “outburst” at the after show party!).

MARCH

The beginning of March saw me in Monte Carlo for EMS Worldwide doing a conference for RBS then, following some rest time, a repeat of the annual Zurich Financial Services Conference at the Great Eastern Hotel for Pump House Productions .

APRIL

April brought a visit to Frankfurt courtesy of TBA and another visit to Dubai for a concert at the American University of Dubai by the legendary Lebanese singer Fairuz.

MAY

May brought a visit to The Royal Albert Hall for: The Classical Brit Awards. This is the first year that I have been asked to design & supervise the sound for these awards.

PERFORMERS 2002

Andrea Bocelli

Caroline Dale

Chloë Hanslip

Magdalena Kozena

OperaBabes

Mikhail Ovrutsky

The Planets

Russell Watson

JUNE

They are finally here! The two shows that the Queen has waited 50 years for:

"The Classical Proms" on Saturday 1st June

& "Party at the Palace" on Monday 3rd June 2002.

This Press Release from Shuttlesound says it all.....

Prince Charles pays tribute to "incredible sound quality" at triumphant Jubilee pop concert

There is no doubt that the Jubilee concerts held in the grounds of Buckingham Palace over the Jubilee weekend were a resounding success in every respect. Even Prince Charles in his address to the Queen at the end of the rock and pop extravaganza was moved to pay tribute to the army of crew associated with sound contractors Britannia Row and the BBC, without whom we would not have experienced such "incredible sound quality". He went on to add his own personal comment, "I don't know about you, but I thought it was fantastic."

Derrick Zieba who was in overall charge of the Buckingham Palace events agreed. "Britannia Row's X-Line performed magnificently. I don't think I have ever heard a system sound so good," he said. "The quality of sound for the Classical Prom was just outstanding. Even the purists from the classical world and the BBC were impressed. One such aficionado even said to me, 'Apart from the fact that I can hear it, I wouldn't know it was amplified.' And he was right. It sounded flawless. And as for the rock and pop concert, the power and energy that came from the stage was just overwhelming." Britannia Row's Bryan Grant was equally delighted. "It was simply stunning," he stated, "even if I do say so myself! I was stood 70m away from the stage when Shirley Bassey was performing Goldfinger, and it was as if she was standing next to me. I could hear every detail."

The system comprised a main left and right hang of 5 x Xvls 3-way long throw cabinets, 4 x Xvlt 3-way medium throw cabinets and 8 x X-subs per side, all flown, plus two delay towers of 6 x Xvls each. Electro-Voice Xi 1152's acted as in-fills and front-fills. Not a lot of gear for 12,000 people one might think, but the console requirements to deal with the sheer number of performers on stage were impressive. For the rock and pop concert there were two Yamaha PM1D's and two Midas XL4's at FoH and an incredible three XL4's and three Heritage 3000's handling monitors. In fact one of the XL4's out front and one of the Heritage 3000's was brought in by Brian Wilson who is currently on tour in the UK and wanted to stay with his set-up. Derrick admitted that it was something of a double edged sword: "On the one hand it was a godsend because it gave us the extra capacity that we really needed, but on the other hand it was a nightmare trying to integrate it with the rest of the gear. At one point when Brian was performing with several other artists plus the house band AND the orchestra we had five of the six monitor boards all working together!"

Monitor engineer Simon Hardiman definitely had his work cut out for him. Not only was he responsible for all the monitor feeds but he was kept extremely busy juggling the in-ear packs that had to be constantly swapped between artists as they came off stage. Including the in-ear systems being used by the crew to communicate across the site, a total of eighteen systems were in circulation. In terms of microphones, there were six handhelds for the presenters and a further sixteen for the performers, all of which were used at least two or three times. Meanwhile, Dave Bracey at FoH was kept equally busy across a mind-boggling total of 340 inputs. "When you think about it, it was a gargantuan task," said Zieba, "the enormity of which was only concealed thanks to the professionalism of the crew."

Build-up for the shows started on Monday 27th, so it was no mean feat to have everything in place and ready for full symphony concert plus guest artists on 1st June. The crew then had to transform the stage overnight from the symphony stage to a rock and pop stage to leave the artists just one day for rehearsal. "What we managed to achieve in the time is a tribute to everyone involved, and that includes the artists," said Zieba. "Given that we had no dress rehearsal and not even a run-through, everyone performed magnificently on the night. And it really helped that the artists all left their egos at home and just got on with the job." He made special mention of Phil Collins who worked like a Trojan throughout. "He came in for rehearsal at 10am on the Sunday and drummed solidly until midnight. The only break he had was the stoppage for the fire in Buckingham Palace. He then came back the next day and was on stage for the entire performance. He drummed for just about every single artist and didn't put a foot wrong all night. To my mind, he was definitely one of the unsung heros of the show."

It was most certainly a unique occasion and even if one might have started the evening with just a hint of cynicism, there can be no denying that it turned out to be a truly spectacular and indeed unrepeatable event. As Zieba pointed out, when are we ever going to see a bill like that again with the likes of Shirley Bassey, and Joe Cocker on stage with Ozzy Osbourne and Cliff Richard? "I don't think I've ever been so nervous," he said with a grin, "but in the end I think Prince Charles summed it up perfectly it sounded fantastic!"

TO BE CONTINUED.......

D.Z..

You can contact me via e-mail on - dzieba@mac.com

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