Mizzou Athletics Upgrades Arena Broadcast Center With Calrec

A brand-new Calrec Summa console is driving professional broadcast-quality sound for the University of Missouri Athletics department (Mizzou Athletics). The Summa anchors a major upgrade of the Mizzou Arena broadcast center to support ESPNU and SEC Network productions. 

The Summa equips Mizzou Athletics to meet the audio requirements of linear television and the demands of network producers and directors. The desk is housed in a new stand-alone audio room that can handle full basketball productions for the TV networks and complete shows for the arena’s in-house video boards, all at the same time. Mizzou Athletics operators can call on an abundance of auxes and tracks to send signals wherever they need to go quickly and easily, with just a couple of touches on the touch screen.

“As an audio engineer, I never want to tell a director or producer ‘Let me see if we can do that.’ All too often that was my answer with our old console. I had to navigate a confusing menu system with limited resources and hope I could find a way to make special requests work. But the Summa now gives us the resources to say ‘yes,’ even to unusual requests,” says Mike Coons, A1 broadcast audio engineer for Mizzou Athletics.

“The Summa touch screen makes our lives easier and turbo-charges our workflows. For instance, we can link channels to change compression settings on all shotgun FX mics at once, rather than having to configure one and then copy and paste the settings to each of the others. And any A1 can set up the board quickly to suit his or her preferences simply by dragging channels to different faders on the touch screen.”

The Calrec Fader Assist app for the iPad is especially useful for managing two Mizzou Athletics sports broadcasts happening at once. Calrec Fader Assist allows one audio engineer to run the primary broadcast audio directly from the console, while another engineer can control the audio for the secondary broadcast remotely with an iPad.

“Beyond the Summa’s outstanding features and flexibility, it delivers a tremendous improvement in audio clarity over the old console. We switched from the old to the new in the middle of basketball season, and the difference was so profound that the director and producer commented about how much better the game sounded,” Coons says.

“The combination of price, ease of use, and the prominence of the Calrec name in the sports world led us to the Summa,” says Stan Silvey, assistant athletic director, broadcast operations, Mizzou Athletics. “The improved audio quality definitely makes our live broadcasts stand out. But the Summa also plays a big role in helping us prepare our students for the workplace. Since we rely on many Mizzou students to help with live productions, they’re able to train on the Summa — and the experience working with Calrec boards gives them a distinct advantage when they graduate.”

“The Summa lets Mizzou Athletics control multiple channels and easily route signals anywhere they’re needed, empowering engineers to deliver whatever the situation calls for,” says Richard Phillips, regional sales manager for Calrec. “The Mizzou Athletics installation proves how the Summa can help any school improve workflow and flexibility during live sports productions.”