Amadeus has installed over 172 of its speakers, alongside the HOLOPHONIX immersive audio processor, at the newly renovated 560-seat La Scala Paris theater. From the early stages of the renovation, Amadeus worked closely with the owners Mélanie and Frédéric Biessyand the artistic team to design a sound reinforcement system offering unmatched flexibility and audiophile-level quality.
The electro-acoustic system, created by Amadeus in collaboration with composer Philippe Manoury and scenographers Patrice Buniazet and Richard Peduzzi, delivers modularity for nearly limitless configurations, accommodating all types of performances.
Frédéric Biessy, owner of La Scala Paris, explains:
We wanted to build a system that would be able to adapt to any live show and any concert- even the most acoustically and sonically challenging. Our meetings and exchanges with IRCAM were also a key factor in transforming La Scala into a facility with unique acoustical specifications. The hall’s acoustics and sound reinforcement system are at the core of our project, and it makes La Scala even more than a concert hall. To bet on the success of a multidisciplinary performance space implies that, in every domain, the tools are the most demanding and the most adapted to the quality and the demands by the artists invited to perform there. All the artists who have performed at La Scala in the past four months have confirmed that their needs were met.
The system’s core is the HOLOPHONIX spatial sound processor, developed by Amadeus with STMS Lab and supported by CNRS, Sorbonne University, the French Ministry of Culture, and IRCAM. HOLOPHONIX allows real-time mixing, reverberation, and spatialization in two or three dimensions, offering nearly unlimited creative possibilities.
Spread in a hemisphere around the audience to match the theater’s geometry, Amadeus speakers include custom designs for catwalks, balconies, and frontal line arrays. The system draws inspiration from the high-end research setup at IRCAM’s Espace de Projection, featuring technologies such as Wave Field Synthesis and Ambisonics.
Some speakers, particularly those fixed on the two upper catwalks, were custom-designed by Amadeus for La Scala. The first catwalk speakers are mounted at 6.5 m with a 30° coaxial transducer angle for optimal coverage, while the second catwalk speakers are tilted at 45°. Three under-balcony “antenna” systems, each with 12 Amadeus PMX 4 coaxial speakers spaced 1.25 m apart, act as delayed speakers. A frontal high-power line array of 18 Amadeus DIVA M² speakers complements the system, with configurations including 2×9 L/R, 3×6 L/C/R, and 6×3 for multi-diffusion setups.
Renowned scenographer Richard Peduzzi designed the theater’s interiors, collaborating with Amadeus and Argile to finish all fixed speakers in the custom “Bleu Scala” color—a subtle blue-grey blend harmonizing with the theater’s architecture.
