Cohesion debuts in Shanghai with Mariah Carey

Earlier this year, Mariah Carey returned to Shanghai’s HongKou Football Stadium for two nights of music. As part of The Celebration of Mimi tour, which was an extension of her Las Vegas residency and an anniversary of her tenth album, The Emancipation of Mimi, these milestone shows marked the Chinese debut for a full-scale Cohesion audio system that supported both nights in Shanghai.

Jiangsu RenTian relied upon local vendor Shanghai AKUS Co. LTD to provide the audio, and Shanghai AKUS partnered with AirFusion Global to secure a Cohesion audio system that would provide the necessary coverage, clarity, and output for the performances from the six-time Grammy Award winner.

“I always talk about how the throw of Cohesion, its density, it feels like it’s against the laws of physics,” said FOH engineer Paul Falcone, who first experienced Cohesion while mixing Mariah Carey’s Christmas tour last year.

“Cohesion is our PA of choice for Mariah Carey since Paul and I initially weighed our options,” said system engineer Connor Murray. “Most people talk about the power with Cohesion, and the SPL output by weight is surely leading the industry, but that’s not why we chose it. It ultimately came down to a few key strengths Cohesion has: clarity, coverage, and adaptability.”

“It’s amazing to me, the coverage, and of course Connor is great at finding the right angles for the PA to achieve that full coverage,” said Falcone.

The mainstage system was designed with an end stage configuration with main hangs comprising 16 Cohesion CO12 left-right and an additional 16 CO12 on side hangs. 270° hangs comprising six Cohesion CO8 each were deployed upstage of the side hangs for additional reinforcement at the near sides and along the upper bowl.

“Any PA can sound great directly on-axis, but only a fraction of an audience is actually on-axis,” said Murray. “With Cohesion, we can deliver the same show to everyone in the audience. The speaker design centres on phase coherence at every wavelength everywhere in its coverage. We deliver exactly what we want, evenly, everywhere we want it.”

Nine front-facing Cohesion CP218 II+ subwoofers were hung behind the mains in gradient configuration and offered significant infra rejection directly behind the deployed CO12 arrays. On the ground, nine additional CP218 II+ were stacked left and right in cardioid configuration directly under the aerial main system for further support.

“I’m so impressed by the entire frequency spectrum,” said Falcone. “The crossover is set so high that it’s out of the vocal range, so I get that clear high end. Maybe with another system, I have to boost my highs, but with Cohesion, if anything, I can pull it back. One of the coolest parts of this PA is how staggeringly good the subs, the lows, and low-mids are. Even if you have that clarity on the high end, it won’t mean anything if you can’t push the low end. I can shake a stadium with these subs. There’s power to spare, and I can push it without distortion.”

For front fill support, a dozen additional CO8 were placed along the mainstage, and two arrays of three Cohesion CO10 each were flown stage left and right within the stagehouse for side fill.

“I typically have a multi-band compressor and use that essentially as an EQ, and I found I did not need that with the Cohesion rig,” noted Falcone. “A lot of it was mixed on the near fields, and it translated very well to the mix itself with just a little bit of system EQ.”

Two additional arrays of six CO12 each were flown as delays on the back of the FOH structure. These arrays were closer to fans in those sections to reduce the number of enclosures required for full coverage and reduce unwanted energy to radiate outside of the venue in accordance with the local promoter and municipality. The audio crew was keenly aware of the impression the shows might leave in Shanghai, as Falcone detailed:

“We had a huge responsibility since it was the vendor’s first run with this PA. They had a lot on the line, and if I had a bad mix or if we experienced any technical issues, it wouldn’t be a great look, but in the end, it was all hugs and smiles. Everyone knew we were using Cohesion for the first time, and we only heard how great it was. The audience was loving it.”