Asked to lower the sound in Marseille, Marsatac is experimenting with new technologies

End clap, for the Marsatac festival! The 25th edition closed its doors on Sunday evening at Parc Borély in Marseille (Bouches-du-Rhone). The event was marked by the concerts of several headliners: Aya Nakamura, Gazo, PLK and Hamza. But behind the scenes, the organizers had their sights set on an original experiment.

>> “For 25 years, the public has been 25”: how the Marsatac festival has adapted to current musical trends

Thanks to advanced technology and real-time readings, the sound level of concerts has been limited, in order to comply with a decree that has been in force for a few months and is not suitable for open-air festivals. An experiment carried out in particular to give keys to other festivals.

A festival surrounded by houses

And who says hip-hop and electro, necessarily says a lot of infra-bass. Angélique Duchemin, the director of the association “Agissons”, details: “These are frequencies that will irrigate the environment extremely easily and very, very far. We are facing technical challenges for the outdoors and therefore for our profession”.

When Marsatac moved two years ago to Parc Borély, surrounded by houses, complaints from residents arrived. So the following year, the Marseille festival decided to conduct an experiment. Béatrice Desgranges is the director of the festival: “It goes well beyond the question of the diffusion of sound on our stages. It goes on questions of acoustics, and even on the good understanding of the sound diffusion equipment which is not adapted to what the law requires. .”

Adjustments throughout the festival

The sound decree, published in April, sets a quantified limit, in decibels, of the volume not to be exceeded, and it is not compatible with an open-air festival: “Just applying the law is a challenge”laments Béatrice Desgranges.

So the festival had to put its hands in its pocket and spend several tens of thousands of euros, in particular to build sub-bass “cancellation lines”, with several rows of speakers facing the main stage. Jacky Lévêque is the head of the scientific committee: “The subwoofers are all separated in a particular way to avoid rejection as much as possible. If you turn around, you can see a second line of subs. To give you an idea, between last night and tonight, we will have differences on the audience, because measurements have been made.

Months of work and dozens of people mobilized

With her notebook blackened with notes, Carol Meyer, the director of the Art Rock festival in Saint-Brieuc does not miss a beat: “It’s a lesson for all festivals because Marsatac is a forerunner in this area. We, at Art Rock, are particularly interested in it because we are in the city center, surrounded by houses, so the problem is anything that is done to reduce the impact as much as possible is good to take.”