Music City Is Set To Make Some Real Noise With IndyCar Street Race Big Machine Music City Grand Prix roars into Nashville with lots of mics and music By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Thursday, August 3, 2023 - 10:54 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Eighty laps, 168 winding street miles, and more music than you can shake a guitar at. That's the third edition of the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix (Sunday, Aug. 6, NBC Sports) in Nashville, where both IndyCar and the city are looking to what's becoming an annual event to burnish both brands.
The temporary 2.17-mile street circuit takes 26 NTT IndyCar Series racers by the Tennessee Titans' Nissan Stadium, through 11 twisty turns, and over the Korean War Veterans Memorial Bridge above the Cumberland River (the first motorsports course of its kind in the world to cross a major body of water), and into downtown Nashville. All done to a soundtrack that will feature Florida-Georgia Line's Brian Kelley, Chris Janson, M tley Cr e's Vince Neil, Gavin Degraw, and other special guests.
Upshift, Downshift, Crowds, Roar If negotiating those turns are tricky, so is capturing the race's signature sounds. That's the job of A1 Mike Pope, aided by submixer Rob Sweeney. Some of the music might sneak into the broadcast here and there, but most of it will be that characteristic effects mix of upshift, downshift, crowds, and roar.
Street courses are obviously always a little more difficult, mainly in terms of access, explains Pope, who has mixed IndyCar races for 13 years. Of course, on this course here in Nashville, we've got some experience. This is our third year here.
Getting the audio signals around the sprawling downtown campus involves an infrastructure of eight Calrec Hydra network boxes daisy-chained into the Artemis submix console aboard the B unit of IMS Productions' three-trailer production rig (which also handles robos and graphics), buttressed by a parallel Dante network in spots.
The cameras on the truck still have two audio analog inputs, but they also have network connections, Pope explains. Those network connections are what we use for Dante boxes, which also can be configured for intercom. We've done that in the past, but, for this race, we're also using the Dante to bring microphone signals back, primarily for the upshifts or downshifts and maybe a roar - whatever is needed to get the signal back to the submix console.
With more than 50 microphones deployed in total, he can call on Audio-Technica BP4027 long stereo shotgun mics on hard cameras and shorter BP4029 mics for crowd capture and other applications. Sennheiser 416 super-cardioid shotguns have become indispensable for up/downshift sounds and for use on robo cams. A Shure VP88 rounds out the main four-pack of the various transducers that Pope and Sweeney use to cover the vast majority of the race.
All of those are workhorse mics, Pope says.
The camera audio inputs have become a valuable resource for racing effects capture, with improved pre-amps that can collect the full-range audio needed for motorsports. And, because the track is dedicated to IndyCar, the console gain and trim structures are already tuned for the sport.
A lot of the show is already dialed in for us, notes Pope, who mixes it on a Calrec Apollo desk.
Radio, Comms Are Complicated A pair of Calrec Brio consoles are used to mix the audio for the big-screen video around the track, some of which will make its way into the broadcast sound via direct feeds to the main mix desk. According to Pope, the radio mix, mixed by Pat Sellers, is perhaps the most complicated part of the event's audio due to the unpredictability of sources and is on a scant 1.5-second profanity delay.
You're a cat on a wire out there with the radios, he says of the occasionally salty audio nuggets that come across the RF infrastructure provided by BSI. But they're critical because, whenever audio leads the narrative, it's usually because of what's coming through the radios.
The show's comms are conventional but also complicated, built around an RTS ADAM platform with nearly 600 ports spanning seven trailers. It's a fairly standard configuration but made notable by its scale, says Pope.
Not all of them are active, he points out, but they're there. I would say we would have at least 12-16 external panels that we use. In general, it's structured mostly the same, but the comms load can change from a street course or an oval or a road course.
The Big Machine Music City Grand Prix has become somewhat notorious for its crashes - the track varies in width from 37 ft. to 80 ft. - and that takes a toll on the audio infrastructure, from the loss of the occasional microphone to destruction of some of the fiber cabling.
Sometimes a car can hit the concrete barriers and move it, and it can cut fiber, says Pope. We've had it happen.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
19/05/2026
Celebrating its ability to quickly adapt to changing requirements, Ross Production Services (RPS) has put its flexible infrastructure to good use, switching one...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Grass Valley has entered into a three-year enterprise agreement with Phoenix Broadcast Solutions as the Singapore-based company expands its live production oper...
19/05/2026
Clear-Com supported Musikal Perahu Kertas, a large-scale musical theater production in Indonesia adapted from the acclaimed novel by Dee Lestari, through the d...
19/05/2026
Actus Digital, a LiveU company, and a leading provider of intelligent media monitoring and broadcast compliance platforms, announced today that METEO CONSULT ha...
19/05/2026
Globecast, a leading provider of managed services for the broadcast and media industry, today announced the completion of a major renovation of its Singapore fa...
19/05/2026
Following a major upgrade to its Connecticut remote production centre with the installation of three 60-fader Argo S consoles in 2023, RPS has switched one of t...
19/05/2026
PlayBox Technology today announced the launch of Celebro Play, a browser-based media orchestration platform designed specifically for broadcast facilities and p...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
LYNX Technik, provider of modular signal processing solutions for broadcast, post, and professional AV will showcase its latest signal processing solutions at B...
19/05/2026
Media Links, a leading developer and manufacturer of IP media transport solutions, has announced the integration of its Xscend platform with Skyline Communicat...
19/05/2026
Collaboration expands regional partner ecosystem as Media Links showcases IP media transport solutions on stand 4M4-4 and alongside Clearcast Asia on stand
Me...
19/05/2026
Company Highlights Labor-Saving Control and Custom Branding Opportunities Designed to Increase Integrator Profitability
LynTec, a leading manufacturer of ele...
19/05/2026
Mago Studio Moves AI Video Beyond Prompts with New Production-Focused Tools
Brie Clayton May 18, 2026
0 Comments
New Capabilities Bring Controllable, ...
19/05/2026
It May be Time to Stop and Take an AI Breather
Brie Clayton May 19, 2026
0 Comments
If the rock you stay on starts to roll, jump clean. Or you'll...
18/05/2026
Despite a bumpy start to the year, the provider of event-production support and ...
18/05/2026
Daktronics has partnered with the University of North Carolina to manufacture and install 11 LED displays totaling more than 10,000 square feet and more than 14...
18/05/2026
CBS LA has announced a multi-year partnership with the Los Angeles Rams, covering exclusive local broadcasts of Rams preseason games, weekly year-round programm...
18/05/2026
Skyline Communications has announced an integration between its DataMiner xOps p...
18/05/2026
eCLUTCH, the hybrid esports platform powered by iKOMG, has announced an expansion of its distribution across Europe, MENA, Africa, and Asia, along with new cont...
18/05/2026
Behind The Mic provides a roundup of recent news regarding on-air talent, includ...
18/05/2026
With 22 games this season, the production team looks forward to tweaking and enhancing the coverage
After 8,660 days off the air, the WNBA returned to NBC yest...
18/05/2026
(L-R) Midori Francis and Natalie Erika James attend the Saccharine premiere during the 2026 Sundance Film Festival at The Ray Theatre on January 22, 2026, in ...
18/05/2026
Last night, the Spotify Podcast Awards in Mexico returned to the country's capital. Now in its second year, the evening honors creators whose voices are hel...
18/05/2026
ZEN-Core synth goes mobile
Roland's powerful ZEN-Core software synthesizer has just been introduced to the iPad, offering a convenient entry point into ...
18/05/2026
Versatile new limiter plug-in announced
Based in Sheffield, UK, fedDSP offer a range of plug-ins that span the music production, live sound and high-end med...
18/05/2026
A new use for convolution?
Viiri Audio's debut plug-in aims to do something a little different with convolution processing, allowing users to adjust all...
18/05/2026
Delta Goodrem shines for SBS as more than 3.27 million Australians tune in for E...
18/05/2026
The Australian Defence Force uses L3Harris T4 and T7 robots for explosive ordnan...
18/05/2026
Continued investment across Europe and Germany is expanding local teams and improving access to stock, regional expertise, and specialist broadcast support.
CV...
18/05/2026
Agentic AI inference at one-tenth the cost per token with NVIDIA Vera Rubin NVL7...
18/05/2026
18 May 2026
Dubai and New York, May 18, 2026 - VEON Ltd. (NASDAQ: VEON), a glob...
18/05/2026
Monday 18 May 2026
Sky News offers ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes for just...
18/05/2026
Comscore March 2026 Consumer AI Chatbot Usage Rankings Show Claude Gaining Share OpenAI's ChatGPT maintains lead while Anthropic's Claude continues to c...
17/05/2026
Delta Goodrem's Eurovision Eclipse marks end of a stellar run
17 May, 2026
Media releases
Bulgaria wins Eurovision 2026
Relive every spellbinding mome...
17/05/2026
Back to All News
Oasis Premieres on Netflix June 19
Entertainment
17 May 2026
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Summer, sunshine, the beach, parties. T...
16/05/2026
Helps to deliver a clean, balanced midrange
Developed alongside Newfangled Audio, the latest plug-in in Eventide's software collection has been designed...
16/05/2026
Brings onboard stem rendering to RANE System One
Engine DJ have just released Engine DJ 5.0, a free update for their Engine DJ OS embedded hardware and Engi...
16/05/2026
Boris FX Continuum Pairs AI Precision and Advanced Creative Controls
Jessie Electa Petrov May 16, 2026
0 Comments
The 2026.5 release adds automatic de...
16/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
16/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
Music City Is Set To Make Some Real Noise With IndyCar Street Race Big Machine Music City Grand Prix roars into Nashville with lots of mics and music By Dan Daley, Audio Editor 
