Digico

I want to take you back about 22 years to when digital mixers first started arriving in Africa. And I remember the fear because here power is not always constant. And so the big concern was what happens when the power goes? With a digital mixer, people were terrified they would lose all their settings. in an instant, a whole show worth of work gone. And believe me, this has happened to me not once or twice, and not because of power, but because I basically pressed the wrong button. But we live and learn. So a lot of the old-school engineers wanted nothing to do with digital. They stayed loyal to their analog mixers. And honestly, it was not just about power. It was was a massive culture shift. I used to have a big analog mixer and racks of outboard gear, my compressors, my effects, and all of it I could see and touch. And now they were telling me all of that now lived inside one box. And I'll be honest with you, when I first moved from analog to digital It— I did not like it. It just did not sound just right to me. Then one of my mentors said something that stuck with me. He told me, in digital, you have to be accurate to get the sound you want. In analog, the tolerances are bigger, smoother. When you adjust, uh, basically a compressor threshold. There is forgiveness to it, a gentle range. But with digital algorithms, it is sharper. You are right or you are wrong, right or wrong. It is, it is the same with effects like reverbs. The cheaper the digital mixer, the lower the quality of the reverb, and the harder it is to get the right balance between the original signal, like a lead vocal and the reverb level to get that right blend. That changed how I approached the mixer. I stopped expecting digital mixers to basically behave like analog, and I started learning to be precise. And once I did that, a whole new world basically opened up for me. And now, as the technology and computer processing power keeps growing, digital mixers are starting to sound like analog. It is amazing to be part of the generation that is basically going to see the evolution in real life. Here's what I came to understand: not all digital mixers are the same. The real difference is the quality of the processing inside them, the algorithms each company writes for their compressors, their EQs, their effects. I would spend time at Gearhouse in their warehouse in South Africa testing different brands of digital mixers side by side, comparing their built-in compressors against analog compressors, listening to which mixers simply responded the best. And over the years, working on international shows, I've often had more than 2 different brands of mixers at front of house, setting them up, basically testing them, getting them ready for the visiting touring engineers. Because the brand is usually specified by the artists, doing that, you get to hear the different voicing, the different character of each mixer. And one brand that kept standing out, the brand is Digico. Digico is a British company founded in 2002 in England, built on the foundations of the older console maker called Soundtraxx that went all the way back to the early 1980s. Their first mixer, the The D5 Live launched in 2002. By 2008, they introduced their SD series, and today their Quantum range sits right at the top of the live sound space. What makes DiGiCo special is not one single thing. It is the sound of their processing, the power and flexibility of the platform, and the trust the industry basically places on them. DiGiCo is one of the most requested mixers on technical riders anywhere in the world. When Beyoncé and Jay-Z toured, the team ran multiple DiGiCo SD7 mixers. Their engineer said plainly that DiGiCos were the only consoles that could do that show. And that is exactly why, in his words, it is, it is basically number 1 on all the riders. Adele's tour ran on DiGiCo SD7s at front of house and also on monitors. Taylor Swift's front of house has been mixed on DiGiCo, and across the touring world it is the same story. Venue managers will basically tell you that you very rarely get a rider or a tour that does not ask for a DiGiCo mixer. These are the biggest shows on earth. And they basically choose DiGiCo. So here's why I recommend DiGiCo for Africa. When you learn a platform this widely used, you are not just learning a mixer, you are learning a skill that travels. Understand DiGiCo here in Africa and you can walk into a venue almost anywhere in the world and work. Because that platform will be there. And if you are in the business of live events, investing in DiGiCo protects your investment because almost any engineer from any part of the world will know how to work on it. Your gear never sits idle for lack of someone who can also use it. That is exactly why whenever I work anywhere in Africa, DiGiCo is the brand I request. My whole workflow is built around it because I know I'm more likely to find it. You just need to understand the workflow to get the most from it because it has one of the most flexible and open architecture in live sound, capable of some really complex configurations. You are only considered a professional when you use professional tools. I'm Rumembah. Thanks for watching.