This summer, the Montreux Jazz Festival celebrated its 60th edition, while Meyer Sound marked 40 years as the festival’s Global Official Sound Partner—a dual milestone the two organizations have dubbed 60/40: sixty editions of the festival and forty years of collaboration.
From July 3 to 18, the festival welcomed more than 250,000 attendees across more than 700 concerts and events held on the shores of Lake Geneva in Montreux, Switzerland. The newly renovated Montreux Music & Convention Centre hosted the festival’s two main venues: the 4,000-seat Auditorium Stravinski and the 2,000-capacity Montreux Jazz Lab. Both stages featured performances by artists including Sting, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Van Morrison and Marcus Miller, alongside emerging names such as Tyla, Conan Gray and PinkPantheress.
The 60/40 anniversary also coincided with one of the largest technical deployments in the history of this partnership: more than 700 loudspeakers installed across the festival’s 12 official stages, as well as bars, VIP areas and sponsor activations.
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One of the festival’s highlights was the debut of TIGRA, Meyer Sound’s new line array system, following its global festival premiere at Roskilde Festival earlier in the summer. The audio systems were supplied and integrated by Skynight, the Swiss rental company and the festival’s long-standing production partner.
PANTHER and a center-stage production at the Auditorium Stravinski
The Auditorium Stravinski featured a main system based on the PANTHER line array and 2100-LFC low-frequency control elements. Opening night, however, presented a unique challenge: British singer Raye performed a two-hour concert on a rotating stage built in the center of the auditorium, surrounded by the audience and backed by a 22-piece ensemble, with Matthias Garrick serving as front-of-house engineer.
This production required a dedicated system design centered around PANTHER-M, complemented by TIGRA as fill speakers alongside LEOPARD, LINA, ULTRA-X80 loudspeakers, as well as 2100-LFC and 900-LFC low-frequency control elements, all configured to focus sound coverage on the central stage. The performance also featured surprise appearances by Mark Ronson and Alicia Keys, making it one of the most memorable moments in the festival’s recent history.
Preparing the production required 36 hours of continuous load-in, with multiple crews working in shifts, and by the following day the venue had already been restored to its standard configuration for the remainder of the festival programme.
It was one of those moments that only happen at Montreux. This festival aims to create those kinds of experiences—those moments that truly amaze the audience. That’s what makes working here so exciting, even when it presents major challenges. From day one, every department brought their A game to make that first show happen and to maintain the high standards Montreux is known for throughout the rest of the festival, says Andy Davies, Meyer Sound’s Senior Director of Product Management, who was onsite during the festival’s two-week run.
TIGRA debuts at the Montreux Jazz Lab
At the Montreux Jazz Lab, TIGRA served as the main system, supported by 2100-LFC low-frequency control elements. "TIGRA is mid-sized in terms of format and weight, but delivers the sound of a large-format system", explains Martin Reich, the festival’s Sound Coordinator and Resident Engineer. "We now have a large-format sonic signature in the Jazz Lab, where we previously had to use smaller systems because of weight restrictions".
Visiting engineers responded very positively to the new system. London-based front-of-house engineer Femi Bello, who mixed several artists during the festival, highlighted its linearity. "Whether the singer performs quietly or at full power, the system reproduces exactly what comes from the mixing console. The balance is perfect".
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Frank Demaret, the Jazz Lab’s FOH engineer, shared the same view: "Engineers arrive, listen to the system and immediately say, 'It sounds great'. They may make a few minor adjustments, but I’ve never seen anyone say they need to rebuild the entire mix".
For Andy Davies, one of the most significant achievements was the seamless integration of TIGRA with the rest of the Meyer Sound family. "We walked through the Stravinski listening to TIGRA operating as center fills for the main PANTHER arrays, and you simply couldn’t hear where one ended and the other began. These loudspeakers form a single family that can be combined in many different ways". In addition, Nebra software enabled multiple generations of Meyer Sound processing technology to be managed from a single platform, integrating legacy RMServer and Galileo GALAXY Network Platform systems with TIGRA’s onboard GEN-1 processing.
A common foundation for creativity
Consistent sound quality across all stages was one of the festival’s defining strengths. "It’s extremely reassuring to have a consistent sonic signature throughout the venue", says Martin Reich. "We trust the loudspeaker system because we know exactly how it should sound when everything is working correctly".
That consistency also translates into greater creative freedom for visiting engineers. "We give them a blank canvas so they can paint with their own colours. The fact that one engineer cuts a particular frequency range one night while another boosts the same range the next proves we achieved exactly what we were aiming for. Around 75% of the engineers don’t touch the EQ at all".
Throughout the festival, a Meyer Sound technical team remained onsite, encouraging knowledge sharing between highly experienced professionals and the next generation of engineers. "There’s an incredible opportunity to pass on expertise here", says Davies. "It’s a fantastic place for young engineers".
Martin Reich agrees: "It’s incredibly rewarding to see ideas we discussed eventually become real products. Working so closely with the development team is also very inspiring for the audio engineers managing the day-to-day operation across all the festival stages".
Despite the introduction of new systems, the complete renovation of the venue, changes to backstage areas and the exceptional complexity of the opening-night production, Davies sums up the partnership’s fortieth year with a simple statement: "No surprises. Just great experiences and great shows".
Beyond Montreux
As the Montreux Jazz Festival continues to expand into international markets including China, South Africa and Miami, Meyer Sound continues to evolve alongside it.
"The Miami organizing team told us that Meyer Sound had brought the sound of Montreux to their stage", says Davies. "Nobody asked us to do that—it simply happened. And that's exactly our goal: not only to preserve the festival's sonic identity, but to ensure it can be faithfully reproduced anywhere in the world".
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Festival CEO Mathieu Jaton emphasizes that the artist experience and the audience experience are inseparable, and that both begin with sound. "Our relationship with Meyer Sound is built on that shared conviction. It has endured for four decades because it has never stopped evolving. As the festival reaches new audiences, Meyer Sound evolves alongside us, and that continuity is fundamental to everything we are building".
For her part, Meyer Sound co-founder Helen Meyer believes the 60/40 anniversary represents far more than the passage of time.
Forty years ago, Claude Nobs asked us to help create something that had scarcely existed before: a festival where sound would be held to the same standard of excellence as the music itself. What moves me most when I look back is seeing how that idea has continued to grow. Every year we discover something new at Montreux. And that only happens when two organizations share the same values for such a long time.
