Turbosound
TurboSound, a prominent name in professional audio, pioneers cutting-edge sound reinforcement solutions. Trusted by top-tier events and venues globally, TurboSound's speakers deliver exceptional audio experiences. With a focus on innovation and precision, TurboSound sets the stage for immersive and unparalleled sound quality in diverse audio environments.
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The Turbosound story unofficially begins when Tony Andrews was one of the first to seriously question the accepted thinking that live music could never sound the way a band and its record producer had heard it. And with a little divine inspiration, egged on partly by the heady exploratory air of the Glastonbury Free Festivals (later to become major Turbosound showcases) he set out to prove the theory wrong. Sound reinforcement designers of the day had a seemingly impossible challenge: to produce excellent sound quality with maximum projection, in the smallest possible enclosure.
Tony Andrews’ involvement with the Glastonbury Festival led to the development of the Festival System, which consisted of separate bass, mid, and HF cabinets.
It already contained the second generation of the “Turbo” phase device, the distinctive, slender missile nose-cone shaped contrivances mounted directly in front of the midrange cone drivers and projecting almost the full length of the enclosing horn.
The first Turbo phase device goes back to 1973 when it was used with 12-inch drivers, and at that time the possibilities of anything other than a cardboard tube device had not been explored.1973The concept was to build a system like a multi-cell horn but with every cell powered. The discovery that the system proved too loud for smaller gigs prompted the decision to go into PA manufacturing that eventually led to the TMS-3, with that early Turbo phase device evolving into the TMS-3’s 10- inch midrange.
By 1978 – which is when the official story begins – Tony Andrews had met Tim Isaac and joined forces with John Newsham, a respected sound engineer, to form Turbosound. They began designing, building and renting out their innovative speaker systems.
New concepts were on the drawing board, and the new Turbosound system – codenamed UHQ for Ultra High-Q – which was to take the world by storm was in some ways a step forward to a more directional, more efficient, and better sounding box, but also, conceptually, a step back to the modular design of the mid 70s Festival System – the system with which the Turbosound story had begun.
Roger Waters was asked in an interview after the last of Pink Floyd’s Wall concerts in the early 1980s if he would ever perform The Wall again. His reply was ‘No, never – unless the Berlin Wall came down…’ Well, of course it did, and the historic concert was the very first outing for Turbosound’s prototype UHQ system, or FLASHLIGHT as it was then known because of its extremely narrow directivity and astonishing projection.
FLASHLIGHT, partly through Turbosound’s symbiotic relationship with Britannia Row Productions, rapidly evolved into the system which was used for the tours of Depeche Mode, Dire Straits, Cliff Richard, Simply Red, The Cure, Oasis, Robbie Williams, Peter Gabriel, and Pink Floyd.
Such was Turbosound’s international success that the TMS-3 was widely copied, hijacking a patented product design down to the last detail. In Canada, a successful legal case resulted in a local company’s TMS- 3 copies being publicly chain sawed.1980s1980sThe TSE series of loudspeakers was launched soon after. Basically a split TMS-4, the TSE-111 and TSE-118 combination became a popular rental company alternative to the TMS-4 due to the boxes’ easier portability and because the split format allowed the mid/high to be pole mounted and angled down with the “pitchfork” flying yoke.
It was in 1984 that, as the prelude to many prestigious installations to follow, Turbosound Inc’s persistence paid off when Nashville’s Grand Ole Oprey decided to ring the changes with a new off -the-shelf sound system that would aim to extend the low frequency capabilities, and get more clarity and punch, than the original system’s honky “horn sound”. As country artists began to require more inputs and better fidelity, the Oprey wanted a system that would give them the sound they needed well into the future. The tightly-arced speaker cluster consisted of nine TMS-1s, seven TMS- 4s and two custom mid/highs for balcony coverage, and gave them a system that would keep abreast of the rapidly evolving country music.
The event exposed Turbosound to over 50 major touring artists, extremely large audiences – and the elements. In fact the system was left outdoors for the entire summer, come rain or shine, a real test of the TMS-3’s all-weather durability. As a direct result, a large TMS-3 system was used in the highly successful 1983 tour of Styx. The press widely praised the TMS-3 system for its sound quality. Turbosound was now well on the way to becoming a dominant force in the US sound reinforcement industry.
It was with the formation of the Edge Technology Group (or EdgeTech), that partnered Turbosound with BSS Audio in 1986 and spawned Precision Devices a year later, that the possibility to have some measure of meaningful influence on the quality of the signal chain became a reality : Precision Devices, working directly with Turbosound’s designers to exclusively manufacture high-spec drive units to Turbosound’s exacting standards and later to become a noted OEM supplier; BSS Audio’s highly regarded crossovers and loudspeaker management systems designed by ex-Midas designers Stan Gould and Chas Brooke; and the distinctive blue Turbosound loudspeaker brand under MD Alan Wick.1986By the time of the first EdgeTech Agent Convention in 1986, Turbosound had expanded the product range in a linear fashion that fully exploited the now patented 10-inch TurboMid device, and notched up an impressive array of key installations both in the UK and abroad.
In a few short years, the TMS-3 had been confirmed as the world’s largest-selling modular full range PA cabinet, with over 3,000 units in use and sizeable systems in all the big rental houses around the globe. Its rapid and sustained export sales growth was responsible for Turbosound’s first Queen’s Award for Export Achievement in 1987 – the first professional loudspeaker manufacturer in the UK ever to be granted this prestigious accolade – and the only company in its field ever to repeat this feat in 1997. Expo ’88 in Brisbane, Australia, offered more variety than all the countless special events that Turbosound had been involved with up to that time. With five sound reinforcement sites and one mobile system, the six month event also proved a challenge for the Queensland Turbosound dealer who fielded numerous systems of TMS-3/TSW-124, TMS-4s, and TSE clusters – all of which worked nonstop, 7 days a week for half a year.
In 2007 the market was looking for a medium scale Turbosound system that would be accessible to local and regional rental companies, and it had become clear that by splitting a POLYHORN and slotting a Dendritic device in between, it was possible to design a better line array – with a choice of controllable wide or medium horizontal dispersion – that sounded as good as a point source. So while Turbosound came late to the line array party, the POLYHORN and Dendritic devices contributed technical advancements that enabled FLEX ARRAY to take off in a big way, with the acoustics technology behind it earning the company a third Queen’s Award, this time for Innovation, in 2012.
In 2008 Turbosound brought peformance and style to a host of fixed installations ranging from cafés, wine bars and restaurants, to themed environments, leisure facilities and retail outlets in a range of versatile and elegantly styled injection-moulded loudspeakers and discreet high 26 performance ceiling speakers. The IMPACT series offered great audio performance, modern styling, legendary Turbosound voicing and long-term dependability. The integral 70 / 100 V line transformers and included wall mount brackets made the IMPACT series exceptionally easy to install and adaptable to large and small projects, together with the versatile four channel RACKDP-50 amplifier.
In 2013 FLEXARRAY and a host of other Turbosound installed loudspeaker products from the TCS and NuQ ranges were chosen for the single largest, and arguably the most exclusive, nightclub in the world.2013In 2013 FLEXARRAY and a host of other Turbosound installed loudspeaker products from the TCS and NuQ ranges were chosen for the single largest, and arguably the most exclusive, nightclub in the world. Hakkasan, which occupies five entire levels of the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, is without exception the biggest nightclub installation Turbosound has ever been involved in, and features a total of some 450 loudspeakers, amplifiers and loudspeaker management systems. Of course these kinds of achievements do not go unnoticed, and already there are proposals under way in other markets that will seek to emulate this extraordinary feat.
Already proving itself on a host of festivals and tours from Alanis Morissette and Emile Sande to Young Voices, FLASHLINE is poised to once again push the barriers of live sound reinforcement. Turbosound’s MILAN series exploded on to the MI scene in 2012. It combined incredible performance with ultimate convenience for musicians, DJs and AV applications in a range of stylish portable powered loudspeakers with an unmistakable sound signature enhanced by the industry’s most sophisticated DSP. Featuring high efficiency Class D amplifiers, on-board Klark Teknik DSP with intelligent limiting, two-channel mixer with mic and line inputs, comprehensive EQ and frequency shaping, the MILAN series demonstrated Turbosound’s innovation in a much wider market. The Turbosound range of loudspeaker products, control electronics and amplified systems has in common one single purpose - to provide the best solution for every application.