The $125 million renovation to the Jacobs Music Center in San Diego honors the facility’s origins – the historic 1929 Fox Theatre – while adding significant modern upgrades to enhance the acoustics and provide exceptional programming flexibility.

Included in the renovation are a reshaped seating area with improved universal access and better sightlines, reconfigured stage and a choral terrace added behind the orchestra; total seating capacity is 1,831. Backstage space was expanded, and audience amenities upgraded.

Wenger Corporation’s significant involvement included rigging an acoustic canopy and providing motorized acoustic curtains, utilizing a custom J.R. Clancy controls solution operating on Vantis ^™ hardware. Wenger also supplied rigging for projection screens, speakers, stage lighting and the hall’s five chandeliers.

Altogether, Wenger successfully coordinated rigging through more than 75 openings precisely positioned within the historic plaster ceiling. 

The acoustic canopy consists of 20 custom-designed, acoustically reflective composite FRP panels weighing between 300lb. and 675lb. (136kg and 306kg). Requiring multiple hoists each, the 15 upstage-most panels can be precisely and independently adjusted in three dimensions – height, tilt (upstage/downstage) and roll (stage left/stage right). The five downstage panels can be raised and lowered at their fixed orientation.

“This canopy is the most sophisticated we’ve ever designed,” comments Paul Scarbrough, Principal with Akustiks. “It gives us extraordinary flexibility to fine-tune what the musicians hear onstage and the sound energy projected out into the house.”

Together with the canopy, another acoustical element is crucial for expanding the hall’s programming versatility: variable acoustic curtains rigged in multiple locations – behind the stage and along the hall’s sides and rear.

Made from heavy velour with 100% fullness, these motorized curtains are predominantly concealed behind decorative, acoustically transparent woven wire screens designed to highlight finer details of the hall’s interior while balancing its heavier architectural components.

To operate the myriad equipment throughout Jacobs Music Center, including the acoustic curtains and canopy, projection screens, speakers and lighting, Wenger programmed a custom motion controls solution utilizing their J.R. Clancy Vantis line of consoles; more than 160 machines are controlled. 

The fully tailored system, intuitive for up to two operators managing complex production elements, enables a high degree of customization and provides a streamlined, user-friendly operation. The Vantis implementation features both desktop and mobile units.