Aalborg Musikkens Hus (House of Music) is a gleaming, futuristic architectural masterpiece, standing prominently on the water in Limfjord in a new cultural district of Aalborg, Denmark’s bustling fourth-largest city and major port.
Opened in March 2014, the building offers a 1300-capacity main concert hall, a 600-capacity recital hall, plus numerous practice rooms and is home to the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra and The Royal Academy of Music Aarhus/Aalborg. A lively and interesting music program offers approximately 300 concerts and live performances a year, including orchestral, choral and classical, as well as acoustic and amplified rock and pop shows. The venue additionally hosts a range of corporate and business events.
The moving lights in the main hall are now all Robe – a combination of T1 Profiles and T1 Fresnels with LEDBeam 350s – the LEDBeams were delivered this year by Robe’s Danish distributor, Light Partner.
Musikkens Hus production director Peter Klokker Iversen and head of lighting Jonas Kjærulff have made all the decisions related to which lights to specify, which started with 12 x Pointes in 2016. They joined the inventory as part of a rock ‘n’ roll package to offer appropriate lighting for the rock and pop gigs.
The T1 Profile investment of 14 fixtures happened in 2019, and this was specifically for providing front and key lighting for whatever action was happening onstage in the main hall.
Silent running was a key here to keep the orchestra happy, together with excellent CRI and overall quality of light. They were also a huge time and effort saver for focusing, and all the techs for many reasons prefer working with the moving lights on the front bar, rather than a motorized bar of static lights!
When they started looking for a wash light, having had such a great experience with the T1 Profiles, it made sense to stay with the same family of lights and purchase the T1 Fresnels, which arrived in 2024.
“The color continuity was a perfect match and once again, the low operational noise was perfect for the orchestral environment,” noted Peter. Of course, the additional T1 features and effects are also very useful and add to the general flexibility at hand for lighting the space.
Before making a new technical investment, Peter and Jonas will look closely at technical riders and at the extras being brought in by different productions, as well as keeping an ear to the ground generally out there in the industry, and a combination of these factors led them to purchase the 40 x LEDBeam 350s.
They assessed several options here for a small LED wash beam, and once again Robe won on quality. The orchestra was also involved in the process and the LEDBeam 350 color matched perfectly with the other Robe fixtures and scored well on the low noise comparison.
While it was also not the cheapest option, this thorough evaluation gave Jonas and Peter the confidence to choose Robe as the best value long-term option. Initially planning to purchase 24 LEDBeam 350s, they were delighted when the budget came through to get the 40 units!
Peter commented that the resale value of Robe products remains high, and when it comes to talking about Robe more generally, Peter is impressed with the reliability: “You definitely get what you pay for, which is a big thing for us and also means that we can be very cost-efficient from a service perspective”.
He thinks that Robe’s new tech is impressive and observes that the company is constantly breaking ground and being properly innovative.
Peter and Jonas visited the Robe factory last summer and appreciated the modern and streamlined production setup that also employs dedicated, highly skilled and motivated people, who give the products a unique hand-crafted touch, right down to the PCB design and manufacture. He also likes the fact that Robe products are proudly and genuinely European-sourced and built.
Naturally, when investing in any brand, strong and consistent service from the local distributor is a linchpin in the whole process, and Peter recognizes Light Partner as a “seriously good and well-run company” offering outstanding support and knowledge. His interaction with the Herning-based sales and technical specialist and “crew behind the crew” dates to the early 1990s when the company first started.
Photos by Louise Stickland