McCune Audio Video Lighting (previously known as Harry McCune Sound Service, McCune Audio Visual and McCune Audio Visual Video) is an American company based in South San Francisco, California, with offices in Monterey and Anaheim. It is one of the oldest and largest audio visual rental and sound services in the U.S. McCune was founded in 1932 by Harry McCune Sr, McCune AVL provides audio, lighting and high-definition video services to events as varied as outdoor festivals such as the Monterey Jazz Festival, and the Bohemian Grove, and to arena conferences such as TED.
In December 2017, Atlanta-based Shepard Exposition Services bought McCune.
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History
Harry McCune, Sr. was working days as an auto mechanic. He also liked working on radio equipment, and small audio systems. McCune built a small amplified sound system, and founded McCune Sound Service in 1932. He built several small sound systems before he completed one large enough to handle a large dance band. He would rent out his sound system and personally operate the equipment for $1 on a Friday night. Then McCune would give the equipment rental for free on Saturday night. Harry McCune, began renting sound systems more often to various big bands in the 1930s and 1940s, and with his son, Harry McCune, Jr. (1930-1996), would help radio engineers broadcast the concerts live over AM radio from ballrooms in San Francisco.
In the 1940s, McCune Sound operated out of 10 Brady Street in San Francisco, which was centrally located near the Civic Center. In 1963, McCune adopted the name "Channel X" for its video production services. In the 1960s, McCune operated from 960 Folsom Street in the South of Market (SOMA) area. In 1969, the company moved to 951 Howard Street, and built an audio and video recording studio within the structure. McCune later expanded to both sides of Howard Street. Still expanding, the company moved to a single large building on 2200 Army Street, later named Cesar Chavez Street, before moving to their current location at 101 Utah Avenue in South San Francisco.
McCune Sound has been credited with creating and improving many of the concepts of the modern day live concert performance, and was one of the very first sound companies to provide touring sound systems, beginning in 1965 with Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass and progressing to diverse acts as Andy Williams, Dionne Warwick, The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Steely Dan, John Davidson, Crystal Gayle, and many others. One of the first times that a stage monitor was used for a live concert, the monitor was provided by McCuneSound. The concert was by Judy Garland, at the San Francisco Civic Auditorium. The concert rehearsal was not going well, and Harry McCune Jr. came up with the idea of pointing a stage speaker at Garland. McCune ran to his truck, and drove to the McCune office, grabbed a loud speaker,and brought it back to the concert rehearsal. Mcchine placed the added speaker on the corner of the stage. McCune then took a audio feed off the main system, turned up the mixer and Miss Garland was pleased with the added sound. In the late 1960s music was flourishing in San Francisco, and so was sound design itself, Monterey Pop Festival and, even before that, The Beatles' last-ever live concert performance, held at San Francisco's Candlestick Park, during which the small sound system could not be heard over the screaming of the Beatles fans. Mort Feld mixed the house sound for the Beatles concert that day. In the late 1960s, engineer Dan Healy drew from McCune equipment to amplify the Grateful Dead; Healy said he sometimes blew up electrical circuits trying to get the audio louder.
McCune thrived in the concert market during the early 1970s and 1980s, and even branched out into theatre, supplying equipment for East Coast companies like ProMix and Masque Sound, at the same time creating the famed "wall of sound" for the Grateful Dead, and creating touring systems for Jefferson Airplane, CCR and others.
Employees John Meyer and Bob Cavin created an active speaker system in 1971 known as the JM-3, named for John Meyer. This was a three-way, tri-amped system that enclosed the power amplifiers and all of the integrated electronics associated with the loudspeakers in an external equipment rack with few or no controls, the settings having all been calibrated at the shop. The fully horn-loaded system was used on CCR's final tour. The amplifier enclosure also included preset crossover filters, limiters and equalization. The outside of the amplifier rack was simple: a two-circuit AC power cable connection, XLR connectors for input audio signal, and two 4-pin female twist-lock NEMA L14-30 connectors for carrying the amplified 3-way audio signal to two JM-3 loudspeakers.
Bob Cavin was a pioneer in designing and building consoles, and systems designed and fabricated at McCune were being used on Broadway, with touring acts and at Las Vegas show rooms. Taking these systems out to Broadway was Abe Jacob, who was an early and influential sound designer. Jacob got his start at McCune touring with Peter, Paul and Mary and several other acts. Abe moved to New York and worked on Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita, A Chorus Line, Beatlemania and many other shows using McCune equipment.
Harry McCune Jr. had little desire to grow his manufacturing process beyond the needs of his immediate clientele, which he believed the mass production of his speakers to sell would detract from his core sound rental business. Some McCune employees however saw the future of stage and concert audio, and John Meyer left McCune to form Meyer Sound Laboratories, while Deloria and Bob Cavin formed Apogee Sound.
Former employees
- John Meyer, the founder of Meyer Sound Laboratories
- Bob Cavin
- Ken DeLoria, President and founder of the Petaluma-based Apogee Sound
- Abe Jacob
- Charles Ginsburg, project leader for the first practical video tape recorder
- Mort Feld Sound Mixer and General Manager
Notable events
- The Berkeley Jazz Festival
- Monterey Pop Festival
- Monterey Jazz Festival
- Playboy Jazz Festival
- TED
- Bohemian Grove
- 1984 Democratic National Convention in San Francisco
- XI International AIDS Conference, 1996
- The Beatles final Concert
- Olympic Games, various venues, Los Angeles 1984
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References
External links
- Official website
- AV Universal audio rental services website
Source of article : Wikipedia
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