Walk in music source?

[Ryan Gallagher]

We maintain ASCAP/BMI mostly for the reasoning that our live shows demand walkin music... and as a side bonus I get to play music ahead of movies too. But yes, in the US, technically you need a public playback/performance license to cover your music selection, unless you subscribe to a service that rolls that licensing into the cost and takes care of it for you.

The spotify adjacent service I was referring to is "Soundtrack", and may not actually be Spotify owned, but is partnered/endorsed by spotify.

https://www.soundtrack.io/

There are some other service like "SoundMachine" that at least claim to support importing playlists from spotify if you are already heavily curated on spotify. Track availability may not be perfect match.

https://sound-machine.com/spotify-business

Technically Spotify player itself is not for this use case, it is officially against the app TOS to use it that way regardless of what licenses you maintain. But we always end up painted into a corner because EVERY tour these days simply wants to hand you a Spotify playlist link and seems blissfully ignorant of that fact.

[Scott Norwood]

I always thought that it was weird that Dolby processors lack balanced inputs for non-sync playback. It would make setting up a common music source in a multiplex much easier, with a simple balanced distribution amp. Everywhere that I worked that had an unbalanced distro amp had hum or buzz problems (which may have been more of an installation issue, but, still, one that could have easily been solved with balanced inputs).

My own preference is to have a separate CD player (or other music playback device) for each screen, since it allows different music selections based upon the films being screened. This only seems to happen in small (2-3 screen) venues. Perhaps understandably, no one os buying 20x CD players for a 20-screen multiplex.

[Steve Guttag]

Scott, Cinema was the last bastion of professional unbalanced analog audio (other than instruments). Our buss levels are -8.2dBu (300mV) and unbalanced. For Dolby, that carried all of the way up until the CP650, for Dolby...the last film processor. As for Non-Sync...when I started in cinema...there were 8-track players, cassette players, then CD players...etc. In other words, they were consumer unbalanced...so the Non-Sync inputs being consumer friendly made sense. If you had a distribution amp, it should have had an isolation transformer on every output...so it is a differential transmission line. The output transformers should have been relatively low-impedance. You shouldn't have gotten hum unless things were set up wrong. Now, if someone grounded the screen system to the distribution chassis (thwarting the transformer isolation), that's on the installer.

Even if they had balanced inputs, if you tie all of those grounds together from the disparate racks and the distribution amplifier, you are going to create a ground loop. Then there is the CP500 which took a novel approach to grounding...they floated their ground with a resistor. If you jumped the signal ground to the chassis ground you'd eliminate a hum.

[Scott Norwood]

I can believe that this was an installation problem. I'm told that it was common to basically every 1990s General Cinema build, so obviously something was specified wrong there.

[Mike Blakesley]

I have a few 20-minute DCPs of random music that I play ahead of our ad package. Hardly anybody hears it though, because people generally don't come in until after the ads start. So for that reason I've never felt much need to try to license that music. I'm pretty certain that the cost of such a license would make me just stop playing it.

The true main function of the music is for me to verify easily that our server and sound system are working properly.

[Josh Jones]

Really? Could you point me to one, please?

Anything I've managed to find is some kind of a cd player with a usb port on the front that you can plug a flash drive into. Which ain't the answer because who needs a flash drive sticking out of the front of your sound rack that's guaranteed to get broken off.

I've tried to find a self-contained rackmount mp3 player (not a cd player) that has its own internal storage and I've never managed to find one.

Denon and Marantz used to have several models we used for installed sound and aircheck recording. Many of them are discontinued now, but are available on ebay for much less than they were new. The later ones had SD card support, which should work for you. The Denon DN-300 and DN-500 both have multiple versions, some with CD mechs in them, but do have SD card support. They also made a small player only, the DN-F300. I think most of them have a random mode as well. Just search ebay. An older pro model is going to likely outlast some of the modern dj junk.

[Ryan Gallagher]

If you don’t mind the same music package(s) every time, making a DCP as Mike has is definitely the most direct and automatable route. That approach hinges on the visuals being something you control, unless you have a silent adroll via alt source, no reason the alt video and DCP audio can’t roll concurrently.

Even if there was occasional audio on the Alt source, could automate the fades and source switching if one was really motivated and the material was consistent.

[Carsten Kurz]

I guess distribution was a thing when players were expensive or difficult to handle. Now you can have cheap MP3 players with thousands of songs at the cost of a few dollars in each rack. We use a simple PC running iTunes (it has multiple functions beyond music), we can control it through Wifi with the standard remote app from our phones. Staff is also enabled and allowed to do that. Which also makes it easy for special events, birthdays, engagements, etc. to play special music from the auditorium. Nowadays I wouldn't even want a rack player, eats too much space, as they can be so small. An old iPod or iPhone donated by your younger relatives is all you need. Running Spotify on an old smartphone is another option.

As for licensing, every cinema operator in Germany has a contract with GEMA for film soundtrack licensing (GEMA is the German SESAC/ASCAP/BMI equivalent), and that contract covers walkin music in a convenient inexpensive package.

[Steve Guttag]

I don't know many people that would want a separate player for all auditoriums (too much to keep up with). In our Q-SYS theatres, one source covers them all. We always provide for having a local Non-Sync source as well for special events.

[Frank Cox]

I don't know many people that would want a separate player for all auditoriums

So you can match the music to the movie that's playing. For example, I am playing some Big Band music (Glenn Miller, Count Basie, etc.) with my Downton Abbey this week. If I was playing a horror movie I might be playing Nine Inch Nails and Slayer.

[Ryan Gallagher]

So you can match the music to the movie that's playing. For example, I am playing some Big Band music (Glenn Miller, Count Basie, etc.) with my Downton Abbey this week. If I was playing a horror movie I might be playing Nine Inch Nails and Slayer.

I think that is a more common need for a university/museum/rep/art-house/single-screen than any chain cinema. We certainly do it, two screens, but mixed use classics rep house. But we are way beyond using physical media players. We still have them cause live events might on occasion provide a disc, but that is really in the live audio system and not the film setup. Our Blu-Ray player can play music if needed too.

[Frank Cox]

So another example of chain cinemas taking the showmanship out of the movie theatre experience.

[Ryan Gallagher]

So another example of chain cinemas taking the showmanship out of the movie theatre experience.

I think that fun started dying as soon as automation took hold and you stopped having an operator per screen. When you have a dedicated booth and dedicated person, it's much easier to add per event flare such as that.

I've always been a back of house technical type person, interact with the audience very little and worked in fully FOH staffed venues, but even that is in contrast to what many past operators used to be, very front facing, owning the business, greeting patrons at the door etc etc. If you are still an owner operator single screen venue, enjoy the perks, do all the things, keep the torch lit for everyone else as long as you can?