In 2023, Entertainment - Especially Music - Was a Major Part of Broadcast Sports Mic placement brought fans ever closer to the athletes By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Tuesday, January 9, 2024 - 11:07 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
May you live in interesting times. That hoary and putatively Chinese blessing/curse was no more present than in broadcast-sports audio last year. 2023 was a year in which live entertainment on stadium stages rivaled that on the field, when fans were pulled closer to athletes than ever - thanks to increasingly intimate microphone placements - even given the prospect of games' not getting to air at all as RSNs struggled amid corporate clashes.
At the Intersection of Sports and Music 2023 will be remembered as year in which the connection between sports and entertainment reached new levels. The Super Bowl Halftime Show at State Farm Stadium in February was hailed as the third-most-watched television show in history, with an estimated 118 million people tuning in to see Rihanna - 5 million more viewers than the game itself attracted. But that annual event has become just the highest peak in a mountain range of entertainment increasingly partnered with major sports events.
The Super Bowl LVII Halftime Show featuring Rihanna attracted 5 million more viewers than the game itself.
Rihanna's star power was rivaled by the NBA All-Star Game, where Post Malone performed a medley of hits following the first-ever in-arena NBA All-Star Draft. It was part of a weekend's worth of entertainment and sports events in which Grammy winner Burna Boy, 2023 Grammy Award winner and Oscar-nominated singer/producer Tems, and rapper Rema collectively headlined an Afrobeats-themed NBA All-Star Game halftime show.
The third edition of the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix in downtown Nashville had a soundtrack that featured Florida-Georgia Line's Brian Kelley, Chris Janson, M tley Crue's Vince Neil, Gavin Degraw, and others.
League draft events have also turned into music moments. Less than a week after the Country Music Association's annual CMA Fest extravaganza took over Nashville's NFL Nissan Stadium, the 2023 NHL Draft moved into the Predators' Bridgestone Arena. Between them, it was as though the music never stopped, with the Brothers Osborne, Jo Dee Messina, Kip Moore, Maddie & Tae, Mitchell Tenpenny, and Dierks Bentley picking up where CMA left off. The almost seamless transition between one event and the next underscored sports' transformation into high-concept entertainment, complete with a red carpet.
When I started here about 13 years ago, the draft had already transitioned into an entertainment space, meaning into the arena environment, says Ivan Gottesfeld, EVP, broadcasting, NHL. Before that, drafts were held in ballrooms and spaces like that and were conducted strictly as business meetings. Since then, it has become an entertainment event for many touchpoints, such as league sponsorship, and the markets that we go to in an effort to grow the game.
Taylor Swifts appearances at Kansas City Chiefs games created $122 million in brand-value and added 550,000 followers to the team's social-media accounts.
But the big story for the marriage of music and sports was, of course, Traylor or Tayvis or Swelce, mashup monikers for the budding romance between newly minted billionaire Taylor Swift - her Eras tour boosted the entire U.S. economy by $5.7 billion - and KC Chiefs' Travis Kelce, who may be looking at his third Super Bowl ring this year. Her appearances at two NFL games to watch him play created an equivalent brand-value of $122 million, according to MarketWatch. Further, a study of Instagram, X, and TikTok data tracking the social-media followings of all 32 NFL teams from the beginning of the season found that the Chiefs gained nearly 550,000 new followers across its social-media accounts - a 6.48% increase and nearly double those of the next-highest Miami Dolphins.
More Close-Up Sound On-field and on-player sound also reached new levels last year. For instance, for the 2023 NHL All-Star activities, the audio team deployed wireless lavaliere microphones in the cones that athletes navigate in the skating competition to pick up the unique sound of blades in a tight turn; for the accuracy contest, a pair of shotgun mics in a golf-tee-box configuration captured the explosive impact of the shots.
The Skills competition on Friday affords us the opportunity to try some different things, a kind of Petri dish for different ideas we're trying out, says Dan Buddha Bernstein, lead A1, hockey, ESPN. It's its own kind of X Games or even a gymnastics event trying to mike individual elements that people might hit, like multiple mics in each goal for different kinds of shooting options. It's a test bed for new ideas.
Repartee between MLB outfielders and broadcast announcers has been increasing over the last couple of seasons. What began as a Spring Training experiment became a regular part of the broadcast audio when ESPN made it part of its Sunday Night Baseball sound palette. - and then took talking baseball to the next level.
Miked-up Dodger shortshop Miguel Rojas fielded a hit during on-field interview in Giants game.
ESPN wired two outfielders for sound for some games, with each player wearing a Q5X PlayerMic transmitter and a Countryman B6 microphone element, along with an IFB earpiece developed by the broadcaster and its RF partner, CP Communications. The miked outfielders were able to speak both with the booth announcers and with each other, a multipart conversation more complex than the previous season's single-player exchanges.
Interviews with headset-wearing team managers during the game are now a staple of the broadcast. There were also experiments with integration of soci
Most recent headlines
21/02/2025
On February 19, 2025, Julia Herting, the Site Manager of SGL Carbon in Bonn, signed a declaration of intent, marking an important step in contributing to climat...
21/02/2025
Ken Bedingfield (President, Aerojet Rocketdyne, L3Harris) was joined by state, l...
21/02/2025
Join us at NAB this April and take the fast route to value. Discover how new functionality in BLAM, our end-to-end content supply chain platform, gives you vita...
21/02/2025
Integration Enhances Audience Measurement Capabilities for Mutual Clients Across...
21/02/2025
LAS VEGAS Wisycom has announced that it will debut its BFL2 Portable RF-over-Fiber system to the broadcast market at the 2025 NAB Show between April 5-9 at its ...
21/02/2025
IRVING, Texas Nexstar Media Group has appointed Samantha Osborne Reynolds vice president of political sales. In the new role, Osborne Reynolds is responsible fo...
21/02/2025
How to Make Street Art in Apple Motion
Simon Ubsdell February 21, 2025
0 Comments
How to create a 2D trompe l'oeil street art effect in Apple Moti...
21/02/2025
Clear Life Media Adds Blackmagic Replay For Sports Streaming
Brie Clayton February 21, 2025
0 Comments
Texas production company competes for larger pr...
21/02/2025
LOTR Cinematography: Lighting Techniques Explained
Filip Ne old February 21, 2025
0 Comments
How does lighting shape storytelling in The Lord of the R...
21/02/2025
Redshift for Cinema 4D: The Art of Anisotropic Reflections
Marc Potocnik February 21, 2025
0 Comments
Anisotropic Reflections and Radial Micro Scratch...
21/02/2025
ESPN announced Thursday night that it will no longer broadcast Major League Baseball games starting in 2026 after the network failed to agree to terms for a new...
21/02/2025
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has asked the U.S. Dept. of Justice to closely scrutinize Disney's acquisition of FuboTV, expressing concerns that the d...
21/02/2025
Paul Glasgow also takes on the role of sales and marketing director under strategic changes made by Marquis owners, Dan Technologies Group
By Matthew Corrigan ...
21/02/2025
The Berlusconi-owned media group owns a 29.9 per cent stake in the broadcaster
By Matthew Corrigan
Published: February 21, 2025
The Berlusconi-owned media...
21/02/2025
A new study suggests that the 50th season of Saturday Night Live is proving to be a major financial success for NBCUniversal's Peacock, generating an esti...
21/02/2025
Calrec expands its flexible production model at NAB 2025 with True Control 2.0, ...
21/02/2025
Rossetto Supermarket Ad Campaign Shot on Blackmagic PYXIS 6K
Brie Clayton February 20, 2025
0 Comments
Campaign brings dreamlike visuals to life throu...
21/02/2025
Corbel 3D and Pixel Light Effects' Leap to Simple, Fast File Transfer
Brie Clayton February 20, 2025
0 Comments
The Setting Corbel 3D, located in ...
21/02/2025
Alum TK Johnson Backs Bartees Strange for a Tiny Desk Instant Classic The drummer has been playing with Bartees since 2022, and also appeared on Jimmy Kimmel ...
21/02/2025
Telos Alliance Announces New Features for Omnia Forza FM and Forza HDS at 2025 ...
21/02/2025
2025 SVG GFX Forum Bring Together 250+ Attendees To Forge New Ideas, Discuss Fut...
21/02/2025
ESPN-MLB Rights Deal Will End After 2025 Season as Sides Mutually' Opt Out ...
21/02/2025
ESPN To Stream Alternate Broadcast of Iowa State-Houston Men's College Hoops...
21/02/2025
MLS Kickoff 2025: MLS's Ignacio Garcia Talks New Production Facility, Sunday...
21/02/2025
MLS Kickoff 2025: With Opening Weekend Ahead, NEP Group Ramps Up Production Work...
21/02/2025
Sky acquires highly anticipated suburban-thriller series starring Sarah Snook, A...
21/02/2025
Back to All News
Trailer for When Life Gives You Tangerines' Offers a Glim...
21/02/2025
Back to All News
Netflix Unveils the Premiere Date and First Look of Dome Karuk...
21/02/2025
Back to All News
The Metamorphosis Studio Hosted Aitanas Big Night
Entertainment
21 February 2025
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Download the party ...
21/02/2025
Advanced production switcher technology supports Emirate broadcasters expansion...
21/02/2025
Today, Apple announced Apple Intelligence is coming to Apple Vision Pro in April. With Apple Intelligence for Vision Pro, users will be able to proofread, rewri...
20/02/2025
Ever since Spotify and FC Barcelona forged a first-of-its kind partnership three...
20/02/2025
As Spotify continues to roll out audiobooks to new listeners worldwide, we're committed to providing authors with tools that help them reach those listeners...
20/02/2025
The amount of broadcasters worldwide using artificial intelligence (AI) has more than doubled over the last 12 months, with 25% now employing the technology....
20/02/2025
BOSTON New England sports fans nationwide will now have a new FAST channel bringing them news, insight and live programming covering its major league and colleg...
20/02/2025
MELVILLE, N.Y. Chyron today launched its 2025 Designer of the Year Competition and said the winner will be announced live at the 2025 NAB Show, April 5-9, at th...
20/02/2025
LONDON Sports entertainment platform DAZN said the second season of NFL Game Pass on DAZN saw significant growth, with paid subscribers growing by 23% year-over...
20/02/2025
Stuart Barnes, Yospaces VP international business development, explains the importance of getting stuck in when part of the media tech industry
By Matthew Corr...
20/02/2025
Broadcast techs saw a 25% boost in their pay in 2024, according to annual survey
By Tom Butts
Published: February 20, 2025
Broadcast techs saw a 25% boost...
20/02/2025
WASHINGTON The 2025 NAB Show, April 5-9, at the Las Vegas Convention Center will mark the debut of the Business of Entertainment track developed with The Ankler...
20/02/2025
TYSONS, Va. Tegna Inc. has announced that news veteran Adrienne Roark has been named chief content officer reporting to CEO Mike Steib, effective March 31....
20/02/2025
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. Roku has further expanded its sports content with a new media rights deal with Bassmaster that will make Roku the streaming hub for Bassmaster ...
20/02/2025
WASHINGTON National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) President and CEO Curtis LeGeyt opened The Media Institute's 2025 Communications Forum series with a s...
20/02/2025
The Belonging Co., a Nashville-based church renowned for its dynamic worship experiences and multimedia-rich conferences, tapped DigitalGlue's creative.spac...
20/02/2025
Mediahuis Radio continues its expansion with the completion of a new production facility in Amsterdam. DHD RX2 and DX2 audio mixers connected to XD3 Cores form ...
20/02/2025
At NAB 2025, Calrec is introducing a suite of new interconnected products and updates aiming to help broadcasters meet a variety of challenges. With increased c...
20/02/2025
Keepit, the world's only independent vendor of cloud backup and recovery solutions designed to protect SaaS data, today announced a remarkable year of growt...
20/02/2025
Expanded SMPTE ST 2110 support strengthens lip-sync and latency measurement solutions
Hitomi Broadcast, the market leader in audio/video alignment and latency ...
20/02/2025
LiveU, a leader in live IP-video and remote production solutions, today announced the successful implementation of its comprehensive IP remote production soluti...
In 2023, Entertainment - Especially Music - Was a Major Part of Broadcast Sports Mic placement brought fans ever closer to the athletes By Dan Daley, Audio Editor 
