When you think of central Wisconsin, recreation readily comes to mind. Fresh air, hiking, camping out in the green forests and rolling hills, boating on the many beautiful lakes that dot the landscape.

One form of recreation that you might not think of right away is gaming. But located near Bowler, Wis. - in the east-central part of the state - is what they like to call, “the friendliest, classiest casino in Wisconsin.” It’s the Mohican North Star Casino, operated by the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of the Mohican Indians.

The casino boasts more than 1,000 slot machines, 18 blackjack tables - and its latest addition: a 750-seat entertainment facility, named the Indus Room. The new facility is used regularly for bingo, trade shows, meeting, banquets - and the casino brings in national entertainment an average of twice a month. Patrons don’t have to go all the way to Las Vegas to see the stars - the Mohican North Star brings them to central Wisconsin.

When the new facility was being planned, the casino’s management put in a call to Dave’s Recording Studio & Sound Company of nearby Manitowoc. Owner Dave Scroggins had produced many shows for the casino over the past four years prior to the expansion and is well-known in Wisconsin for his consistent high quality service and audio expertise.

“It was an interesting project,” Scroggins said. “The structure that serves as the entertainment facility is unique. By day it’s a bingo/meeting/banquet facility, and for shows, it’s almost magically transformed into
a first-class ‘show room.’”

The 90x150-foot facility is what is a “Sprung Instant Structure.” It consists of an aluminum-frame dome structure with a stretched, thick vinyl skin covering the frame to form both the outside walls and the roof. Scroggins was to provide a front-of-the-house system that would meeting the demands of performing artists and produce smooth even coverage to all seats in the venue. It had to be of high quality to be musically accurate, plus it needed to provide the necessary SPL and frequency response requirements demanded by the artists’ own technical people.

Because seating begins just five feet from the front edge of the stage, the sound had to cover 180 degrees horizontally without blocking any sight lines. “We had to fly the system from ground-supported towers to provide the necessary coverage but not block sight lines to and from the stage,” Scroggins said.

For the mid-high range, Scroggins opted for six BAG END Crystal high-output speaker systems flown from trusses above the front of the stage, three stage-left and three stage-right. They are complemented with two BAG END TA6000 speaker systems per side - flown under the Crystal arrays - to act as near fill speakers.
A third TA6000 provides mono center fill.

Each Time-Aligned Crystal system contains a pair of 12-inch woofers and a 1.4-inch exit titanium compression driver with waveguide. Those speakers cover the 80 Hz to 18 kHz range.

The compact, Time-Aligned TA6000s are comprised of two 6.5-inch woofers and a 1-inch exit compression driver with horn, covering 90 Hz to 20 KHz, that weigh only 27 lbs. each and work excellently as fill speakers.

Scroggins came up with a unique method to simplify flying the arrays. The Crystals are constructed in a trapezoidal design - specifically for flying. Scroggins designed aluminum plates in the shape of the caps of three arrayed enclosures. He bolted the cabinets to the plates at the bottom and top of each array, thus creating very easy to handle and very stable arrays.

To cover the bass range, Scroggins selected 12 BAG END D12-E systems, each containing two 12-inch subwoofers. The 24 subwoofer speakers are controlled by an ELF - or Extended Low Frequency - signal processor that provides a bass signal down to 8 Hz. The subs are hidden below the front facade of the stage.

The system also includes a number of BAG END TA2000s and TA1200s, which function as monitors and drum fill.

“The system is pretty basic and straight-forward - and does a heck of a job,” Scroggins said. “The only challenge we ran into on the whole project was to make the room acoustically correct. The unique dome shape of the building and the smooth interior wall surfaces created all kinds of sound problems.”

“To dampen reflection, we hung 50 or 60 baffles from the ceiling - actually I’m not even sure of the final number,” he said. “The 4x8-foot thin, foam-covered acoustic baffles are strategically hung in staggered areas across the ceiling to ‘tighten’ the room acoustically."

“After we got the baffles placed, the acoustics of the room improved dramatically and the quality of the sound was incredible,” he said. “We’re happy and they’re happy.”

The Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians has survived centuries of struggle to maintain their identity and pride as a people, now call themselves the Mohican Nation, Stockbridge-Munsee Band. The Tribe originally occupied lands in the area that is now New York State. However, over time, the Tribe was removed westward to its current reservation in east-central Wisconsin, comprised of the townships of Bartelme and Red Springs.

Many of the Tribe’s 1,500 members live on this reservation where its tribal facilities include a library-museum, a health center and a family center. The Tribe operates an RV park, a gas station/convenience store and the Pine Hills Golf Course, which is on reservation land. Every August, the Tribe holds an “Honor Our Veterans Pow-wow” at its Many Trails Campground. The annual pow-wow draws drummers, dancers, traders and spectators from all over the country.

The Mohican North Star Casino is located on the Stockbridge-Munsee reservation, on County Highway “A” between Gresham and Bowler, Wis. The casino’s toll-free telephone number is 1-800-952-0195. Its web site is: www.wisconsingaming.com.

Scroggins Recording Studio and Sound Company is located in Manitowoc, Wis. The telephone number is: 920-683-3218, fax: 920-683-8690. Scroggins’ e-mail address is: djmagic@lakefield.net.