Oct 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Sarah Benzuly

George Michael performing

George Michael's stop in San Diego, Calif. — the first show in the artist's six-week final leg of the 25 Live tour — was his first live performance in North America in 17 years. On board to celebrate Michael's return to the other side of the pond were monitor engineer Steve May (replacing former monitor engineer/audio consultant Andy “Baggy” Robinson, who was on paternity leave) and front-of-house engineer Gary Bradshaw mixing on a DiGiCo D5; Simon Hall and Steve May mixed monitors on a DiGiCo D5 and D5T for Michael and the band, which included drums, percussion, a bassist, sax/keyboard player and three guitarists on the stage's top tier; below them were two keyboard players and six backing vocalists — all on Sennheiser SKM 5200 wireless handhelds with Neumann KK 104 S capsules.

The tour also brought 18 channels of Evolution EW 300 G2 personal wireless monitors with multiple receiver packs. Full-range EW 572 G2 wireless guitar systems were used on two of the guitar players and additional wireless packs were used with e 904 clip-on mics on the congas when they moved downstage for parts of the show.

Eighth Day Sound provided racks and stacks; Wigwam Acoustics (UK) spec'd the rest of the gear.

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