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“Gleeful” New Reality Show Shines Spotlight on API lunchbox

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Los Angeles, California – June 2011:
API's lunchbox® is ready for its close-up. The ever-popular six-slot rack has earned a prime role on the new reality series titled The Glee Project, which follows hopeful contestants as they try to win a recurring role on the musical TV series Glee. While many who initially auditioned did not make it to the recording stage, the lunchbox (filled with API modules) was a shoe-in all along.

"When I was looking for gear for the new show I tried a couple other systems and some of the music got a little fuzzy and cloudy," said Kris Pooley, a musical director for live tours and the music producer for The Glee Project. "The API gear gave me all the punch I needed and worked especially well on vocals." Pooley's lunchbox was filled with API 512c mic pres, 550A equalizers and 527 compressors.

According to Pooley, when Glee creators and executive producers Ryan Murphy and Dante Di Loreto started the search for a new face (and voice) for Glee, they realized that the casting process would provide a great opportunity for a reality program. Out of more than 40,000 people who initially auditioned via online submissions last year, twelve were picked as finalists to officially compete for the prized role and appear on the reality series. In the process, contestants recorded multiple songs with the help of the API lunchbox.

"The studio that I had on set was basic – almost like a project studio," said Pooley, "but it was amazingly lit for television. It was just me, the lunchbox, a computer, and some other gear for arranging and building keyboard tracks." According to Pooley, he used the API lunchbox "pretty much every day for sixty days" to record each of the cast members' vocals and found it was exactly what he needed to achieve the Glee sound.

"The lunchbox was the most useful tool for what we needed on this show," said Pooley. "The Glee sound is very bright and punchy. It's a very vocally driven sound that's layered and larger than life. That's what I found with API."

Pooley added that he enjoyed using the lunchbox so much that he is using it again while on the Glee Live Tour to record the cast for the upcoming feature film Glee Live! 3D! slated for theatric release August 12th.

The Glee Project premieres on Oxygen June 12th at 9:00 p.m/EST.