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Italy - K-array has launched a new pro audio brand, Kgear, which aims ‘to bring the latest technologies and top-level performance into a sleek design, easy-approach package, with a special attention to budget-sensitive yet demanding applications’.
Kgear’s product portfolio is divided into two main areas - high performance and installed sound - and comprises column systems, line-arrays, ceiling and wall mount speakers, subwoofers and amplifiers for applications ranging from large venues and commercial buildings to room-sized, residential environments.
“Over the past two years we took the chance to re-focus ourselves and start dreaming and designing in a different, challenging perspective to draw the very essence of K-array and apply it to create a more accessible

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Europe - LED manufacturer Absen is set to hold three online round table panels on immersive LED experiences. The sessions will cover immersive LED in virtual studios, retail spaces, and corporate spaces, with each round table session hosting a variety of expert brands in each sector.
Hosting all the roundtables will be Jessica Golding, Absen’s European brand manager. The first roundtable, upcoming on 19 May, will discuss the impact and rise of virtual studios on the AV industry over the last year. With a panel of the industry’s virtual studio experts, including Christian Czimny, Absen’s industry product director, the panel will discuss what virtual means in the industry, where virtual studios can be used, and what the benefits are of using LED over traditional ‘green screens’. The event will provide a multitude of perspectives, from end user to integrator, on the r

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Italy - The Aosta Valley is sparsely populated, home to only about 200,000 residents within its villages and countryside. But the picturesque region tucked into Italy’s northwest corner isn’t lacking in welcoming spots where people can go to sit back and relax over a glass of beer or wine.
According to a recent study by Statista, there were 548 bars in the region before the pandemic. Sadly, many of them have gone out of business, while others have remained closed during the lockdown, but anyone can still experience the spirited conversations, conviviality and music of these establishments on the Ralbol Network’s Symosyo programme.
Airing on the network’s YouTube channel, Symosyo recreates the looks and feel of a real Italian bar, complete with songs, spirits, friendly patrons and even a crusty but amiable, bartender. Adding to the atmosphere to the show’s eig
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Indochine X PixMob Fan Immersion

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's - 40 thousand LED pixels on a ceiling!!! Indochine's whirlwind tour transports fans to another level of the live experience - immersing them from floor to ceiling with PixMob's X4 wristbands, and an LED ceiling made entirely of its NOVA Minis! With the vision of Indochine's creative team, PixMob used its LED fan-technology to turn attendees and venues into an ocean of effects, and a starry sky of LED magic. Très très cool!

Read more about the Indochine tour in the latest issue of LSi

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New Zealand - The 328m-tall Sky Tower in downtown Auckland, New Zealand has had its grace and elegance further enhanced with an Anolis lighting installation comprising 154 x Divine 72 LED fixtures.
The high-profile landmark is also a vital telecommunications hub and a popular observation point sitting at the heart of and presiding over this vibrant metropolis.
The lighting design was created by Richard Bracebridge and Sam Walle from Light Works Ltd. Technical specification, installation and systems integration were the work of Nick Abel from LS Group, with lighting fixtures supplied through Anolis’ New Zealand and Australian distributor, Jands.
Light Works has been involved with lighting the tower since 2007 when it was first re-lit following the original metal halide installation which dated back to 1996 whilst it was under construction.
The 2007 flood

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USA - Shure Incorporated is entering its 96th year in audio technology and is planning a number of celebrations of company landmarks throughout the next 12 months.
S.N. Shure started the audio company in downtown Chicago in 1925, selling radio parts kits. Since then, the company has grown into a global player, offering a diverse portfolio of wired and wireless microphones, personal and professional listening products, and conferencing and meeting solutions. Shure products are now sold in more than 120 countries, and through the decades, they have been trusted and used around the world by such luminaries as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Elvis Presley, Pope Francis, Nelson Mandela, The Beatles, and every United States President since Franklin D. Roosevelt.
“While our 95th year provided several challenges as it relates to the pandemic, we continued with our superior pro

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France - The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), based in Paris is an international organisation made up of 37 member countries that works to build better policies for better lives. More than 1,000 conferences are organised annually in the OECD conference centres (La Muette and Boulogne), including around 30 conferences and major events. The OECD Conference Centre offers 3,000sq.m of modern and modular conference rooms and a range of facilities.
Currently, OECD manages around 250 daily web conferences. Most high-level meetings offer interpretation in at least both official languages of the OECD and rely on collaboration, meaning interactions are dynamic amongst participants.
Audio visual services (audio, video and web conferencing) have been used for several years in OECD, but with the significant increase in remote participation requests in

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Iceland - Harpa is a venue in the heart of Reykjavik, housing a concert hall and conference centre. According to technical director Andri Guðmundsson, the venue is “a one stop shop” with premier facilities, sound, lighting, video, and catering.
Due to COVID-19, Harpa has pivoted to virtual events using an advanced, Dante-based audio environment. To maintain precise Dante timing Guðmundsson and his team turned to the Model 5401A Dante Leader Clock from Studio Technologies.
“Throughout the pandemic, we have been shifting our infrastructure to Dante to meet the demand for the surge in virtual and streamed events,” said Guðmundsson. “The Model 5401A Leader Clock from Studio Technologies has provided us with a solid master clock to support all timing needs with our Dante operations.”
The Model 5401A Leader Clock provides precise timing signals for appli

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South Korea - Harman Professional Solutions recently collaborated with TechDataPS to equip Geumsan Daragwon with new audio systems.
Geumsan Daragwon is a culture and welfare centre featuring literary, cultural, education, sports and health centres, as well as a large concert hall and small performance theatre to host plays, musicals and concerts. In order to ensure premium sound quality at these events, Geumsan Daragwon required modern audio solutions in each room. To achieve this, venue operators hired TechDataPS to equip the performance spaces with sound reinforcement systems provided by Harman.
TechDataPS reports that a combination of good acoustics and robust system design from Harman helped them deliver quality sounding and reliable audio solutions that complement the architectural aesthetics of each space. The JBL VTX A8 loudspeakers and VTX B18 subwoofers provi

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Italy - Powersoft has launched a new training programme on its website, which provides two new free training sections for users: Webinars, where all Powersoft’s recent webinars are uploaded, and E-Learning, where the live sound and install courses are available online now for anyone who wishes to take them. The OEM course will be released in the coming weeks.
The E-Learning platform is designed to be a one-stop destination for online training. The courses are designed to provide sound engineers, integrators, and AV technicians the advantage to learn directly from Powersoft’s experts and gain certification upon completion.
“Created by our in-house experts, these courses are for anyone working in the professional audio market, so they can operate with specialist understanding on audio systems, and gain an expert’s insight into our audio products,” said Marc Koc

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South Africa - DWR Distribution’s Jaco Beukes welcomed nine delegates who attended the two-day DiGiCo S-Series training workshop hosted in May. The course was held at the DWR offices in Johannesburg.
“The training went exceptionally well,” said Beukes, who presented the workshop. “It was exciting and good to recap everything on the S Consoles. We went through a lot of interesting topics and everybody seemed to enjoy it. Even the more senior guys learned new things.”
The group of delegates included freelancers, technicians from rental companies and technical crew from a local church.
“Some of the delegates have used the console for years while others have only started audio more recently, so it was a diverse group,” said Jaco. “Thank you very much to everyone who joined us.”
The training included a demonstration of the DiGiCo S-Series digit

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China - Follow-Me, manufacturer of remote follow-spot and auto tracking solutions, has announced the appointment of ACE, Advanced Communication Equipment (International) Company as its distributor for China.
“As an established name, marketing quality manufacturers and their products throughout China, we believe ACE is perfectly placed to promote the Follow-Me brand,” explain Gary Yates and Erik Berends, co-founders of Netherlands’ based Follow-Me. “Due to their experience and professionalism we see ACE as the ideal partner to support our growing client base in China.”
“Follow-Me is the perfect addition to our lighting product portfolio, being both a flexible and cost-effective performer tracking solution that can be deployed in multiple applications,” says ACE’s vice-president, Mr. Bingo Tso. “We are constantly looking for products that represent the

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Hungary – Rental and installation company, G-Sound, was founded in 2014 by József Gricz, an experienced engineer who previously worked for the country’s National Radio. Recently, the company decided to add L-Acoustics K Series to its inventory, elevating its own standing within the Hungarian market and strengthening the country’s K2 alliance.
The system was supplied by Audmax, an L-Acoustics certified provider distributor for Hungary, whose CEO, Krisztian Varga, recalls G-Sound’s decision process for choosing K2. “In 2019, József was looking to take the next step in event technology and started to dive into the L-Acoustics world,” Varga says. “In December of that year, I offered him a visit to the L-Acoustics corporate office in Marcoussis. Both József and his system engineer Zsolt Balogh were impressed with what they saw. We spent a fantastic day with sales

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UK - Following on from the latest Scottish Government announcement and in light of UK guidelines summarising clear plans for the return of the events industry south of the border, event industry leaders across Scotland have warned of a critical juncture in the recovery of the Scottish sector, as there still remains no indication of when gatherings of scale will be permitted and when social distancing parameters will be removed.
Whilst restrictions on retail and leisure are lifted in Scotland, the events sector remains largely locked down and unable to plan ahead under current policy and plans.
Geoff Crow, director of 21CC Group and member of the Event Industry Advisory Group comments, “We need consistency and clarity. The event sector in Scotland is at a standstill, which is difficult to watch when we see other sectors opening up and the rest of the UK and parts of

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UK - Organisations from across the UK’s arts, entertainment and technology industries including Digital Catapult, the Warner Music Group and O2 are collaborating to create the first hybrid 5G festival.
The 5G Festival will be ‘a showcase of creative talent blended with the power of advanced digital technologies, and broadcast live directly to audiences at remote locations from world-leading venues, as well as producing novel immersive in-venue experiences’.
The collaboration is led by 5G specialist Digital and brings together global music company Warner Music Group ; live arts venue and culture organisation Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival working with Brighton 5G testbed partner Wired Sussex; telecommunications service provider and sponsor of The O2 and O2 Academy venues O2 ; Metropolis Studios, Sonosphere and Audiotonix and digital technology companies Ma

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Green Light - Theatres across England have been given the green light to reopen from next week under the next stage of the government’s roadmap. Venues will be able to open with social distancing, with capacities capped at 50% or 1,000 people for indoor shows, and 50% or 4,000 people outdoors.
For many theatres it will mark the first time they have been able to open their doors in more than a year, with theatre bosses now looking forward to the possibility of social distancing being removed completely by June 21, the next date in the roadmap.
Prime minister Boris Johnson said theatres would be able to reopen on 17 May and added that the country was “on track" to move to Step 4 of the roadmap on 21 June, under which social distancing would be removed. "Today we are announcing the single biggest step in our roadmap and it will allow us to do many of the things we hav

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USA - BriteShot, vendor of LED lighting solutions, has shifted its manufacturing strategy amidst the global pandemic and now specializes in COVID-19 decontamination products. Mitigating COVID-19 exposure in indoor environments, BriteShot’s decontamination solutions include its AirAffair air filtration system and BriteShot decontamination tent.
“To help venues re-open safely amidst the COVID-19 outbreak, we have dedicated our R&D resources to design ground-breaking innovation in air filtration and air purification,” says Roy McDonald, co-founder at BriteShot. “With more than a decade of knowledge and experience working in the entertainment space, we aim to have our decontamination technology be a factor in helping entertainment venues, restaurants, schools, houses of worship and more, reopen their doors in a safe and effective way.”
BriteShot’s AirAffair

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Australia - ARX has introduced the USB Ultra I/O VSR Broadcast, a 24 bit high resolution plug and play USB 2 channel play and record digital/analogue pro audio interface. The USB Ultra I/O VSR Broadcast removes the need to use any existing sound card outputs, with their inherent noisy environment and problematic grounding.
Designed for interfacing USB equipped computers with the balanced inputs and outputs of professional sound systems, the full transformer balanced Inputs and Outputs on the USB Ultra I/O VSR Broadcast provide the isolation required to eliminate earth loops / ground hum and other extraneous interaction noise and distortion.
The USB Ultra I/O VSR Broadcast offers analogue style recording headroom with Analog 0dB In converting to –18dB and FS Digital providing Analog style headroom when recording in the digital domain. The -18dB Digital signal reverts

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Portugal - Arda Recorders, which opened in 2017, is located in the heart of Porto. It features five independent spaces with Van Damme cabling throughout.
Studio A features a vintage Neve 8068 console and a Fazioli F278 grand piano. It has a 100sq.m live room, three iso booths and an echo chamber with variable ceiling.
Studio B is suited for most modern productions, with a versatile 20m2 live room and a sound lock that doubles as an amp booth. Its control room is centred around a 32 channel Rupert Neve 5088, complemented with a great array of outboard gear. Studio C consists of a small live room and a control room for voice-over and overdubs sessions.
The Mixing Room is centred around 32 channels of Avid Artist Mix faders and more than 100 channels of vintage and modern hardware. The Mastering Studio was designed with quality acoustics in mind and has ATC main sp

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USA - Lighting design house, Lightswitch, transformed an everyday parking garage on the Arizona State University campus in Tempe into an experience for the senses and turned to Elation luminaires, including Proteus Hybrids, for much of the sensory-rich exhibit. Called designspace, the drive-thru experience featured visual design installations from industry professionals, structural artists HYBYCOZO and ASU students enrolled in the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts.
Lightswitch, who successfully redesigned The Morton Arboretum in Illinois into a drive-thru experience this past holiday season, tapped into that knowledge for the mile-long drive adventure through the Packard Parking Garage. Described as an exploration of the duality of space, both the space above us and the space between us, the experience took riders on an immersive journey from our world to ou

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USA - Broadweigh was the wireless load monitoring system of choice for California based Cassidyrig at a recent Miley Cyrus gig at the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. The performer was the musical guest at the NCAA’s Final Four basketball tournament on 3 April. In a Tribute to Frontline Heroes, Cyrus performed for an audience of first responders during the Capital One Tournament central show, airing on CBS between the first and second national semi-final games.
Dan Cassidy, MD of Cassidyrig explained: “We were delighted to be approached by Warner Broadcasting to handle the rigging for this fairly elaborate project. This halftime concert is one of the highlights of a season called March Madness so it’s a pretty big deal. As most people know, Miley Cyrus is anything but a conservative performer, so we realised that we’d be working on something fairly large sc

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Saudi Arabia - When Middlesex Sound & Light (MSL) undertook a contract in Riyadh 16 months ago - to invest a new gym concept with a high octane ‘club-spec’ technical infrastructure - they little knew what was waiting around the corner.
“We shipped the gear out to Riyadh in February last year, and the following month COVID struck,” recalls project manager Toby Jones. “Rather than suspend the work, they decided to press ahead.” Engaging with local crews - communicating via video calls and different programming platforms - hey finally managed to fly out to commission the system during the brief pre-Christmas break from lockdown.
While this represented a joint venture between 1Rebel in the UK (represented by James Balfour and Giles Dean) and Pulse Fitness Group’s Fahad Alhagbani and Nathan Clute, there have subsequently been a number of venues open in Lon
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