USA - One of the most elegant fixed sound system installations now graces the 400-seat sanctuary of the Valley Life Centre in Dallas. Nexo’s compact Geo M6 line array has been delivered by local audio specialists Alpha Sound, as the front end of a digital system featuring a Yamaha QL5 mixing console, and personal in-ear monitoring facilities.
“The 400-seat, intergenerational congregation sanctuary previously had a mono centre cluster of horns enclosed in a fabric cloud and a simple analogue console with a few wedges for monitors,” says Devin Sheets, head engineer at Alpha Sound.
Now, two Nexo M6 line arrays cover the 180° room evenly with added localisation from low profile out-fills. Along with the subwoofers, the speaker system naturally delivers a "modern" soun

UK - White Light provided the lighting equipment for Arthur Miller’s The American Clock which has recently opened at the Old Vic Theatre, London.
The American Clock portrays the devastation that American citizens experienced when the stock market crashed and the Great Depression began in 1929. The play uses an ensemble cast to explore the lives of several families across several cities. It is directed by Rachel Chavkin and features a lighting design by Olivier Award-winning Natasha Chivers.
Natasha comments: “This is an epic play that manages to tell a huge story about an entire nation. Rachel wanted to create something quite extraordinary in which we put the audience right into this extraordinary time in American history. Part of this included having audience members on stage. What this means is that the Old Vic stage has now been turned so that it

UK - Hot on the heels of their latest studio release Holy Hell, British metalcore act, Architects, have recently completed their UK and European tour accompanied by an Allen & Heath dLive system. The tour included some of the band’s biggest headline shows to date - finishing off at the SSE Arena in Wembley, London to an audience of 12,500 fans.
“After touring with a variety of consoles over the last few years I decided to make the switch to dLive after having them recommended to me by fellow users Ben Hammond and Jared Daly”, comments FOH engineer, Jonny Burgan. “I am a big fan of how modular the dLive systems are, being able to scale down surface size without sacrificing audio quality and compromising on processing power is something that not enough manufacturers have tried to address, yet Allen & Heath have managed to perfect it.”
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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

UK - The heady mix of highly tuned bikes, screaming engines, screeching tyres and brakes and supernatural speed races meshed with the breath-taking daring of motorcycle stunt acrobatics… indoor Motocross racing and Freestyle MX all rolled into a single adrenaline fuelled night of seat-edge action complete with pumping soundscape . . . and you have the heartbeat of
Producers and organisers Arena Sports Live presented Arenacross (AX in three of the UK’s leading arena venues – Belfast, Birmingham and Sheffield – for their 2019 AX tour, with HSL supplying a full production package – lighting, video and rigging – plus sound in partnership with Nitelites.
Additional venue ‘sports lighting’ was also provided by HSL for the two Birmingham shows at the Resorts World Arena (NEC).
HSL’s project manager was Ben Perrin. He and the team were delighted to be

UK - Technical theatre students at the Guildford School of Acting recently benefitted from hands-on experience creating dynamic soundscapes and source-oriented vocal localisation for their stage musical production of 9 to 5.
Cambridge-based immersive audio pioneers, Out Board, provided the school with a TiMax spatial delay-matrix, complete with TiMax Tracker, for students to experience the creation of a sound design pushed beyond the usual boundaries of intelligibility, balance and audience immersion.
After the student production, course tutor Sam Digny and guest mentor sound designer Justin Teasdale held a seminar insight day showcasing their experience and success with the advanced immersive TiMax technology. A wider audience of invited industry professionals comprised local hire companies, production managers, sound engineers and students old and new.
O

UK - The Bodyguard stage musical is an ambitious show, with a large cast, orchestra, and crew required to bring the classic, soulful song list to life alongside Alexander Dinelaris’ acclaimed libretto.
Since its successful West End run, the show has toured the world and now has a second UK tour underway, with Alexandra Burke taking the lead as singer Rachel Marron. It is also proving to be a showcase first outing for the new Sennheiser SK 6212 mini-bodypack transmitter, supplied by Autograph Sound.
From the start of this run, sound designer for the show Richard Brooker was sold on using a digital wireless system, having already used Sennheiser’s Digital 9000 system on Bend it Like Beckham and Dreamgirls. “Moving to digital gave a new sound that is much more open and clear,” he recalls. “It isn’t compromised by the companding process...

UK - During his four years in the company, Martin Audio’s Richard Van Nairn has steadily broadened his remit, and with the recent restructure of Martin Audio’s sales force, it has opened the door further for Van Nairn to bring even more territories under his management.
The restructure, which has seen Bradley Watson promoted to the new role of international sales director, meant many of the countries under his management has moved to Van Nairn.
Already in charge of Cyprus, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Slovenia, Estonia and the PALOPS block, Van Nairn now has responsibility for a further swathe of territories across Central and Eastern Europe, as well as the Middle East (including Israel and Jordan). He also has responsibility for the whole of Africa (apart from South Africa), including Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco.
“I feel privileged to be entrusted with so much res

UK - Notch, the visual creation tool for interactive motion graphics, is set to incorporate ray tracing into the software's realtime workflow as part of an upcoming March release (0.9.22). The news was announced at NotchCon, the inaugural Notch conference held in London in January.
Ray tracing, an advanced graphics rendering technique that has long been used for non-realtime rendering, provides realistic lighting by simulating the physical behaviour of light. It is the foundation of visual effects used in movies and TV and will provide a ‘significant jump’ in visual precision directly inside Notch, says the company.
Matt Swoboda, founder of Notch, comments: “At Notch, we’re committed to making software for content creators that is flexible and scalable. We enable people to realize their creative ideas and improve their workflow, through the power of rendering i

USA - Behind the Scenes reports that Gray Matter Visual has become a Pledge-a-Service Partner by pledging to donate a percentage of their design fees to the charity. Gray Matter Visual is a lighting and production design firm working on corporate and special events, concerts, television, benefits, and more. Founded in 2010 by Brendan Gray and based in Brooklyn, New York, GMV works with clients all over the US and beyond to realise their visions.
Brendan Gray, principal designer and president, states: “I became aware of the Pledge-a-Service programme through fellow designer (and friend) Herrick Goldman's involvement. Joining sounded like a great idea, but one that sat on the back burner for a while. The recent sudden loss of a friend and colleague prompted me to take action. I hope that other designers and business owners will follow suit and support this worthy cause."

UK - The team at Nottingham-based OneBigStar was already familiar with the Chauvet Professional Ovation series when they made a major investment in the LED fixtures. “We’ve built the Chauvet trade show booths for years, so we’ve worked with Ovation units before and have been very impressed,” says Steve Yeardsley, managing director of the technical and event production company.
Recently, Yeardsley and his team acted on this confidence by adding a substantial number of Ovation ellipsoidal and par-style fixtures to OneBigStar’s inventory. The new fixtures are intended to replace the company’s existing tungsten units.
“We’re constantly looking to invest in new technologies, especially when they involve moving from older units to better, brighter and more energy efficient ones,” says Yeardsley. “The Ovation range certainly stands tall against the tungste

UK - Edinburgh Castle and the medieval Old Town offered a magnificent backdrop to Edinburgh’s Hogmanay celebration for thousands of revellers who welcomed the new year immersed in a city centre-wide high quality pro audio installation.
In collaboration with the sound designer Dan Jones, Catalyst Event Production Services was tasked with specifying, installing and operating a sound solution for much of the event that would envelope partygoers, leading them to "a complete d&b audiotechnik loudspeaker, amplification and R1 control software solution".
UK-based live entertainment company Underbelly, which has produced the event on behalf of the City of Edinburgh Council since 2017, bills Edinburgh’s Hogmanay as “one of the biggest celebrations in the world”. The famed Street Party showcased Scottish and European musicians, street theatre artists, dancers, choir

USA - For a third year running, TAIT has been included in Fast Company’s annual list of the World’s Most Innovative Companies in Live Event for 2019. The list honours businesses making the most profound impact on both industry and culture.
“Receiving this recognition again is a great reminder of just how important teamwork really is and how influential innovation is in creating extraordinary experiences,” says Adam Davis, CCO at TAIT.
“Live events create shared experiences that are community building and binding. Some are in-person communities others are digital communities. Because the ability to experience a live event has multiplied in form, it is essential that we continue to challenge ourselves, our clients and the industry, to be even more innovative when creating. This is an exciting time, we are at the advent of revolutionizing the live event experie

UK - Artem, the physical special effects company, made further inroads into the theatre sector recently with a new effects’ challenge from the world of dance. Artem, whose credits include Harry Potter: The Cursed Child and Holiday on Ice, were asked to design and build a piece of equipment capable of projecting a single giant smoke ring the shape of a doughnut - known in physics as a Torus - from the rear of a stage, out over an audience.
The ‘smoke vortex cannon’, as it came to be known, had to be large enough to make an impact in a sizeable performance venue, whilst being resilient and easily transportable on tour. In addition, the cannon needed to be DMX programmable, to enable control from the lighting gallery.
Artem’s client is the Birmingham and Barcelona-based dance company, Humanhood. Artistic directors Rudi Cole and Júlia Robert Parés

UK - Industry charity Backup has revealed a busy fundraising schedule for 2019.
First in a line-up of events is the inaugural Bikefest, kicking off on 18 May with a day of two-wheeled action and fun for all levels of riders.
There will be a 100km ride through the Sussex and Surrey countryside, which will take in much of the famed Olympic and Prudential Ride London-Surrey 100 route, including Leith Hill, the highest point in Surrey, and the famous Box Hill Zig Zag.
“Whether you’re riding as an individual, with friends or as a company Peloton, this will be a great day out to sport your finest padded shorts, have an excuse to shave those legs and pack as many bananas in your cycling top as possible,” says Backup.
The event will also feature a 50km route across the Surrey countryside, past a number of isotonic watering holes en route to allow riders to

UK - In anticipation of a busy 2019 order book, Triple E has recently completed a move into larger premises, which has also included a complete restructure of the warehouse to improve efficiencies and production work flow.
Triple E had outgrown its previous warehouse, having been there for the past 16 years, and the company has now settled into a larger facility which has doubled the square footage of their office, factory and workshop. The expansion has also provided for improved training facilities for distributors, installers and specifiers who visit Triple E, as well as dedicated meeting room spaces and improved office facilities.
The increased footprint has enabled a more streamlined factory and warehouse layout with additional yard and storage facilities and a larger demonstration area for clients to see the products first hand in the factory setting.
The

UK - Free registration is now open for PLASA Focus Leeds, PLASA has reported.
The sold-out event, taking place at Leeds' Royal Armouries Museum on 14-15 May, will feature 120 exhibitors and is ideal for professionals working across live events, concert touring, production, performing arts and installation.
Present will be lighting companies including Elation, Robe and Philips Entertainment Lighting; pro audio firms including d&b audiotechnik, Funktion-One and Shure; and rigging, staging and production specialists including Area Four Industries, Gerriets, Hawthorn and J&C Joel. The trade show will also welcome several new exhibitors, including loudspeaker manufacturer Wharfdale Pro Audio and US sound masking company, Cambridge S

The Netherlands - De Effenaar is a music venue with an illustrious history spanning almost 50 years. Nestled in Eindhoven, the technology capital of the Netherlands, its two impressive performance spaces have played host to an array of major artists including The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Florence+The Machine, Editors, Nelly, Stromae, Queens of the Stone Age, The Ramones, Pearl Jam, R.E.M. and The Cure.
Towards the end of 2018, De Effenaar needed to upgrade its audio inventory, and the technical team engaged in an extensive evaluation of all live sound consoles on the market. At ISE 2019, the team confirmed an order for four SSL Live L200s, one SSL L100, and a massive 348 channels of SSL SuperAnalogue mic preamps.
According to Effenaar’s senior audio engineer, Sven de Hoog, the team of engineers had individually scored the four shortlisted brands in nine different categ

Poland - On 14 October last year, at Warsaw's PGE National Stadium, confectionary giant Kinder celebrated its 50th anniversary in style. The all-day event culminated in the Koncert Pełen Marzeń (Concert Full of Dreams) - a free event that featured Polish pop artists David Kwiatkowski, Natalia Szroeder, and Grzegorz Hyże, as well as musical star Katarzyna Łaska (Frozen, High School Musical, Enchanted) and a full symphony orchestra.
TSE Grupa was responsible for technical services at this huge show, which included everything from stage construction to an ambitious multimedia, lighting, and sound production. L-Acoustics components were used exclusively for sound reinforcement, with almost 200 loudspeaker cabinets deployed around the stadium.
TSE Grupa, founded by Łukasz Kubiak and Piotr Basek, is not new to large, complex events, with a portfolio

Australia - Adding impact to a recent production of Les Misérables at Scotch College in Melbourne was a Tom Willis-designed lightshow that featured Chauvet Professional Maverick MK1 Spot fixtures, supplied by Showtools International.
Creating an array of textures and colours on stage with the 350W moving LED fixture, Willis reflected the hope, despair, and unrequited love that marked the relationships between Jean Valjean, Fantine and the story’s other characters.
“This is the second project I did with OSMAD (Old Scotch Music and Drama), the theatre group that performed the musical at the school,” says Willis. “The set I worked with was beautiful, but it actually had very few moving parts, so light became important to help transition from one location to the next - from field, to inn, to water hole etcetera. However, there were many times where locatio

Europe - Belgian AV solutions provider AED Display has recently announced its decision to invest in AV Stumpfl's new Pixera media server software and hardware.
With a total of six full-spec Pixera two media servers, six Pixera one servers and 10 Pixera mini player units ordered at this year's ISE 2019 in Amsterdam, AED Display will soon be able to allow its customers to choose from more than 45 AV Stumpfl media server systems, making the company the world's largest provider of AV Stumpfl media servers.
AV Stumpfl CEO, Fabian Stumpfl, comments: "As a long term partner, AED was one of the first companies to understand the potential of our new next-generation media server system Pixera. We are very happy that AED customers will soon be able to discover the world of Pixera for themselves. The Pixera roadmap for the near future is very exciting and we are looking forward

UK - With less than two weeks until ISCEx 2019, the Institute of Sound and Communications Engineers has announced a number of new exhibitors, including Shure UK, Sennheiser, Sound Network, Ambient System and Source Distribution, have signed up to the event alongside the 31 manufacturers and distributors who had already confirmed their presence. This means this will be the event with the highest number of exhibitors yet, says ISCE.
Taking place on Wednesday, 6 Marchat Coombe Abbey Hotel, Binley, Warwickshire, ISCEx 2019 provides networking and learning opportunities. Leading audio manufacturers and distributors are on hand in the exhibition zone, whilst a programme of informative seminars is held in separate conference rooms throughout the day.
ISCEx 2019 is open to members and non-members of the ISCE. Entry is completely free of charge and promises to be an opportunity

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