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Worldwide - Roland Corporation is pleased to announce a brand-new, worldwide venture to concentrate on Pro Audio, to be called 'Roland Systems Group'.

Incorporating the existing EDIROL group and the newly formed Roland System Solutions (RSS) division, Roland System Group's (RSG's) main focus is on providing video and audio solutions for all aspects of the professional market. New products such as the S-4000, 40-channel Digital Snake, and V-440HD high-definition video mixer are just the start of a continuing development programme aimed squarely at the professional audiovisual market.

With many years of industry experience, RSS UK technical sales will be handled by Martin Thomas. Martin has a proven background in both professional audio and video and is well known throughout the i

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UK - Harmen Pro UK is lining up four major new products to be shown at this year's ABBT Theatre Show - Soundcraft Vi6 digital live console, JBL VP Series powered reinforcement systems, AKG HUB 4000 Q Wireless Network Concentrator, and Crown XTi power amplifiers - all feature the company's HiQnet advanced audio, control, and configuration network functionality.

HiQnet, Harman Professional Group's proprietary audio system configuration, control and monitoring network, offers users rapid configuration, enhanced control and comprehensive monitoring of complicated audio systems composed of products from Harman Pro brands, says the company. System Architect, HiQnet's central control software, gives users the ability to easily set up and manage large, multifunctional audio systems from a single computer, using a single graphical user interface.

The Soundcraft Vi6 large format live di

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USA - ESTA - the North American Entertainment Services and Technology Association - has announced that BSR E1.17, Entertainment Technology - Multipurpose Network Control Protocol Suite, the draft standard commonly called "ACN," is now available for public review until 19 June 2006.

The draft standard is a suite of protocols offering needed services in network management, device management, device description, and device control with reliable multi-cast transport on data networks that use the common Internet Protocols. There are 21 documents that describe various aspects of the suite of protocols, and they are all contained in the approximately 2.5 megabyte compressed file ACN.zip. Reviewers should also read the Readme.pdf file. It is not part of the draft standard, but it explains the structure of ACN and the changes that were made since the last public review.

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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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Costa Rica - In Latin- America, outdoor festivals create a big draw, and Costa Rica is no exception. Ramon Mendiola, director of the Costa Rica Brewery, recently staged 'The Imperial Festival 2006', which included some of the biggest local, latin and international stars. Names such as Jamiroquai, who headlined day one, Hector el Father, and The Rasmus, performed for the first time in Costa Rica. Day two's headliner Sting added this event to his 2005-2006 Broken Day World Tour.

La Guacima racetrack, just outside San Jose, was host to the two-day concert held on 1-2 April and saw more than 30,000 attendees over the weekend. Sound contractor RSTV Sonido supplied main arrays of 12 Adamson Y18s and four Y10s per side, which provided enough sound pressure to fill La Guacima. The setup was designed by RSTV 's owner Virgilio Azofeifa and techs Elias Arias and ManriI Vargas, using

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Germany - A diminutive performer with a remarkably powerful voice takes the limelight when Meyer Sound's new M'elodie ultra-compact high-power curvilinear array debuts in Europe later this month. Underscoring the upbeat mood of the occasion, the M'elodie demo sessions in Germany will feature source music from a live Latin band as mixed by veteran FOH engineer Buford Jones, who also serves as Meyer Sound's tour liaison manager.

The festivities begin with four sessions on 15 and 16 May in Hannover, followed by four sessions in Wiesbaden on 17 and 18 May.

The smallest sibling in the growing MILO family, M'elodie shares the sonic signature and easy-to-use rigging of the larger MILO and MICA systems. M'elodie's trim dimensions and minimal weight are a perfect match for small theatres, ballrooms, clubs, and corporate AV applications.

The M'elodie debut marks one of the first major

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UK - Entertainment lighting supplier White Light is this year returning to its roots: supporting the Royal Court Theatre, the theatre from which White Light was founded, during the Court's 50th Anniversary Celebrations.

The Royal Court Theatre in London's Sloane Square is Britain's leading theatre company dedicated to new work by innovative writers. The Court's 50th anniversary celebrations are centred around 8 May 2006, fifty years to the day from the 1956 opening of John Osborne's Look Back In Anger, widely judged to be the play that marked the beginning of modern British drama. Since that time, the Court has premiered plays by many writers, who include: Edward Bond, Peter Gill, Christopher Hampton, Athol Fugard, Howard Brenton, Sam Shepard, and Hanif Kureishi.

The Court's influence on theatre design has been equally important, with the theatre leading the way in the

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USA - Rock climbing, like most extreme sports, is equal parts skill and attitude. Learning the art of threading oneself to the side of a mountain is a task best undertaken by those who have learned to channel their adrenaline, and the staff at Earth Treks are among the best. The company, which operates offices and climbing centres in the towns ofColumbia, Timonium and Rockville, Maryland, specialises in rock and ice climbing instruction and mountaineering expeditions, and has guided several thousand climbers through international expeditions on six continents, including the Himalayas and Everest. Their facilities have even been used to train for the recent Athens Olympics.

Earth Treks recently opened their newest training facility in Rockville, a state-of-the-art indoor facility with 44 foot walls and over 15,000 square feet of varied climbing surfaces, including overhangs and s

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India - Bangalore may rank as one of the fastest growing cities in Asia but it still suffers from erratic power conditions and high temperatures - important considerations when planning any major installation of lighting and sound into a venue. When Bangalore-based Acoustic Control was contracted to both design and install a high end sound and lighting system for Christ College's new auditorium, they chose LSC Lighting products.

"The LSC dimmers and consoles are suited to India's unpredictable power conditions and extreme temperatures," said Sanjay Mudartha, director of Acoustic Control. "The dimmers have saved our lamps on many occasions when voltages exceeded safe limits, by shutting down. And despite very hot and humid conditions have never shut down due to thermal issues."

Situated on the third floor of the new block at Christ College, the auditorium se

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US - Bandit Lites are servicing US singer Hilary Duff's UK and European tour, part of a world tour that started last year, promoting her hugely successful "Most Wanted" album.

Lighting designers Seth Jackson and B.K. Waggoner put their heads together at the outset to devise a very flexible rig that could be toured extensively, and broken down into different component parts and versions for the various sections of the tour - depending on the type of venues being played.

Their lighting company of choice on both sides of the Atlantic is Bandit Lites. Waggoner, who is also out operating the tour says, "Bandit's gear is always in excellent condition, their crew are fantastic and the service is second to none." He adds that it's also great to have continuity of supplier across the two continents.

For Bandit Lites, Lester Cobrin handles all UK and European requi

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UK - After a four-year gap, Hawthorn has again worked on Pro Retail, this year - the number one retail trade show in the UK, is held at Telford's International Centre. Hawthorn was contracted by DB Systems to provide lighting, sound, rigging, staging, power distribution, starcloth and crew for the two day event.

Hawthorn's project manager, Matt Oscroft specified Clay Paky Alpha Spots and Alpha Wash lights, supplemented with Pulsar's LED Par 36s and Thomas LED battens. For control, he chose an Avolites Sapphire and Irad Pixel drive. In order for Hawthorns to get across their design concepts, Oscroft used their new WYSIWYG suite, providing visuals and complex designs for both DB Systems and the final client, Palmer and Harvey. This software proved to be invaluable as time was limited onsite and there were no space or time for errors.

Oscroft's sound spec included Martin Audio li

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UK - Showsec managed crowds at London's Earls Court and Manchester's MEN Arena for the new format Give It A Name festival.

Give it a Name was a new indoor festival concept launched in 2005 at London's Alexandra Palace This year the festival developed to run over two days, in two cities (London 's Earls Court and Manchester 's MEN Arena ), with two stages in the two venues.

Lost Prophets and My Chemical Romance headlined 26 bands that gave tens of thousands of fans ten hours of non stop music, with two stages allowing quick change-overs, creating a great atmosphere at both venues.

Showsec manager Paul Joy ran a team of 120 trained crowd management professionals at the MEN Arena, looking after the fans front-of-house, the pit area and the backstage. Steve Reynolds ran the FOH Showsec team of 200 staff at Earls Court, and the two managers liaised through-out the weekend

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Denmark - Martin Professional has introduced the new Magnum 1500 - a portable yet powerful fog generator aimed at clubs, DJs and performers of all types. As a little brother to the long-time industry workhorse Magnum 2000, the Magnum 1500 features a robust 1200W (240V) heater that delivers impressive output for a portable machine.

Housed in a sturdy compact casing, the unit complements the growing Mania DJ/performer line of effect lights, colour changers, deco effects, strobe lights, scanners and promotional lights, say the company: its 2.3 litre fluid capacity giving impressively long run times.

The Magnum 1500 comes with a flying bracket as standard and an innovative 180° 'Flip Solution' allows for versatile positioning for precise horizontal or more vertical projection. It comes complete with a truss-mounting bracket for easy installation. The bracket also works as a ha

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South Africa - dbx Professional Products, a manufacturer of professional signal processing products and a division of Harman International, have played a key role at the Kitchen Bar, in the ground-breaking Design Quarter, in Johannesburg.

Situated in the suburb of Fourways, it is South Africa's first truly comprehensive décor and design retail centre - a vibrant hub for lovers of cutting-edge décor products and design services, industry trend setters, socialites and restaurant patrons.

Kitchen Bar is a key feature of the development, presenting new standards of culinary excellence influenced by international trends. A crucial element in the new venue is having AV facilities to equal these standards. Harman Pro products distributor, Wild and Marr were called to the challenge.

Since Kitchen Bar was designed to be a restaurant, cocktail bar, lounge and night spot

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USA - Circuit Lighting was once again hired to provide Robe ColorSpot and ColorWash 1200 AT fixtures for cable TV channel HBO's most popular football show Inside the NFL. The show was recorded at the Ford Museum in Detroit.

Circuit Lighting services many major TV shows and events, and their team of four was led by Mirash Lekaj for this event. This award-winning and popular cable talk show, which analyzes football teams and games, was staged in the middle of the Museum's exhibition displays.The fixtures were dotted around across the floor, on the set and on a ground supported trussing system. Being in a museum environment was very challenging - all the work had to be undertaken with great care and skill, and with the safety of the exhibits in mind at all times.

The Robe's - 12 Spot and 12 Wash fixtures, the latter with electronic ballast - were chosen because of familiar

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Belgium - Barco reports that the Royal Sporting Club Anderlecht (RSC Anderlecht) has chosen Barco's latest sports perimeter LED solution for its very own Constant Vanden Stock Stadium in Belgium. The SP-10, specifically optimized for Broadcast, brings LED visualization and the broadcasting world together for the first time.

Anderlecht chose the Barco SP-10 and Sports Box management controller for its stadium as it wanted to differentiate itself from other stadiums by providing an enhanced match day experience for fans, viewers and advertisers alike. As one of the most successful Belgium football teams on the European level, Anderlecht fully recognizes the real value the SP-10 will add to the sponsorship packages that it is able to offer advertisers. With the SP-10, advertising opportunities are greatly improved and provide a better experience for viewers and greater revenue oppo

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USA - Loud Technologies has appointed Jeffrey Cox to the position of vice-president for the EAW brand group. As the new business leader for the EAW brand, Cox will be responsible for defining and leading all business and product strategies, including collaborating with Loud's sales, engineering, operations and marketing teams to ensure the deployment of these plans worldwide.

Cox brings to EAW a proven track record of introducing industry-defining sound reinforcement products and building highly successful business organizations around them. As the founder and CEO of Cox Audio Engineering, he was responsible for the introduction and manufacturing of the L-Acoustics V-Dosc Line Array, a product that caused a paradigm shift in loudspeaker formatting which completely altered modern-day touring and installed systems.

"I couldn't be happier that Jeff has agreed to head EAW,&qu

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UK - AV and integration specialists Metropolis have completed a sound, lighting and AV installation at the new-build independently owned Common Room in Sheffield, which features the first use of their new Met3 RGB Cove Strip LED product.

The venue's owners wanted to appeal to wide mix of students, young professionals and sports fans, and approached Metropolis on the strength of their other work in this field which includes the current Sports Café brand roll out.

For the first floor Common Room - in a converted Post Office warehouse building - they wanted to create a stimulating and lively environment throughout the bars and large pool playing area with the imaginative use of sound, lighting and AV. They also wanted colour changing LED lighting in the street side windows and below the pool tables.

The project was managed for Metropolis by Stuart Clowes. The client's sp

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USA - Meyer Sound has announced that mixer Mark Frink has joined the company in the position of tour manager.

Frink has spent decades on the road mixing FOH and monitors for artists ranging from Tony Bennett to Joni Mitchell to Meredith Brooks. He also has worked on major events including the Superbowl, Pope John Paul II's 1995 Giants Stadium appearance, the New York Philharmonic/Metropolitan Opera's In the Parks concert series, and the Tibet Freedom Concert held at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C. Most recently, Frink acted as monitor engineer and production manager for k.d. lang on her 2004-2005 worldwide tour, on which she performed in concert halls with symphony orchestras.

Frink has also kept his finger on the pulse of the industry through his 10 years as sound reinforcement editor for MIX magazine, as well as a recent stint as tour sound editor for Li

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UK - XL Video supplied video equipment and crew for the sold out arena tour of Jeff Wayne's War of The Worlds. The show - a dream of Wayne's to tour live ever since he wrote the piece in 1978 - has received great reviews for its staging and projection visuals.

The tour, run by Steve Nolan's Chromatic Productions Ltd, featured a front projected 80ft wide by 15ft high screen using eight Barco ELM R18 projectors, relaying two hours of high resolution CGI narrative visuals, created by Media Station.Above was a massive Martian Fighting Machine (MFM) set piece, and on stage right was a flown 10ft three-dimensional head onto which a specially made video animation of narrator Richard Burton was projected.

The tour was project man

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Italy - Following a very successful first year, in which business targets for the first two years were exceeded, Star Orbit Italia has moved to larger offices. A total of 35 Star Orbit stages were erected in 2005 around Italy, ranging in size from 12m to 20m spans and extra equipment is currently being manufactured to build up the Italian stocks.

The benefit of the operation was also dramatically demonstrated on Live 8 weekend in 2005, when the UK industry completely ran out of stage roofs. But Star Events Group was able to come to the rescue provide a 20m Orbit system by shipping it over from Italy to the organisers of B-Live on Clapham Common at very short notice.

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USA - After a recent remodel, Christ United Methodist Church (CUMC) in Sugar Land, Texas moved into a larger and more aesthetically pleasing space. Unfortunately, the room suffered from a twofold reverberation problem: too much of the wrong kind for one application, and not enough of the right kind for another.

The church's dual dilemmas stemmed from the spectral characteristics of the sanctuary's architectural acoustics. Any sound system that fully excited the room would produce high-frequency reverberation certain to impair voice intelligibility. At the same time, low-mid reverberation needed for depth and fullness in organ music and congregational singing would be seriously deficient. Further architectural changes to remedy the situation would have been prohibitively expensive, and likely detrimental to the visual aesthetics of the room, as well. Fortunately, consultant and a

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