The Electroacoustics Group of the Institute of Acoustics in collaboration with ABTT, APRS & ISCE is staging Reproduced Sound 23 at The Sage, Gateshead, 29-30 November, and has issued a 'Call for papers'.

"This Reproduced Sound conference will be hosted at one of the UK's newest and largest venues for staging concerts and other live events," says an IOA spokesman. "We will have an auditorium to use for the presentations and for any demonstrations associated with these, so there is an exciting opportunity to devote a large part of the conference to subjects relating to audio in the production of live events. These might include: sound reinforcement, room acoustics, recording (audio and video), broadcast, loudspeakers and microphones, intelligibility, innovations."

Germany - Berlin's historic KulturBrauere (Culture Brewery), a former beer brewery, includes six courts and more than 20 richly decorated attached buildings including the Kesselhaus which is used increasingly as a rock music venue.

A recent was a sold out evening featured Linkin Park previewing material for their upcoming European and North American Tours.

Kenneth Van Druten, Linkin Park's FOH engineer, specified Adamson for the upcoming Linkin Park dates after meeting with Jesse Adamson at a ZZ Top gig using the Adamson Yaxis rig in Corpus Christi, Texas, who were playing on an Adamson's Yaxis rig.

Van Druten's requirements for the show were specific: even coverage and excellent intelligibility throughout the venue to do Linkin Park's new material proper justice. Jochen Sommer, Adamson's newest addition to its European support personnel assisted with the final system design

France - Fleetwood Mobiles was backstage in Paris recently to capture Avril Lavigne in concert for an MTV Special, which was broadcast during April at various different time slots. Fleetwood director Tim Summerhayes travelled to the city with only a D-Rig for company. The concert audio was captured at the side of the stage using API mic amps and Radar.

"The concert took place in an old music hall near Sacre Coeur, in front of an invited audience," Summerhayes explains. "Access to the venue was very restricted, so I had to use a D-Rig instead of a mobile recording truck. However, Avril's road crew were incredibly helpful and made sure I had everything I needed. Her performance was electric and that atmosphere really came across on the soundtrack."

The programme was directed by MTV's Russell Thomas and the pictures were recorded on High-8 video by Bolke Burna

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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 final for Unsigned Heroes, AKG's UK unsigned bands competition has been rescheduled. The three bands in the final, Liverpool's The Kashmirs, Hertfordshire's Flamboyant Bella, and London's own The Standards, will now take the stage at Koko on the evening of Friday 1 June, with DJ support from Mani of Primal Scream, before the Club NME event happening at Koko later the same evening.

Amanda Chester, Harman Pro UK's marketing manager, commented: "We're delighted to join Club NME at Koko for the rescheduled final. Club NME is all about great music and upcoming talent, so it's the perfect fit for Unsigned Heroes. It's going to be a great night for music."

(Jim Evans)

USA - Elation has added two high-output fixtures to its Design 36 LED family of lighting products - the Design LED 36WA and Design LED 36 UV. A white and ultraviolet wash respectively, the new DMX-compatible units use advanced LED technology to highlight any object, area or event with drama-enhancing washes of light, says the company.

The Design LED 36WA white wash is designed for video production and other applications where a white light is needed. It includes 30 white LEDs, plus six amber-coloured LEDs, which can be mixed via DMX to create varying degrees of warm and cool white hues. The more amber added, the warmer the white, giving users the ability to create the exact 'shade' of white they desire.

"The addition of amber on the Design LED 36WA brings the colour up to 3,200K to give it extra warmth," explained Eric Loader, director of sales for Elation Profession

UK - Radical Lighting and HSL are collaborating to stage a two-day Open Event at HSL's Blackburn HQ on 29 and 30 May. This is designed to showcase Radical's latest products and services, and offer an insight into the world of digital media and lighting technologies.

The event will be presented by lighting designer Dave Byars (Beautiful South, Futureheads, Young Knives and many more) - known for his innovative work and as a leading exponent in the art of blending lighting and video sources into one visual theme. He has designed a special lighting rig for the occasion to illustrate the various topics and themes of the event.

He is joined by Radical Lighting's technical director, Simon Carter. Both will be on hand to answer questions, along with HSL staff and crew.Day One is titled, 'The technical world of Media Servers', and topics covered will include an introduction to media s

UK - The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (RWCMD) recently staged a new adaptation of The Who's 1973 double album Quadrophenia, which inspired the 1978 film of the same name.

Staged at Cardiff's Sherman Theatre, the entire performing and technical crew of the production were students of RWCMD, which was also the first independent theatrical production of Quadrophenia to receive the endorsement and creative input of The Who's Pete Townshend.

A Yamaha M7CL-48 console was chosen to mix the show, with second year student Seeta Mistry as the show's FOH engineer. She was tutored on the console by RWCMD 'old boy' Nigel Thomas, with some help from Yamaha's Karl Christmas.

Having previously been head of sound at Bristol's Old Vic theatre school - where he determinedly introduced digital audio, Thomas' recent experience with the M7CL on an Opera Babes tour convinced him t

South Korea - A-Works Korea is the name of the new distribution company recently set up to represent French digital console manufacturer, InnovaSON, in South Korea. Based in Sungnam City, A-Works will also be distributing Camco amplifiers and Nexo loudspeakers.

The man behind the move and responsible for the creation of A-Works is James Lee, along with former Nexcor colleague Eddie Kim. Between them, the two men have worked with their three core brands over many years and are confident that the new company will grow business significantly and increase market share for each brand throughout South Korea.

"We feel that the future of pro audio here in South Korea, as it is throughout the rest of the world, lies increasingly within the digital domain," explained James Lee. "We're delighted to have InnovaSON on board as a premium digital console product, and one in wh

China - Outline's distributor for China, Guangzhou ACME Show Technology, organised a seminar/presentation of Outline's entire product range at the Regal Palace Theatre, in collaboration with the Research Institute of TV and Electroacoustics of Beijing and Beijing Hengyiyuan Concert Productions Co.

With this seminar, the manager of Guangzhou ACME Show Technology, Wyman Lee and Outline's vice president and international sales manager, Giorgio Biffi , introduced Outline's complete product line, sold in China under the Butterfly brand.

During the seminar, Prof. Fan Bao Yuan and Prof. Shen Hao described to attendees the tests recently carried out at their Institute on a number of Outline/Butterfly products, confirming the high quality of the products and their full respect of specifications declared by the Italian manufacturer.

A listening demo of the Butterfly line-array and oth

Germany - Clear-Com has been chosen by TVN Group, one of Germany's leading TV, film and outside broadcast production companies, to equip its new state-of-the-art TVN UE3HD OB truck with matrix intercom systems to expand their communication network.

The new OB truck has been fitted with a Clear-Com Eclipse Matrix with 32 digital and 96 analogue ports, and the new Eclipse PiCo digital matrix. In addition to this, Clear-Com has developed a customised LCD desktop panel to meet TVN's exact installation requirements.

"We have worked with Clear-Com for a long time," said Frank Beekmann, chief production engineer at TVN, "and we've had very good experience with this highly flexible communications system."

(Jim Evans)

Switzerland -With its compact profile and light weight, the Nexo Geo S cabinet is a winning proposition for historic interiors that demand a line-array solution. In Geneva, the Casino Theatre is just such a venue.

Zap Audio, the Geneva-based equipment importer and system designer, has already created an impact in the city with the installation of a Geo S tangent-array system in the celebrated Victoria Hall, a landmark classical music venue well-known in international touring circles.

Encouraged by the success of the Victoria Hall, the Zap team was next consulted by the Casino Theatre, a smaller venue also of historic importance to which they often supplied rental systems. The theatre's technical team chose to design and install the system itself, using Nexo's GEOSoft package.

The Casino Theatre, also known as Le Petit Casino, is mainly used to present small musical and drama

China - The Slek New Air Hostess Show Final, hosted by China Southern and Guangdong TV Station, recently took place in the 800sq.m studio of Guangdong TV Station, with live broadcast by Guangdong TV Satellite Channel and Pearl Channel to all parts of the world. Fifty air hostess candidates presented their individual charms on stage to hundreds of millions of viewers.

The event used W-DMX of Wireless Solution Sweden to transmit DMX signal to four High End Systems DL.2s and a HOG iPC, along with numerous computer lights.

(Jim Evans)

UK - Theatre sound specialist Orbital will be sponsoring dedicated Digital Mixing Desk training sessions at The ABTT Show 13-14 June in London. These sessions will focus on advanced solutions in contemporary theatre shows. Involving the latest Yamaha M7CL console at the hub of the presentations, attendees will be given be offered a hands-on, operational view of the first of Yamaha's latest generation digital consoles.

The sessions will cover topical subjects that play a vital role in today's theatre designs, including digital audio networking and scene management, whilst exploring the creative possibilities of placing a modern digital console at the hub of a system encompassing most of the current audio network solutions available.

Orbital Sound's Simon Whitehorn and Sebastian Frost will host the sessions and fuse their experience and expertise to deliver an illuminating and i

UK - British Harlequin will be exhibiting at the ABTT Theatre Show 2007 to be held at London's Royal Horticultural Halls, 13-14 June. Showing a wide range of examples from their extensive range of floors for performance and display, visitors will able to examine many different floor types with expert support on hand to provide guidance and advice, says the company.

Although widely recognised as world leaders in floors for dance and the performing arts, Harlequin also provide special flooring for television studios, exhibitions and display. Harlequin manufactures a comprehensive range from portable, roll-out floors to cushioned, heavy duty permanent floors, plus permanent and touring sprung floor systems. These are complemented by a range of accessories including tapes and cleaning products, roll straps, storage bags and an extensive range of ballet barres.

Immediately prior to

UK - BeamHoist is the latest addition to Stage Technologies and will be promoted, along with the company's other products at the forthcoming ABTT Theatre Show. Installed at venues in the UK, Europe and China, it provides a low cost power flying systems that is fast and simple to install and i easy to operate. BeamHoist is ideal for smaller venues such as school theatres, conference centres and television studios, says the company.

Also on show will be the Illusionist control console, billed as an affordable entry level console offering all the advanced programming and operating tools of the standard Chameleon software.

Saxis control unit is Stage Technologies' portable single axis system designed for theatre productions, live music concerts, TV and film studios that would like to move a single piece of scenery, fly a performer or "whiz a film camera across a set".Tow

UK - Fresh from its successful launch at ProLight+Sound Frankfurt, the new addition to the RCF TT+ range, the TT08-A will have its UK preview at this ABTT Show in London.

The speaker, which is the smallest member of the TT+ family. The RCF design team has come up with a careful and innovative acoustic design, utilising the highest quality in house transducers. The powerful amplifier makes this system the perfect solution for small live sound situations, as well as playback and monitoring, corporate events and broadcast studios, says the company.

RCF's Phil Price says, "The TT08A represents a breakthrough in speaker technology. We have designed this speaker quite literally from the ground upward, including both the transducers utilised plus digital amplification technology and protection systems.

"In debuting the speaker at ABTT, we feel that we will be targeting th

UK - Brent Woods has been appointed general manager of Litestructures Studios. Canadian born Woods will report to Litestructures GB managing director, Adrian Brooks, and will be responsible for business development, operations, marketing and sales for the Litestructures Studios rehearsal facility.

Since its opening in May 2005 the Studio has hosted production rehearsals for Coldplay, Robbie Williams, Muse, George Michael, Westlife, Meat Loaf and many others.

Adrian Brooks says, "This is an exciting new appointment for Litestructures. Brent brings with him considerable experience within both the live music and television production sectors. He will bring real innovation to this role and establish the Litestructures Studio as the UK's premier rehearsal facility."Brent Woods adds, "Litestructures has built a wonderful facility which is unique not only in Yorkshire,

USA - Symetrix is showing version 1.1 of the Integrator Series Zone Mix 760 paging and music management system at the InfoComm 2007 exhibition.

Version 1.1 introduces a number of feature enhancements to the 760, a zone mixer that has been designed to provide the optimal feature set and I/O count needed for restaurants, hotels, sports bars and nightclubs.

The number of presets now available has been increased from 10 to fifty, and some minor issues have additionally been fixed.

(Jim Evans)

UK - 5 Star Cases has supplied XL Video with a specialist flight case for one of its Grass Valley Kayak HD mixer/switcher consoles, which is an integral element of its new HD PPU (portable production unit) systems.

The console case was specified by XL Video's Malcolm Whittall, who worked closely with 5 Star's design team on its development. It is designed so the desk stays sitting inside the case once in position and set up.

5 Star has also made cases for other XL Video consoles in the past, and Whittall comments, "They have an excellent woodworking department, are really flexible and will make things on request - always a great advantage."

The console case is based around 5 Star's Heavy Industrial range of flight cases and is sloped and shaped to the Kayak, featuring all the usual recessed hardware and the XL Video logo and graphics cut into the wood.

XL put the

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