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USA - The three-day Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival annually attracts crowds of up to 70,000 a day to see more than 180 international artists perform on six stages at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, in the California desert.

To meet the requirements of the artists performing on the stages in the Mojave and Gobi tents, Rat Sound, the production sound provider for the Coachella Festival for the past 11 years, this year supplied two complete systems comprising a total of 28 EAW MicroWedge12 (MW12) stage monitors.

"We provide the artists with what they want rather than what we think they should have, and we offer three premium monitor systems," stated Dave Rat, Rat Sound Systems founder and co-developer of the MicroWedge line with EAW. "The sound quality, volu

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Slovakia - A new venue, Happy End, opened in the Slovakian Jasná ski resort this year, featuring a flexible Funktion One and XTA audio system.

Happy End functions as a restaurant during the day and a lively entertainment venue during the evening, so an audio system was needed that would provide subtle background music for diners, but also provide high energy, high quality sound reinforcement for DJs and live bands.

"There was only one requirement - to provide the best sound, positive vibes and maximum power for the music," says Igor Horváth of Humenné-based installation company Citylight. "So, for me, there was only one possible solution."

Happy End's owner had been to the Blue Note jazz club in the Slovakian town of Nové Mesto nad Váhom, which was Igor's first Funktion One, MC2 and XTA installation in the country. "With that combina

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UK - Scottish band, GlasVegas, is currently on a global tour with a compact Allen & Heath iLive digital mixing system managing its FOH audio. The band has already visited an assortment of venues across Europe and the USA, and is playing at many of the international summer festivals, including a headline spot on the John Peel stage at Glastonbury.

FOH engineer, Steve Pattison, has previously used various iLive systems for bands such as Alphabeat, Ellie Goulding and Royksopp, and for this tour, has opted for an iDR-48 MixRack with the rackmount iLive-R72, supplemented by the iLive MixPad app, providing remote and instant control of key faders.

"The R72 fits anywhere and I can carry it under my arm but that's only part of the story," Pattison reports. "To me, using only the basic functions of a desk is like having a gym membership and never going. There are a lot o

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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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UK - Clay Paky has announced a competition in which visitors to PLASA 2011 will be able to win a free Sharpy spotlight.

The company is bringing two of its vintage, Vegas-style slot machines to the show, customised to allow players to play for one of the company's most sought-after products.

Clay Paky president Pasquale Quadri, a long-time collector of gambling paraphernalia, has had two machines from his personal collection specially refurbished in a Clay Paky theme. All guests at the Clay Paky stand (1E 36) will be entitled to a free spin of the reels, while any visitor bearing an official voucher will be able to double their chances with an additional play. The redeemable vouchers can be retrieved from the official PLASA catalogue or from the July edition of Lighting & Sound International.

The slot machines will be in operation throughout the official opening hours

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UK - 2011 marks not only the fortieth anniversary of entertainment lighting specialist White Light, but also 10 years since the company moved to its expansive headquarters in Wimbledon, South-West London. Now, White Light is expanding again - spreading into a neighbouring building to increase its footprint by more than 50 percent.

To mark this expansion, it is inviting everyone along to explore the new facility during an Open Day on Thursday, 21 July.

"For those who remember it, our base in Fulham was charming but difficult to work in, particularly as more and more shows moved to HGV transport and the drivers had to back down the narrow suburban streets," comments White Light's managing director, Bryan Raven. "Moving to Wimbledon a decade ago immediately made life easier, with much more office space, much more storage and equipment preparation space, and much, m

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Canada - Pop act Donny & Marie Osmond are taking their Las Vegas show to the cooler climes of Canada. Pete's Big TVs is providing equipment for the special run of high-energy Donny & Marie Live shows this month at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto.

LD Peter Morse, who designed the duo's long-running show at The Flamingo Las Vegas Hotel & Casino, designed a smaller production of the multimedia spectacular for this special two-week gig. Running the shows is lighting director Joseph Eddy, who directs the Flamingo shows for Morse as well.

"It's a fun show," Morse says. "It's a scaled down version of the Vegas show, with just three trusses of lights. There's a lot of archival content projected on the video screens, and we're adding three new songs into the repertoire from the new album."

Pete's Big TVs is supplying three LED scr

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UK - Tower Productions has recently devised a showpower package of four generators in an attempt to lessen fuel use and 'empty running' at concerts and other applications where the load profile changes dramatically.

The synchronised package of two small and two large machines has proved popular with promoters as it offers fuel saving and greater redundancy than a traditional two-engine set up, says Tower. Typically only one small machine is needed for the fit-up period or night running, this can be synchronised with its mate or left running/standby, with the large machines not commissioned until rehearsals/showtime.

All four machines can be synchronised together to give 600kVA. So far, Rod Stewart and JLS have had this setup, with Simple Minds and Boyzone coming up.

Tower's Pete Donald comments: "It's a fantastic set up as it allows us to shoe-horn machines into tight s

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Germany - Hamburg's oldest parish church, Hauptkirche St. Petri, founded in the 11th century, has been equipped with a state of the art sound system designed and installed by Cobra sound light. The Hamburg based live event and system design company has fitted church of the Hanseatic city with Renkus-Heinz IC Live digitally beam steerable loudspeakers.

Located in the heart of downtown on Hamburg's major shopping hub, Mönckebergstrasse, the 1,033-seat Hauptkirche St. Petri is considered the 'city church' and opens its doors daily to offer on oasis of calm and a place to meet.

Cobra sound light engineer and project manager Hendrik Thode says the company's roots in live events is reflected in its approach to installations. "In live shows we always meet a new challenge. The fascinating job definition now is using new tools which offer new potential even in difficult locations

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Germany - The Eurogress in Aachen is one of the most modern conference centres in Germany. Situated in the middle of a park, the complex offers facilities for a wide variety of events, including concerts, exhibitions, theatrical performances, trade fairs and conferences.

The facilities include 16 conference rooms (with capacities varying from 15 to 420 places) as well as three halls of different sizes (with capacities of 1700, 650 and 430 seats respectively). Of the three halls, the best known to the general public is the Europasaal. It is this architecturally outstanding venue that provides the setting for the presentation of the annual Wider den Tierischen Ernst awards that brings the carnival in Aachen to a conclusion.

The progressive installation of a comprehensive alarm and sound reinforcement system in the building began back in 2004. Now the long-term project has

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Australia - A new event production company, Absolute Sound & Lighting (ASL) offering a broad range of equipment and professional services has chosen dBTechnologies speaker systems.

The company is located equidistant from Queensland's Sunshine Coast and the state capital, Brisbane. Managing directors Steve Teunis and Camryn Brown saw the need for another event production company to serve the fast growing population and huge tourist market in the region. No strangers to event organisation and shifting black boxes, Teunis and Brown seized the opportunity, pooling their resources and putting together a comprehensive portfolio.

"We have a dBTechnologies box for every occasion," says Brown, listing the inventory which includes the DVA Line Array, FlexSys mid/high units, S20 subwoofers, DVX series monitors and the digital Opera series. "In fact, we have enough boxes t

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Germany - The 24-hour race on the Nürburgring ended with a victory for Porsche. The Manthey Racing team's drivers came out on top after completing 156 laps on the legendary Nordschleife.

During the race, tarm Showlaser GmbH projected large-format laser graphics on the castle ruins, under contract to the Stuttgart-based agency, Silkroad.

The Porsche logo, a silhouette of the Nürburg and animated laser effects were blazed against the night sky by a pair of full-colour, 25W lasers.

(Jim Evans)

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Spain - Rosco Europe has announced that Cristian Arroyo of Rosco Iberica is to take on an expanded role within the company from 1 July 2011. Arroyo's new position is a dual role consisting of business development manager - South Europe and European textiles manager.

As business development manager - South Europe, Arroyo will be responsible for developing Rosco markets in Italy, Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Croatia, Malta, Slovenia, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Bosnia, Kosovo and Israel. In doing so he will be taking over the territories previously handled by Margie Heymann who steps back from 30 years of account management to focus on European colour filter production management. Arroyo and Heymann will work closely together over the next six months to ensure a smooth transition of responsibilities.

As European textiles manager, Arroyo will focus on Rosco's aim of generating signif

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Finland - Genelec has updated its 8000 Series monitors to include new contemporary colour options. The new finishes add a touch of style to the series while retaining the traditional strengths of the leading 2-way monitor series on the market, says the company.

"During its years on the market, the 8000 Series has become the benchmark for active monitoring loudspeakers" says Terho Savolainen, marketing manager of Genelec Oy. "With its combination of excellent performance and user-friendly features the range is a popular monitoring choice across a range of disciplines; studio, broadcast, installed event and fixed installation.

"This popularity has extended into the home studio market where aesthetic considerations can be a persuasive influence. We've responded to this trend by updating the colour palette of the range with some new contemporary finishes specif

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USA - The Christie YK100 won the title of Most Innovative New Product at the InfoComm/Rental & Staging New Product Awards ceremony held in Orlando, Florida.

The Christie YK100 single-arm yoke system is designed for use with the Christie M Series and Christie LX1500 projectors, offering brightness levels ranging from 5700 to 15,000 ANSI lumens and a choice between 3-chip DLP and 3LCD technologies. DMX512 protocol manages projector movement and control - empowering users to integrate and control lighting equipment and video projectors easily with the same console. Another advantage of the Christie YK100 design is its quick lock system. This interchangeable head system lets users replace the video projector with another Christie projector or Xenon light - on the same yoke.

Installed at ground level or rigged to truss, Christie Nitro Solutions are designed for video projection map

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The Netherlands - Fairlight has been appointed the new official distributor of Lynx Pro Audio products in the Netherlands. Fairlight made contact with Lynx Pro Audio at Frankfurt in April and went to Valencia for meetings and to demo the product range.

Peter Van Workum, Fairlight director said: "On paper the Lynx products looked really impressive so we decided to take a trip to Spain to see if they sounded as good as we thought. We were not disappointed. We were very impressed not only with the LX Line Arrays but also the ADP touring range and the QB Install series. We placed a substantial stock order and enough material to set up a demo room here in Holland.

Lynx's Ben Sinclair commented: "We are very pleased to be working with Fairlight. They are a very professional team with many years' experience in the Dutch market and they know their stuff. I am confident they

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UK - Audient's ASP8024 mixing desk scored a thumbs-up from engineers, producers and artists at the first temporary recording studio at Glastonbury, this year. Consisting of a wooden structure and straw bales rendered in mud, Cowshed Studio hosted artists including the Noisettes, Jah Wobble, Seth Lakeman and Show of Hands as well as many unsigned hopefuls taking the stage.

Audient supplied the 24-channel high resolution console to the project, the brainchild of music producer Joe Leach of Cowshed Studio in London, who wanted to create a highly specified, fully soundproof recording studio in the middle of a field at the festival.

UK sales manager Gareth Williams was on hand to hear the comments from the various users throughout the five-day event. "We're not using any external mic pres at all, we are using all the console pres and they sound clean as a whistle. We're all re

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Israel - Britannia Row Productions has provided a Midas XL8 live performance system for an open air production of Aida, part of the Masada, Dead Sea and Jerusalem Opera Festival in June.

Verdi's opera was performed against the backdrop of Mount Masada by the Israel Symphony Orchestra conducted by Daniel Oren, with the Tel Aviv Philharmonic Choir. At front of house was engineer Richard Sharratt, veteran of many classical and operatic concerts, and a fan of the XL8 for his productions. "I always enjoy using the XL8 as the sound quality next to none, the EQ and dynamics are powerful and natural, and there is great versatility of control by using POP(ulation) groups," he says.

BRP's system tech Josh Lloyd has also worked with the XL8 on many gigs and festivals, and found the system's flexibility came into its own for the five Masada performances, which required a

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UK - Summer cocktails hosted by WiSE (Women in Stage Entertainment) went down a storm at the ABTT show. WiSE Industry sponsors were invited to dabble in cocktail design by inventing their own cocktails to raise money for industry charity, Light Relief.

The cocktail line up included: the Avolites Ruby Rum, Charcoalblue Cooler, White Light Wimms, Rosco Lux Sangria, Phillips Entertainment Blue Hawaii and the drink with no name from MA Lighting.

Whilst sampling the various concoctions on offer, WiSE sponsors, members, guests and the press had the chance to network, make new friends and give generously to charity. Ultimately the event raised a respectable £137 for Light Relief, all in the space of just a couple of hours.

Coral Cooper, industry veteran and Philips Vari-Lite trainer was cocktail coordinator extraordinaire and kept the

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USA/UK - Following the unveiling of their latest design/documentation tool, Stardraw Design 7, at InfoComm last month Stardraw.com has reported a massive uptake for the public beta programme.

Stardraw.com marketing director Rob Robinson explained that the beta program for Design 7 was announced publically on Friday 1 July and interested parties were invited to register. "Considering that it was the start of one of the biggest holiday weekends in the US, we were anticipating a slow take-up in the first week following the announcement. However, by Tuesday 5 July, despite the fact that there had been no working days in the US since the beta programme was announced, we already had well over 1000 registrants."

The application is Stardraw.com's seventh-generation software solution for systems integrators. Offering a holistic approach to system design and documentation, Sta

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UK - Jodrell Bank Observatory, the site of the UK's iconic Lovell radio telescope, presided over the first of a potential new series of live concerts.

Manchester based dbn was asked to provide lighting by co-promoters Ear To the Ground, who were collaborating with Kendall Calling and The Warehouse Project to stage the event in this different setting, headlined by the Flaming Lips. Also on the bill was British Sea Power, OK GO and two other bands. A 5000 capacity audience attended.

dbn's project manager Nick Walton comments: "It was a fantastic opportunity to work in a very special place overlooked by one of the most amazing scientific instruments in the world. Everything went smoothly and it was a massive success all round. We hope this will be the first of more events here".

The 12m orbit stage was situated just to the right of the 76m wide revolving telescope dis

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Indonesia - Located some 20k from Jakarta, the Sentul International Convention Center (SICC) was recently the site of the Justin Bieber concert. Held as part of the artist's My World Tour, Jakarta-based DSS (Don Sistem Suara) rental company was contracted to provide sound reinforcement services. The SICC is Indonesia's largest indoor concert facility and DSS provided an impressive sound system drawn from the Aero and Aero Series 2 catalogues of D.A.S. Audio.

With the ability to accommodate as many as 11,000 people in its main hall, the SICC is a challenging acoustic environment.Donny Hardono, owner of DSS and a highly recognized figure among the region's music industry, reports:

"For this concert, we deployed 32 D.A.S. Audio Aero-38, three-way, medium format line array elements. These enclosures were flown in four clusters - each with eight line array elements. We

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