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China - Singer songwriter Jacky Cheung, regarded as the 'God of Songs' in the Chinese community, recently played a run of 20 dates at the Hong Kong Coliseum. A variety of DPA microphones was used for the concerts.

For Cheung's vocal, the DPA 4088 miniature cardioid headband was used. The 4088 has long been used for Cheung's acoustically demanding concert performances where sound quality, visual elegance, background noise and feedback are concerns, as it has been proven to tackle these challenges with ease.

For the musicians, six DPA 4099S and 4099T live clip mics were applied for the horn section which included trombone, trumpet, alto and tenor sax. A combination of 11 DPA 4061 miniatures and 4099V were used for the string section which included violin, viola and cello.

"

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Sweden - Gröna Lund Amusement Park, located in Stockholm, has recently inaugurated two new rides, including the Blå Tåget.

The Blå Tåget ride already existed but has gone through a total makeover. This ride is a ghost train loaded with new chills, thrills and effects especially designed for visitors' enjoyment. The train passes through several chambers, each filled with skeletons, scarecrows, rats, wolves, fire, lightning, ghosts and more.

The setting inside the ride was designed by artist Magnus Sörman and the entrance to the ride was designed by Joakim Hansén. For the technical making of this scary adventure-ride, Kreativ Teknik was contacted by Gröna Lund. Kreativ Teknik, a Swedish-based company which mainly works with lighting, control systems and effects, selected Medialon to be part of the project.

Kreativ Teknik delivered a total solution including light

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Czech Republic - Moving light and LED manufacturer Robe lighting will sponsor and co-organise the 2013 Showlight conference, which will be held in ?eský Krumlov in south Bohemia.

Staged every four years, Showlight is an international symposium organised by and for professionals working in all areas of lighting and the visual arts including video and projections, stage and set design.

Open to all, from the most experienced practitioners to the most enthusiastic aspirants across all sectors of the performing arts and entertainment industries, the four-day colloquium is supported by an exhibition and a full social programme for networking.

A diverse range of individuals attend Showlight. It is a forum for discussion, debate and exchange of knowledge and ideas, as well as an opportunity for approximately 400 guests to see a selection of the latest technology available. Companie

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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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The Netherlands - eldoLED's LINEARdrive 720D - designed for full-colour LED applications in entertainment, stage, façade and architectural lighting - has been upgraded to support 5V, 12V, 24V and 48V LED strips.

The LED strips can even operate concurrently, giving designers increased freedom and future proofing for the installation, says the company. The LINEARdrive, which dims down to as low as 0.1%, can be used with all leading protocols (DALI, DMX, DMX/RDM, 0-10V). A wealth of configurations settings is set over the intuitive user interface.

Thanks to the driver's Remote Device Management support, you can easily track down and address your luminaires from an RDM capable DMX controller. There is no need to open luminaires to re-address the driver during installation or re-commissioning.

When using the LINEARdrive in a DMX network, you can easily configure it to get the li

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UK - The only remaining flying Vulcan bomber plane has returned to its original cold-war hangar, with a special ceremony supported by LS-Live.

A crowd of over 200 admired the Vulcan XH558 bomber plane at its new permanent home in Hangar 3 at Robin Hood Airport in Doncaster, Sheffield, the historic site of former RAF Finningley. The iconic aircraft, said to be one of the most popular planes in the world, will be open to the public and available for private and commercial events.

"This is one of the biggest steps for Vulcan XH558 since her return to flight in 2007. It brings a new era of opportunities that will help to fund her future and provide new levels of access for her supporters," said Vulcan to the Sky Trust CEO, Dr Robert Pleming.

Aviation event company Directions CIC needed support in producing the event to celebrate the return of the Vulcan and LS-Live sup

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UK - Liverpool based rental company Adlib supplied lighting, sound, AV and considerable presentational expertise in the genre of live comedy to the recent Good Mourning Mrs Brown UK arena & theatre tour starring Irish comedian, Brendan O'Carroll.

Wanting to retain the intimacy and feel of the original theatre show, a pros arch look was recreated at the front of the stage with black drapes and theatre tabs, with the two left and right IMAG video screens incorporated into the draping system. Side masking and a full set of legs was also supplied by the Adlib team, who used the house black upstage at each venue.

The tour's production was designed by Martin Delany & Adlib Design's Peter Abraham who says, "The set & design haven't changed dramatically over the last 10 years just the technology used to create the effects makes our lives easier. The biggest challenge was r

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UK - Manchester based lighting design and rental company DBN is often involved in interesting and esoteric arts-based projects, but particularly during the Manchester International festival (MIF), their collective ingenuity and sense of adventure is called on to collaborate in some truly evocative and different works.

This was the case when Stephen Page was invited by MIF to illuminate a performance by virtuoso Russian-born violinist Alina Ibragimova in collaboration with filmmakers and animators, The Brothers Quay. It was staged in and around the Library of the historic Chetham's School of Music, Manchester.

The atmospheric promenade performance for 100 people each evening introduced them to several different locations in the heart of Chetham's 600 year old centre of learning, where Ibragimova performed four different solo violin pieces by Berio, Bach, Biber and Bartók.

In

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Australia - As a part of the AFL's expansion into the Gold Coast, the new $144m Metricon Stadium has opened at Carrarra. Metricon Stadium is operated by the Gold Coast SUNS, was designed by Populous, built by Watpac and the audio installation was carried out by The PA People.

The stadium is a multipurpose facility that currently seats 25,000 spectators and will be capable of being extended to 40,000 seats in the future. Metricon Stadium features an AFL oval that will also be capable of holding ICC cricket matches, concerts, festivals, IAAF athletics events and FIFA World Cup soccer matches.

The PA People opted for a tested formula that they have used in other stadiums designed around a variety of JBL speakers. The Stadium has grandstands around three-quarters of its perimeter with an open Northern end where the scoreboard is situated.

"We have 20 clusters to deal with t

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Europe - Yamaha's free StageMix iPad app has been an extraordinary success since its launch in September 2010, says the company. After over 45,000 downloads of the app, the company has announced the launch of StageMix 2.0, which gives users of M7CL andLS9 digital mixing consoles even greater control.

The success of StageMix is proved by it being downloaded more than 130 times every day since it was first announced at PLASA 2010.

Connected via the iPad's built-in WiFi and a wireless connection point linked to the mixing console via Cat 5 cable, the straightforward, intuitive graphic interface of StageMix allows the user to easily mix stage sound via anM7CL or LS9, even if the mixing console is at the front of house position.

A number of new functions complement the existing array of controls, which include control of input channel faders, on/off, parametric EQs and channel cu

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UK - PR Lighting has intensified its penetration of the architectural lighting market with the release of the PR-8800 and PR-8802 - which "create vibrant outdoor colour changes with the added possibility of wireless DMX control".

The PR-8800's design includes a true outdoor IP67 waterproof rating, an advanced RGB colour mixing system and automatic environmental brightness adjustment. It has already obtained an exterior design patent.

Containing 108 x 3W LED's (27 each RGBW) and linear colour temperature correction, it has a power consumption of 350W at 220V and LED lifetime of 50,000 hours. Other features include 0-100% linear adjustable dimmer; 0-20 fps strobe; field angle of 28°(with optional 26° and 56°) and beam angle of 14° (with optional 8° and 45°); DMX512 (and wireless) control, with 16 recallable preset and 16 user memories. The DMX m

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UK - LD Systems has released the D1015CM gooseneck microphone. The slim and flexible design of the D1015CM gooseneck microphone with its professional, highly sensitive and uni-directional condenser element makes it designed for all situations where supreme clarity is required, says the company.

Its low self noise also makes it suitable for professional sound reinforcement and recording in meeting and seminar rooms, schools and churches. Equipped with a three-pole XLR connector, it operates on phantom power (9 - 52 V).

Andrew Richardson, managing director of Adam Hall UK comments, "The LD D1015CM Conference Microphone provides an overall improved performance and is ideal for spoken word applications such as seminars, schools, churches and meetings."

Accessories include the D1015CMB Metal Base, which ensures secure positioning of gooseneck microphones and offers a fe

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Northern News - Scotland's oldest working theatre, the Theatre Royal in Dumfries built in 1792, has been saved from closure with support from the local charitable Holywood Trust. The trust has agreed in principle to make a "substantial contribution" towards work required to upgrade the theatre and make the building weather-tight. The Guild of Players, which has owned the 215-seat theatre since 1959, will also be able to purchase two adjacent properties.

Children's Favourite - Bristol Old Vic's production of Swallows and Amazons is to play in London's West End for a five-week Christmas run. Based on the classic children's novel by Arthur Ransome, the songs for the musical have been created by The Divine Comedy's Neil Hannon. It will be directed by Bristol Old Vic's Tom Morris, co-director of the National Theatre's West End hit War Horse. The show wi

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Europe - The entertainment horse show, Apassionata, has just completed its By the Light of the Stars tour. This saw the spectacular event visit 30 European cities between November 2010 and May this year, with more than 500,000 tickets sold.

The impressive mixture of horse show and acrobatics was thematically embedded in a gentle, romantic story. Altogether, 45 horses starred on the specially-created stage, captivating audiences with their charm. To reinforce the story, the entire Apassionata manège was continuously bathed in different-coloured lighting, giving extra depth to this equestrian theatre.

Lighting designer Henning Schletter used among other effects 20 impression 90 RGB, 12 impression 240 XL and 36 Ypoc 700 CMY heads, from LED moving head manufacturer GLP.

Schletter has been a freelance lighting designer and operator for many years and is fami

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USA - Turning the clock back two decades, boy bands New Kids on the Block and Backstreet Boys have joined forces in a major American sell-out arena tour this summer under the soubriquet NKOTBSB.

In order to allow the bands to engage at close quarters with their hordes of screaming fans, production designer Butch Allen designed a 91ft catwalk leading from the main stage to a 'B' stage - using no fewer than 79 GLP Volkslicht Zoom LED spots to edge the perimeter of the vast 155ft-wide main and subsidiary stages - including 17 footlights down each side of the thrust. The complex staging and movement was fabricated by Tait Towers.

"Since the whole set design was based around the 91ft thrust, my idea was to use the Volkslichts as footlights, to carve the space out around the audience," said Allen, explaining the concept.

The tour has seen him reunited with Jesse Blevins

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Italy - ETC dealers from across central and southern Europe got to view the company's new Rome office - and experience legendary Italian hosting - earlier this month, as part of ETC's annual Dealer Focus event.

In a series of talks and seminars over the course of three days, delegates learned about new ETC products, projects and systems.

Part of the event centred on ETC's latest LED fixtures, Selador Desire, which comes in a range of different options, each optimised for every type of lighting need.

Selador's x7 Colour System adds four colours to the traditional RGB mix, radically expanding the colour range and power. The range was specifically designed to mix well with traditional tungsten lighting, giving lighting designers the best of both worlds. Desire's optional red shift mode mimics the way the colour temperature of a tungsten lamp warms as it fades.

Erik Larsen, ma

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Germany - For 20 years, music lovers from Germany and abroad have been travelling to the Classic Open Air Festival in Berlin to enjoy internationally acclaimed artists performing classical masterpieces in the magnificent setting of the Gendarmenmarkt square. During the past years around 600,000 people have attended 105 concerts, with musical offerings ranging from opera, operetta and musicals to crossover productions featuring pop, soul, swing and jazz classics.

With this year's series of concerts between 7 and 12 July 7, the organiser celebrated 20 years of staging this successful event. At the same time, a new technical concept made its debut behind the scenes. This year for the first time, the audio infrastructure was digital, based on the use of two all-digital Eclipse mixing consoles from Innovason and digital microphones from Berlin-based manufacturer Neumann.

An Etherso

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Italy - Gardaland, one of the best known and most popular amusement parks in Europe, has chosen the Coemar Infinity ACL M for its recently redesigned Art Deco theatre.

Jerry Roberto Romani, designer of the theatre's lighting system, has evaluated these mobile heads designed for creating light scenes in shows and musicals. The ACL M were chosen because they are "adaptable, small, powerful, and low consumption. Furthermore, their silence makes them ideal for theatrical/musical productions".

Thanks to their characteristics they have been selected by the technical staff of Gardaland, and in particular by artistic director Filippo Tassi and his assistant Roberto Botti.

(Jim Evans)

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USA - Push the point hard enough and consolidation is inevitable; that's the premise presented to Simon Foster as he prepared to take the revitalized Pixies around north America once more. "We had already confirmed the LED video and lighting parts of the tour," said Craig Mitchell, "when I learned the band's preference was for a d&b audiotechnik PA system, I suggested we provide sound as well."

Mitchell handles touring sales at Florida-based LMG, a company with a long and highly reputable history in the corporate market, but relatively less well known in touring circles. For Pixies production manager Simon Foster the one stop shop logic was sound, but it's not just equipment that determines these things.

"I wasn't familiar with LMG before the last Pixies US tour," said the band's long time house engineer Ray Furze. "When Simon mentioned they

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Sweden - DiGiCo digital mixing consoles have recently been used by Swedish rental company, eurosound media crew, for two very different projects.

The first sees a DiGiCo SD9 take up residence at Sweden's national broadcaster, Swedish Television, for 55 consecutive days from 13 June for its early morning children's show, Sommarlov, which is not only broadcast nationwide, but also has a live audience of 500 children each morning.

"The SD9 and D-Rack sit at the heart of the whole sound set-up as the mic pre/gain master," says eurosound's Mattias Dalin. "The show is set in the harbour at Malmoe's Docklands, but the broadcast sound is mixed in SVT's regular studio control room at their premises. A two-way fibre connection between the SD9 and the control room services all audio signals.

"Because of this set-up, we need maximum safety and we're confident

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UK - Canford is providing a PLASA debuts for the new 'enhanced' Tecpro Wireless handsets and TW403 wired to wireless interface, the new RTS BTR-240 wireless comms system, Cat 5e stageboxes and multicore cables in several lengths up to 75m and last but not least the EMO E810 LED racklight that interfaces with comms systems to flash, letting the operator know of a call inbound.

Canford will also show a selection from their comprehensive range of cables including the D'n'A series which redesigned all their most popular audio cables to handle both analogue and AES digital audio. Also being featured by Canford will be the latest products from Cloud and Databay.

The new enhanced Tecpro Wireless beltpacks offer full Duplex Operation and licence-free operation in the UHF frequency band. The powerful new handsets can supply up to 200mW with a 400m max Range and now benefit from a range

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UK - CHAUVET, a leading manufacturer of professional lighting recently installed nearly 150 Chauvet fixtures in Troxy, a multifunctional venue for live concerts, corporate events, weddings, indoor sports and more. Lighting designer Dan Sanders capitalized on the dramatic uplighting opportunities of the art-deco style venue with a bevy of LED wash lights specified by JPS Sound & Light based in St. Ives.

Installed throughout the venue are 16 COLORado Tri Tour, 60 COLORband Tri and 10 COLORado Batten 72 Tour, as well as 36 LED PAR 38 wash lights. Sanders specifically sought LED-fitted fixtures due to their longer life and color changing capabilities.

"There are 150 fixtures installed throughout," Sanders said. "I didn't want to change 150 light bulbs. Colour-changing LEDs were selected because the interior is white and pastel and we could add colours and turn [the

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