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UK - Soundcraft has added a further model, the MH2, to its range of VCA-grouped performance consoles. It is aimed at "touring companies and installations of all sizes".

Alongside its bigger brothers the MH3 and MH4, the MH2 is also capable of dual-mode (FOH/Monitor) applications, and features eight sub-groups, ten auxiliary busses, eight VCA groups and six mute groups, as well as an integral 11x4 matrix. It is available in frame sizes of 24, 32, 40 and 48 mono channels, all with four comprehensive, full function stereo inputs as standard.

As with the the other desks in the series, the MH2 can be switched to a front-of-house or monitor mode, whereby ten 60mm faders can be switched to control the auxiliary outputs instead of the groups for monitor use. In FOH mode, these faders normally control the eight group outputs plus two of the auxiliary sends.

"Our custom

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Belgium - Sony Professional Solutions Europe has confirmed that it will be a Platinum Sponsor at ISE 2006 which will be held 1-3 February 2006 at the Brussels Expo. Following its successful debut at ISE 2005 in Amsterdam, Sony will demonstrate its "latest array of products that provide new ways to interact with multimedia information in the office and on the move".

"Sony is looking at the major shows to enhance its visibility in this emerging market and ISE is an emerging platform to achieve this." says Ian Collis, VP marketing for Sony Europe.

"We were pleased with the positive response, feedback and general enthusiasm generated by the 2005 show in Amsterdam and are delighted to see that ISE 2006 is already 40% bigger that the previous show. We see ISE as a pivotal event that has gained an important foothold on the Integrated AV systems market and we

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UK - Following the Muziektheater in Amsterdam, The Royal Opera House in London is the second theatre of international fame that has replaced all current fly bars, as part of the complete theatrical installation, for an installation based on the ProTrac system from Prolyte.Prolyte distributor White Light brought the two parties together after they were informed that the Royal Opera House was looking for a new fly bar installation.

A regular fly-bar does not have the required strength if the uniformly distributed load needs to be upgraded from 300kg to 500kg and the point load from 40kg to 150/200 kg. Therefore, the single round tube is often replaced with ladder beams, usually made from steel. ProTrac offers a better alternative than these steel ladder beams, being specially designed to meet the demands from a modern theatrical environment and the CE compliance for lifting equipm

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UK - Northamptonshire Magistrates Courts Committee has invested in 15 Shure ConferenceONE discussion systems for use in every one of the county's magistrate's courts.ConferenceONE with its innovative, fold-out telescoping Microflex microphone and integrated IntelliMix automatic mixing technology is virtually effortless to set-up and operate and delivers consistently natural, feedback-free audio and speech intelligibility automatically and is ideal for meetings and discussions for up to sixty participants, say Shure.

Each of the court discussions systems consisted of a single chairman unit with varying number of delegate units. The systems also included a Shure Microflex MX412 gooseneck mic at the witness stand and a boundary mic in the secure dock. In order to effectively manage each of the said mics, a Shure SCM410 automatic 4-channel mixer with Intellimix was utilized to incre

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UK - Difuzion - the lighting division of Fuzion plc - have designed and supplied the lighting for a major new club on Blackpool's Promenade based around Futurelight fixtures. Graham Barron, who heads up Difuzion (which distributes Futurelight in the UK), renewed his acquaintance with Over Audio's Mike Boylan, who won the contract to provide the complete sound and lighting package for Peter Bowden's 2300-capacity Club Sanuk.

The building - formerly The Waterfront when it was operated by Luminar Leisure - has been completely refurbished at the hands of Bowden - one of the industry's most experienced professionals, and also a long-term acquaintance of Graham Barron. Bowden was previously operations director for Luminar before moving to the Far East as project director for Ministry of Sound, Bangkok, Taipei and then Singapore. He has divided his new venue into four distinct areas (i

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UK - James Thomas's Pixel team continues its collaboration with ground-breaking light-sound-video based atmospheric engineers, United Visual Artists, supplying equipment for UVA's recent performance at London's Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) - part of the ICA's onedotzero season of electronic arts. UVA staged their own newly developed music and visual show at the ICA to a packed audience. The show was created in collaboration with two major technical associates James Thomas Engineering/Pixel range and Creative Technology.

The ICA show is the latest in a long and inventive list of projects to fuse the imaginative talents and enthusiasm of the Pixel team and UVA. It follows work on Massive Attack's 2004 festival tour which featured a horizontal wall of Pixelline used as a giant low-res LED surface - driven by UVA's latest Dragonfly control software.

PixelLine 1044 and the n

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UK - Set within acres of rolling countryside and heritage-listed gardens, the luxurious new Four Seasons Hotel Hampshire (near Hook) has tasked its sound system contractor, Onyx Media, with providing a system to play back a wide programme of ambient, tranquility music through its many zones.

The content is key to setting the right mood to boost the wellbeing of guests in the retreat hotel, and Onyx Media director Richard Studerus turned to familiar audio brands. One of these was Denon - a mainstay over the past 10 years. In the latest Four Seasons - which Onyx fitted out over a three-year period - they have used Denon's DCM-280 five-disc CD-player exclusively.

With its digital output, the player offers excellent performance at an unbelievable price point - while still containing Denon's traditional build quality. It is ideal for delivering the new age music which is central to

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UK - Reading-based Skan PA Hire has acquired a third Midas XL4 console, which left directly for a two-month tour of European dates and festivals with US metal band Slayer.

Skan took the decision to buy a third XL4 following "overwhelming demand" for its existing boards, which are fully committed to the company's busy summer of events. This includes the Chemical Brothers tour, the Download festival, Keane's summer dates and a series of concerts for the National Trust.

"All three purchases have been driven by customer demand, as the XL4 is still the desk of choice for a lot of FOH and monitor engineers, who are adamant it is the best sounding board available," says Skan director Abby Llewellyn. "Despite the increasing acceptance of digital consoles a lot of our clients prefer the sound of an XL4."

The new console is being operated by Slayer's fron

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UK - Bandit Lites is supplying lighting production for System Of A Down's Mesmerise world tour which kicked off in Europe this month. System - among the loudest and most energetic exponents of the US nu-metal generation - is being LD'd by Joe Paradise. The account is being handled by Lester Cobrin from the Bandit UK office, who says, "One of the most anticipated tours has finally arrived. This is big, bold and mega bright... in fact, enough to make your eyes bleed!"

Paradise was initially approached after working with production manager Eddie Kercher on Incubus last year. He decided to create a 'Great wall of lights' effect for the show - which currently carries no video, so the main visual element, other than the band - is lighting. His primary objective is to match the intense, raw sonic impact of the band with lighting semantics.

Paradise also wanted to mak

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Germany - Klangschmiede, one of Germany's largest PA rental companies, has added a Cohedra Compact rig to its already extensive inventory of HK Audio products.

The rig comprises 32 CDR 108 C mid/high units and eight CDR 210 C Sub units and made its debut at a corporate birthday party, 60 Years WÜRTH, which took place over a week and featured performances from Jose Carreras plus an appearance by the President of Germany. It has since been used in the Cologne Arena for a traditional German folk music concert.

"The Cohedra Compact gives us a huge amount of flexibility since the system is perfectly suitable for small events due to its compact dimensions, but also offers good opportunities to scale up if sufficient cabinets are used," says Michael Frank, co-owner of Klangschmiede. "The sound characteristics and enormous power capability in relation to its size fully

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France -Swiss Acoustic design company Studio Equipment, run by industry veteran Terry Nelson, was recently contracted to provide the sound, staging and screen for the presentation of the new Sony 4K digital cinema projector. The launch was held at the Château de la Napoule during this year's Cannes Film Festival, and Nelson chose a Telex Communications setup based around a Midas Venice console, Klark Teknik Helix digital equalisers and Electro-Voice surround sound system for the event.

Studio Equipment, which was commissioned for the project by Anna Valley (UK), treated the room acoustically to give it the characteristics of a proper screening room before setting up an Electro-Voice Plasma surround speaker system. At the centre of this, Nelson used a Midas Venice 160 as his monitor controller plus a processing rack of three Klark Teknik Helix DN9340 equalisers run by V3.7 Elgar

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UK - A.C. Lighting's Audio division has sold a Mackie TT24 digital audio console to Nolan Sound, one of Ireland's top sound rental companies.

Nolan Sound's Alan Nolan and business partner Jim Fox had recently invested in a digital console from A.C. and decided digital was now the way to go since the latest generation combined built-in digital processing capabilities with the ability to transfer show data between like-for-like consoles, and were much easier to use live.

They opted for the Mackie TT24 desk because it was designed to be as user-friendly as possible for live sound engineers to operate - sharing its look and feel with the traditionally easier to use analogue console. At the same time it featured all the benefits of a digital console, including a built in effects library, which made set-up very quick and easy.

The Mackie TT24 is a 56 x 45, 24-bit, 96kHz capable di

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UK - Stage Electrics is promoting new products from Prolyte, Apollo, Teclumen plus its own brand Encore at this week's ABTT show.

In March 2005 Stage Electrics was appointed UK distributor for Prolyte trussing, Stage Dex Staging and Prolyft chain hoists. Both Prolyte H30 and X30 trusses are light to medium duty and offer strength flexibility and compactness.

"The relationship with Prolyte has been a natural development for Stage Electrics. We have made a large investment in inventory but the wide range of products they offer and the quality of their manufacturing meant that it was an easy choice to make." said Adam Blaxill, head of purchasing at Stage Electrics.

Ed Gamble Business development manager Ed Gamble adds, "Customers have been extremely receptive to the Prolyte range, both the durability and the design features of the products make them intuitive to

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UK - The coming months see Britannia Row Productions at its busiest, though resources are not quite in their usual deployment patterns, according to Britrow's Roly Oliver.

"We are providing an enormous amount of self contained control and monitor systems to our clients for the festival season; the list is huge, Foo Fighters, Robbie Williams, Will Young, Faithless, Jamiroquai, Oasis, Robert Plant, Marilyn Manson, and Simply Red."

He continues, "Our EV X-line systems are all out for the REM outdoor shows, the Wireless festival, Glastonbury, and now the Live8 event in Hyde Park. V-dosc is being used for a tour by The Kings of Leon, and for delays on several of the bigger festivals.

"With our paced acquisition of Yamaha and Digico digital desks over the past couple of years, and our extensive inventory of Midas and other analogue desks, we actually have enoug

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UK - Wigwam Hire were able to give a full run to their Martin Audio line array systems on the recent Girls Aloud theatre tour, the wide variation of venue capacities enabling the set-up to be easily reconfigurable between the Compact and Mini enclosures.

The W8LC had already proved its worth on sidehang duties with Westlife, and once again production duties were in the hands of Production North - owned by Steve Levitt and Iain Whitehead - with the latter taking production responsibility for this set of dates.

While 24 Martin W8LC Compact Line Arrays and 12 x WLX subs were provided as the core system, two dollies of six W8LM Mini Line Arrays gave the FOH team of Mark Littlewood (sound engineer) and Sid Rogerson (system tech) options of groundstacking or flying depending on available rigging points and weightload restrictions.

The largest show was at the 12,000-capacity Sheffi

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UK - Theatre Royal Newcastle has been awarded training partner status with Stage Electrics. The award, say Stage Electrics, is in recognition of the Theatre Royal hosting and promoting industry specific training days to entertainment workers from all over the country.

In February this year the Theatre Royal hosted two days of intensive training workshops on behalf of Stage Electrics, which included courses on electricity at work and pyrotechnics safety awareness. As Brian Cleary, business development manager for Stage Electrics explains, support from organisations like the Theatre Royal is key to raising awareness across the industry of important health and safety issues. "We think it is very important to raise the standards within our industry and recognise the skills people have achieved."

He continues: "We have a wide range of courses on offer and it's great

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Spain / The Netherlands - Vieta Pro, the Barcelona-based manufacturer of compact and portable sound reinforcement products, has announced that Ampco and TM Audio are to distribute all of Vieta Pro's loudspeaker and electronic processing products in Belgium and the Netherlands. As a bonus, Vieta also get a distribution presence in Romania, where Ampco's partner Paradigma Production will represent the line. Karel de Piere of Ampco Belgium has spent the past 6 months researching Vieta Pro's corporate credentials and product prospects, to ensure a perfect match with Ampco and TM Audio's extensive distribution portfolio.

"The package from Vieta is really well thought-out," says de Piere, "with all the qualities that you'd expect from a company that has a long and reputable history in the consumer market. The team at Vieta share our philosophy on critical issues such as

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UK - Production manager Steve Rebbeck needed an automation system for the many and complicated scene changes in Billy Elliot the Musical, he turned to AVW Controls. Back in 2002, Rebbeck had specified AVW Controls' Impressario system to provide the automation for the intricate flying manoeuvres on Our House and was sure the system would be right for Billy Elliot. Meanwhile, Patrick Molony was looking for set automation that he could rely on for The Far Pavilions. Having previously used the Impressario system on horoughly Modern Millie, he too turned to AVW.

For The Far Pavilions, award winning set designer Lez Brotherston had to create sets which took the action from the snow-capped Himalayas to the hot and dusty deserts of Rajasthan. A raked triple concentric revolve - the three sections of which can move simultaneously, in different direction

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Japan - Fresh from its part in making the Queen-inspired musical We Will Rock You such a success in Australia, the Formula Sound Que-18 units which have been supplying foldback mixes for the show's musicians are repeating their success now that the show has moved on to Japan. "We have 11 Que-18's on the show in Australia, and they have performed flawlessly right from the moment they were first commissioned," says Peter Grubb of Victoria-based System Sound Pty which supplies the show's audio equipment. "Like the various other Formula Sound Que series foldback mixers we have these have been absolutely invaluable and a real hit with the musicians."

The Que-18s have been part of the Queen production since it opened in Melbourne in August 2003, and have moved with the show as it played Perth, Brisbane and Sydney. They have now moved on to Japan where the sh

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UK - Cambridgeshire based 5 Star Cases Limited have recently invested in 3D modelling software by Solid Edge. The Wisbech company, purchased the software from Cutting Edge Solutions Limited of Witney - Oxfordshire, having evaluated various other systems on the market. 5 Star is one of Europe's leading specialist case manufacturers and supplies some of the biggest names in the Entertainment and Audio Visual sectors as well as many blue chip companies including Alstom Energy, Martin Audio, Lighthouse and Rolls Royce.

CES, UK's leading supplier of the renowned Solid Edge from UGS had previously demonstrated the system at a 'Customer Day' back in 2003. Although 5 Star Cases had been using 2D drafting for a number of years, the move to 3D modelling was considered just prior to the demo at UGS.

Works Director Keith Sykes explained "Although three packages were evaluated, Solid

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Greece - PRG Europe was at the heart of one of the highlights of the Greek entertainment calendar when the company supplied lighting design and management expertise to the opening ceremony of the Hellenic Festival in Athens. Running from 20 May to 9 October, this year's events are even higher profile than normal, because the festival is celebrating both its 50th year and the 50th anniversary of the first film to be produced in Greece. Celebrating twin golden jubilees meant that something extra special was required for this year's opening ceremony.

Lighting director Mike Odam's task was to give a spectacular look to the opening ceremony and first performance of the festival, which featured a 60-piece symphony orchestra, 40 piece choir and live 'electric' musicians. Overcoming a range of challenges, Mike and PRG Europe put on a show fit for the high-ranking dignitaries and extensi

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UAE - During the PALME exhibition in Dubai, L&SI was invited to visit the premises of Production Technology LLC - better known as Protec. Protec is a world class event production company and the region's largest supplier of sound, lighting, AV, hydraulic and motor control equipment.

The latter elements are a particular area of Protec's strength, as a tour around its facilities reveals. Everywhere are the remnants of large-scale motorized set pieces, waiting to be called upon. There are set pieces purchased from the selling off of the Millennium Dome's contents; there are large, customized, articulated truss sections, huge spheres and steel and aluminium forms of all kinds of construction; it's like a giant's Meccano kit, with lots of bits that you can't get from the shops. There's enormous potential for creativity here.

Protec is owned by Stephen Lakin, the industry veteran wh

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UK - The assets of Solid State Logic have been acquired by a joint venture established by musician and technologist, Peter Gabriel, and broadcast industry entrepreneur, David Engelke. The company, which will trade as Solid State Logic, will continue to design and manufacture mixing consoles and related audio technology at its Begbroke, Oxford headquarters. The principal investors bring considerable experience of both the company's main markets: music recording and broadcast.

Peter Gabriel's background as an artist is well known, but he has had a long involvement with technology. Syco Systems, which he co-founded, developed the 'Tablet', one of the world's first purpose-built digital audio workstations. Real World Multi Media, part of Peter's Real World Group, won awards for both technological and creative innovation. More recently, he has had success with OD2 (On Demand Distribu

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UK - Production company Flux Events, headed by John Farquhar-Smith, promoted and production managed the recent Cinemaphony performance of Shostakovitch's Seventh Symphony - at the Royal Albert Hall.Shostakovitch's 7th (Leningrad) Symphony in C major was written in 1942, during the terrible siege of Leningrad. The landmark Royal Albert Hall event was staged to commemorate VE Day 1945 and the loss of 26 million Russian Allies in the War. Performed by the 120-piece St Petersburg Academic Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the composer's son, Maxim Shostakovitch, and accompanied by the haunting images of Georgy Paradzhanov's film, it was the brainchild of designer Sergai Davitaya and the Russian Information Agency, Novosti.

Novosti had been impressed by last year's Battleship Potemkin event that Farquhar-Smith produced with the Pet Shop Boys in Trafalgar Square: Flux events was approa

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  2. Café de Paris is first in line for EV's XLVC
  3. Venditti tours with Meyer
  4. Sloppy Joe's heats up with Martin Audio
  5. LSC provides EKO solution for Dreamland
  6. Stagecraft supports Mayor's Appeal
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