UK - Just days after they had purchased their Frog 2 consoles from Zero 88, HSL Productions wasted no time in making them earn their keep - throwing them in at the deep end at Creamfields 2005. Over 50,000 people attended the event at the Old Speke Airfield in Liverpool, the spiritual home of legendary superclub Cream. The event featured the very best of current and 'old skool' dance acts across the Galaxy main stage and nine supporting arenas. The line-up inlcuded Basement Jaxx, Faithless, Paul Van Dyk, Judge Jules, Fat Boy Slim, Scratch Perverts and MC Dynamite.

Launched earlier this year, the Frog 2s have found homes in theatres, churches and multi-purpose venues across the globe - but this was their first outing at a festival event. The two Frog 2 consoles were in action in the 'Full Cycle' Hardcore House arena and 'Hed Kandi' hospitality tent. Controlling a collection of Ma

UK - Robe ColorWash and ColorSpot 1200E AT fixtures were specified and used by lighting designer Mirash Lekaj for the JUMP Broadway finale staged in the Manhattan Studio at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York.

This is the latest in a series of high profile theatrical productions for which Robe products are increasingly finding favour - chosen for their near-silent operation, fast movement and impressive brightness.

Break The Floor Productions' JUMP - is one of the youngest and most innovative dance teaching faculties in America. Led by Gil Stroming, it combines live rock and hip-hop music with the precise rhythms and techniques of tap, jazz, ballet and modern in a new and exciting mix of the two cultures, connecting with a new generation of dancers.

The JUMP Broadway finale was the culmination of a regional tour that encouraged and inspired thousands of aspiring performers

Canada - The Blue Man Group has installed a Lake Contour digital speaker processor and a pair of Lake Mesa Quad EQ digital matrix processors in the audio system for its latest international production, which recently opened in Toronto, Canada. The sonic quality and performance of the Lake processors are well suited to the group's dynamic material, says Mark Radu, head systems engineer at Toronto-based PA Plus Inc, the company responsible for the engineering and supply of the entire sound system for the new show at the city's Panasonic Theatre.

Blue Man Group gained national recognition after establishing a production in Las Vegas in 1999, and currently maintains long-running shows in New York, Boston, Chicago, and Berlin. The Blue Man Group team, led by sound designer and supervisor Ross Humphrey, who has been responsible for the sound design of all of the group's productions si

UK - Italian pro audio manufacturer Outline - recent winner of a PLASA Award for Innovation for its COMPASS system - has made its West End debut at London's famous Savoy Theatre, with The Rat Pack Live from Las Vegas - the show that takes us through the cabaret capers of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jnr. The Savoy - the first theatre in London to have electric light - sees another first this year, as Theatrelease, a new company formed to supply sound and technical support, employs Outline's Butterfly line array for the show.

Two hangs of eight CDH 483 mid/high packs have been flown left and right to cover 75% of the auditorium, with a further two CDH 483s per side to cater for the stalls area, and two Victor live sub basses for the low frequencies. In addition, 21 Outline IS6T cabinets have been employed as discreet delays.

On stage, 14 mixes are catered for by f

UK - A.C. Lighting's Special Projects division has supplied over 400 Chroma-Q Color Blocks to up-light the stage set for the Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang World Tour 2005/2006.

Following the North American leg of A Bigger Bang World Tour, which kicked off on 21 August in Boston, the band will then tour Mexico, South America, the Far East and finally Europe in the summer of 2006.

The Rolling Stones will once again showcase their diversity as musicians and performers by playing different venues from the grand scale excitement of a stadium to the thrill of an arena. This year's tour takes the concert experience to the next level by bringing together the advantages of an up-close club experience with their electric stadium show.

Setting a new standard for concert effects, The Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang World Tour is the first major rock concert to include

UK - Lift-Turn-Move has sold four Lodestar Direct Control chain hoists to Bright Lites UK, based in Colne, Lancashire.

Bright Lites' Neil Dolman says he bought the motors for his hire stock from LTM because of the "Service, detailed product knowledge, friendliness and helpfulness" of the team at the Wirral based company.

Bright Lites supplies lighting and rigging equipment to venues, councils and other professional entertainment industry areas and applications. Dolman wanted a leading industry standard product that was ultimately 'hirable', and since the purchase, the Lodestars have been in constant use, he reports.

"Dealing with LTM was excellent" he says, "Their team are consistently good on the phone, and really friendly. It was great to also meet them face-to-face when I collected the motors in person from the warehouse on Merseyside. I would rec

USA - XL Touring Video, in collaboration with video contractor, CW Productions, recently provided lighting designer Jim Lenahan, with the technical solutions to bring the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers Tour to life!

Jim Lenahan and CW Productions approached XL looking for a solution for a technically challenging concept. Chris Mitchell, XL's chief engineer, explains: "He wanted a wall of projection screens in geometric shapes, each functioning independently and framed with versa tubes. Based on our experiences with Destiny's Child and U2, we immediately suggested the Folsom Encore's Processors which could be controlled via DMX using proprietary software."

XL Touring Video put together a team, including Mitchell, CW Productions' video engineer, Shawn Reek, and independent programmer, Stuart White. "This was a very complex project and many, many hours of programm

UK - Ambassador Theatre Group's west London venue, Richmond Theatre, has upgraded its sound system to cater for the next decade of in-house and touring productions. The new state-of-the-art d&b audiotechnik Ci-Series system was supplied by theatre specialist Orbital Sound's sales division.

Technical manager Mark Warren commented: "Whilst d&b's range impresses me greatly, it also clearly represents the industry standard for international touring productions as over the years it has proved to be the preferred systems' choice of our incoming productions. As a very flexible system, it perfectly meets our requirements as it can be augmented according to any productions' specific needs. We're delighted with its performance and look forward to putting it through its paces through our busy Autumn schedule and beyond."

The system comprises d&b's Ci90 and Ci60 installation ser

The Netherlands - Like most hire companies the Dutch company Atlantic Productions knew it was time to invest in a line-array system. But nowadays this is not such a simple choice, for there are so many suppliers. After extensive testing the company chooses Sound Projects and invested in 12 Linex systems.

One of Atlantic Productions' larger clients is the City of Amersfoort, where the company does most of its large events and festivals. There were important reasons why the company was looking for a line-array system. Chris Polhout (MD) says: "Because we often do events in the centre of the city, we have to deal with stringent rules and laws regarding the maximum allowable SPL at adjacent buildings and/or houses. A great benefit of line-arrays is that it is possible to beam the sound precisely where you want it. We have tried out the Linex system in many of these situations a

Japan - Toyota City in Aichi prefecture in western Japan is known as 'Car Industry City', and is currently busy hosting World Expo 2005. The city's Toyota Stadium, which opened in June 2001, was designed by architect Kiyoshi Kurokawa to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the city's founding. The 45,000 capacity stadium consists of six stories - two underground and four above - and is packed full of amenities: natural turf football field with retractable roof, movable full-color screen, restaurant, party room, and an indoor sports space that includes a swimming pool. Surrounding the stadium is a large open area, Toyota City Central Park, with a magnificent view of the modern Toyota Bridge.

At each corner of the stadium are four large masts that point skyward to a height of 96m. The prominent pillars play more than an aesthetic role, however: the masts support the main and back r

Spain - 15,000 people attended the first Metalway festival in Gernika, near Bilbao in Spain, a 3-day heavy metal party headlined by Korn and the band that claims to be the loudest in the world, Manowar. Juan Gonzalez and his team from Swing Electroshow were using their new Nexo GEO T tangent-array system, powered by Camco Vortex 6 amplifiers, the first time the system has been used on a metal festival in Spain.

With left and right arrays of 12 GEO T4805 full-range cabinets, plus three T2815 downfills, the system used 16 CD18 sub-bass units each side. Fills were all Nexo Alpha, and Nexo PS15s were used as floor wedges. Swing has been using Nexo systems for 12 years, but Gonzalez praises the GEO T system, which he purchased last year, as "without doubt, one of the best systems presently available". His systems are powered by Camco Vortex 6, and Swing uses NexoO NX241 pro

UK - There are still a few places left for Hawthorns latest @ Home event featuring pyrotechnics and radio mics being held on Friday 7 October 2005.

There will be pyro demonstration by Le Maitre; plus Sennheiser, Sony and Trantec will be demo'ing their latest radio mics and will be on hand to offer advice throughout the afternoon. To book a place contact Hawthorn direct on: 01664 821101.

(Sarah Rushton-Read)

USA - After supporting performances from above with its stage rigging systems, Global Truss America can now elevate the show from below, thanks to its new Stage System 360. A lightweight, modular system, the Stage System 360 is as rugged and sturdy as the company trussing products, but provides users with the convenience of an easily portable, customized stage-on-the-go to suit the needs of touring entertainers, small venues and stage rental companies.

The Stage System 360 is comprised of rectangular stage platforms, stepladders and safety railings that can be used in any combination to meet the precise staging needs of a specific event. Each 3'3" x 6'6" (1m x 2m) platform can be linked to other units on all sides, allowing users to create a stage with the square-footage they need and the shape most suitable to their event. Plus, the height of the platform can be set t

UK - Sound Foundation, provider of sound, lighting and video equipment and services, as well as a growing range of short training seminars for live audio production engineers, has added two new one-day seminars to its training programme, featuring the Yamaha PM5D or Yamaha M7CL digital live mixers. "We believe that 2005 is the year in which the scales have tipped in favour of live digital audio mixers in terms of price, performance, features and ease of use," says Sound Foundation's Mark Payne.

In order to allow our sales and hire customers and engineers extensive exposure to these new technologies we are keeping the digital seminars free of charge till the end of 2005. For more information, contact Mark Payne, tel: 0118 969 0900.

(Lee Baldock)

Norway - The original Arena in Bislett, Oslo, host venue for speed skating at the 1952 Winter Olympics, was organized as a stadium for sporting events as far back as 1922 and its present shape dates from just before World War ll. In the following years, the arena served speed skaters in the winter and footballers and athletes in the summer, but by the end of the century the neglect of maintenance resulted in the inevitable decision that a new stadium had to be built.

As a much-treasured building in the region, the decision was taken to construct the new stadium in the form of the old one, but with 21st Century facilities and to current standards. So true was the new building to the design of the original that, at the opening for the "Bislett Games/GoldenLiege", some locals were heard to question it being an entirely new build.

A major addition in the new stadium is t

Switzerland - Switzerland-based rental company, Livesound B AG, has become an Adamson European rental pool partner with the purchase of 24 Y18, 16 Y10, 8 SpekTrix and a planned November delivery of 12 units of the Adamson T-21 subwoofer.

Livesound, founded in 1976 by Werner Christen and Thomas Gfeller, has grown to become one of the most important production companies in the European, and Swiss, pro audio industry. "We knew that investing in a large line array system was a very important step for us", says Thomas Gfeller. "Therefore we investigated intensely, for more than 18 months, before we made our decision. We evaluated most of the famous systems available and came to the conclusion that the Adamson Y-Axis system is the perfect tool for us. Not only is it well accepted by sound engineers, but we discovered very early that the people at DV2 (Adamson's European

UK - Pro Musik GmbH from Trier was responsible for design and implementation of the sound reinforcement system for a two-night open-air event - a lakeside festival beside the Losheimer Dam, near Saarburg, Germany. Pro Musik manager Elmar Hubert chose a Nexo/Camco combination sound system for the job.

The main PA consisted of 19 GEO T4805s plus 1 GEO T2815 cabinet in left and right arrays, coupled with 12 GEO CD18 sub basses on each side of the stage. This was supplemented by Nexo Alpha near and sidefills and all monitoring was supplied by highly effective Camco and Nexo products. The entire sound reinforcement system was driven by Camco amps, 44 Vortex-6s, eight Vortex-200Vs and five Texton 38.4s.

Elmar Hubert, the manager of Pro Musik GmbH, commented: "The sound left absolutely nothing to be desired. We had nothing but positive feedback from the bands and sound engineers

USA - The phenomenally popular Tonight Show with Jay Leno, which NBC broadcasts to viewers around the world, has become the first show in the US to run with the new Congo lighting desk by ETC. The show's two Congo boards debuted behind the scenes on the 6 September broadcast, which included an elaborate moving-light sequence for rock group Lifehouse. The consoles are now busy controlling the lights for each night's show.

"We needed a high-speed console with great reliability and a lot of channels for moving lights," said Gilbert Quintanar, head electrician on the Tonight Show and 29-year veteran with NBC studios. The Tonight Show keeps a full rig of some 475 devices - including 300 conventional fixtures - with numerous ETC Source Fours among them, plus a growing rig of over 90 moving lights. There's no small amount of pressure on this set where the technical crew crea

UK - Manchester's contemporary arts theatre, the Green Room, recently installed an Allen & Heath multi-purpose live sound GL3800 mixer as the venue's main FOH console.

The Theatre stages an assortment of local, national and international productions throughout its calendar year, comprising original dance, music, poetry, play and film performances. The new 24-channel desk was chosen predominantly for its capacity to manage the larger musical events and theatrical productions, running in conjunction with the Theatre's existing Allen & Heath MixWizard 14:4:2 to run line level sources such as CD, mini-disc, or DAT where required.

"We're extremely pleased with the purchase. The GL3800 is a great desk and provides us with a huge amount of versatility for the diverse performances we manage, for instance, one of the productions scheduled this month involves constantly changing ro

USA - Al Crawford, the lighting director for the hugely popular Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, has praised the efforts of PRG Europe in helping to make the group's first ever UK tour go so smoothly. Renowned for its high energy performances, the company is regarded as one of America's greatest dance companies and performs a vast range of styles, including modern, jazz, hip hop, folk, gospel and ballet, and everything in between.

"It's a very eclectic mix of dance, which means the lighting has to be just as flexible and diverse," explained Crawford. "For example, our signature work, Revelations, was first lit in 1960, so one of the challenges is having this recreated with today's more advanced equipment. Other work in the tour repertory can be quite modern, with contemporary lighting effects and lots of vivid qualities - we have the very classical and the very

Germany - CAVIS - the Congress for Audio-Visual Installation Systems, which runs alongside the annual ProLight+Sound exhibition in Frankfurt, has changed its name, the organizers have announced. From 2006 it will be called Prolight+Sound Media Systems Congress. "System integration and media technology are both areas which have been successfully involved in the congress for the last three years and they are firmly established in the fair - so it was time to give this fast-growing trade-fair segment its own proper place in the congress title", says Cordelia von Gymnich, vice-president of Messe Frankfurt GmbH. "We think this is a brand-policy decision whose time has come."

A central theme running through the expert talks in 2006 will be that of "Multiple-purpose halls and arenas." Featuring some 40 sessions, the Prolight+Sound Media Systems Congress is

UK - Stage Electrics have taken delivery of the complete range of RCF's new Acustica speakers. Acustica is a compact series which consists of six speakers and two subs and is designed for both portable and installation applications.

RCF's Phil Price explained: "With the introduction of Acustica I feel that we have produced a range of speakers equal to any of kind on the market today. The positive thing about the Stage Electrics investment is that they have the complete range on active demonstration at their showrooms in Bristol, London, Cardiff, Plymouth, Newcastle and Exeter, whilst also holding stock at their other branches.

The demonstration systems at each branch allow customers to audition all the different models within the Acustica Line Up. Furthermore each system is powered by RCF 'HC' Series Professional Power Amplifiers and the systems utilize RCF's new DX4008 d

UK - Glassheart Audio Services, known for its custom cabling and panelling solutions, has now expanded into Sound Equipment Hire - although it could be said the company is going full circle as that is where it all started. MD Chris Mellors has taken delivery of 10kW of Court Acoustic RAMJET speaker system from Stephen Court, MD of Court Acoustic systems.

Mellors says: "We have been all over the place trying out different manufacturers products but the only speaker that provided the clean bass we were looking for was the Court Acoustic RAMJET, it won hands down!" The major feature of the Glassheart Audio Services touring rig is the attention to matching individual components to give an exceptional clarity to the systems delivery.

"Power with clarity is the one thing that I personally have found lacking at performances I've attended in recent years - I used to get

UK - The PLASA Show has again proved itself one of the most influential events in the industry calendar. Around 13,000 (subject to ABC audit) key industry people visited London in early September to participate in what is now the major international gathering-point for the entertainment, event and installation industries. The emphasis was very much on business, with exhibitors not only generating significant leads, but also reporting an unprecedented number of orders being placed.

As in previous years, the Show had a strong international profile with a third of exhibitors based outside the UK, and an increasing international visitor attendance, which is now nudging the 30% mark.

One of the key reasons for the Show's continued momentum is its focus on new developments and its ongoing investment in interactive feature areas, awards that recognize the best design work in the indu

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