Business

Details
USA - Bandit Lites has invested in Jands Vista consoles for major international concert tours as part of a long-term upgrade of its rental stock inventory. The purchase came about after Jands' exclusive North American distributor, A.C. Lighting, was invited to a shootout at Bandit's US headquarters in Knoxville.

Bandit Lites founder and CEO Michael Strickland comments: "We were trying to find a console we thought could be our go to standard and the Vista received unanimous approval from the LDs at the demo. We did the demo in March and now have Vistas out on three major tours, with other large tours in the pipeline as well."

Chief operating officer Pete Heffernan adds: "We'd been very interested in the Vista since our UK office purchased one and we then got a demo at LDI, but it wasn't until we started seeing lots of interest from LDs that we realised it was tim

Details
USA - Over 1000 bassists from around the world -including low-end luminaries Stanley Clarke and Avishai Cohen - flocked to Oklahoma City University for the recent International Society of Bassists Convention, a week-long programme of clinics and concerts celebrating the four-stringed thunderstick.

Cory's Audio Visual Services (OKC), supplied a combination of Dynacord Cobra-2 line array TOP boxes and PWH subs, EV monitors and mics, a Midas Verona console and Klark Teknik outboard gear for the show, ensuring every step of the signal chain was impressive for the ISB's numerous live events and breakout rooms.

"We are really happy with how the Dynacord, EV, Midas and KT equipment all works and sounds together in this system," says Preston Williams of Cory's, himself a bass playing OCU alumni, who mixed FOH for the ISB concerts. "We can utilise this rig in a variety o

Details
Germany - The first four instalments of Nissan's pan-European Qashqai Urban Challenge took place throughout May, with the final held in Paris at the end of June, with the city centres of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Milan, Madrid, Cologne and Paris witnessing some of the world's best mountain bike free-riders being tested to the limit on outdoor, custom-made courses in front of enthusiastic crowds.

The concept and tour was organised by STREAM with the Cologne event production masterminded by Dietmar Koch of German agency Braintrust Event Marketing. He chose long-time Turbosound users, Westphalia-based BLL/CE Veranstaltungstechnik-Krefeld to provide sound, lighting and electrical installations for the Cologne event, which gave the opportunity for a range of Turbosound's new NuQ loudspeakers to be put through their paces in a challenging environment.

With a large site and crowd to cover

Details
USA - Wybron reports that the Dubai Mall Aquarium, a permanent installation in the world's largest shopping mall, located in downtown Dubai, has purchased 226 Large Format Aquarams and InfoTrace Control and Management System. The aquarium expects to install Wybron's fixtures and the InfoTrace system in September.

Wybron's Aquarams will illuminate the 164ft aquarium to allow visitors to see sharks, stingrays and other species of fish in their natural habitat. Each Aquaram contains up to 32 gel colours and is water resistant. The InfoTrace system will control and manage all of the fixtures via the RDM platform.

"We are very pleased with the spike in sales of our architectural fixtures," said Larry Turner, Wybron CEO. "Wybron continues to introduce new outdoor lighting technology as we expect the demand for lighting designs to grow in the overall architectural and

Details
Europe - Responding to the needs of educators and public/private sector professionals, Anchor Audio has announced the launch of its Anchor Audio Europe website (www.anchoraudio-europe.com). For the first time, the website gives Europeans direct access to Anchor Audio's complete range of portable PA system and portable sound system products for purchase in Euros, complete with product brochures and specifications.

From portable public address systems such as the compact Minivox PA system for indoor/outdoor crowds of 150+ to the Beacon portable sound system for crowds of 5,000+, Anchor Audio offers audio solutions that are ROHS compliant, with a full range of wired and wireless options, true AC/DC capability, and six-year warranties.

The company says that one of its most popular portable public address systems is the MegaVox portable PA system for emergency communication. Among

Details
Europe - Alongside long time partner Doug Adams, owner and president of Pyrotek Special Effects, Metallica's tour Sick of the Studio '07 tour stopped at 11 European venues through June and July. An additional four song performance took place in London for the Live Earth Concert in recognition of global awareness.

Collaborating with lighting designer Butch Allen and working with James Lars, Kirk and Rob Adams' effects list consists of 18 Red mines, 40 Fireballs, 21 Stadium reports (for a loud bang effect), 16 Red flashes, 24 Ack Ack bursts, 24 silver comets with tails, 24 Red comets, and 24 White flashes with bang.

(Jim Evans)

Details
Spain - Last month, Barcelona's MACBA (Museau díArt Contemporani de Barcelona) was taken over by the Sonar del Dia electronic music and multimedia arts festival. Over the three-day event more than 200 performers from 29 countries performed on its stages. The offerings varied from funk to intense trip hop and hip hop to the truly bizarre. Sound company Croma 440 provided 15 sound engineers and system techs for the event. Over 80,000 people from all over the world attended the festival. The sister festival Sonar de Noche, held on the outskirts of Barcelona brought out the better known bands such as the Beastie Boys and DJ Miss Kittin, among many others.

2007 marked the seventh year of Croma 440 taking the Sonar del Dia contract. The largest of the four stages was the open air Village, where trip hop and funk ruled with 12 Adamson Y18s and six Adamson T21s, wi

Details
USA - Marking one of the world's first deployments of JBL Professional's new Vertec VT4887A compact line array loudspeakers, CTS Audio of Nashville is providing the live sound reinforcement system for the current Women of Faith - Amazing Freedom 2007 tour.

During its 10-year existence, the Women of Faith tour has drawn more than 2.5 million attendees, featuring numerous guest speakers from around the world. Each year, more than 20 cities throughout the United States and Canada host this event, which draws sell-out crowds in arenas including the American Airlines Center in Dallas, the United Center in Chicago and the Honda Center in Anaheim. This year's tour kicked off March 15 at the Alamodome in San Antonio and continues until December.

CTS Audio has been handling this project for the past eight years. For 2007 CTS designed a speaker system comprising eight line

Details
USA - The powerful lighting design for the Broadway musical 110 in the Shade (at Studio 54 by the Roundabout Theatre Company) centres around a massive visual focal point - a glowing disc that evokes a 24-hour progression of atmospheric changes: dawn, high noon, moonlight, storms and shade. The disc - a lightbox filled with automated wash fixtures - represents the play's controlling motif of light and heat.

For Tony-nominated lighting designer Chris Akerlind, creating the complex effects of this unconventional lighting rig meant employing a comprehensive control console, ETC's new Eos. "The entire lightplot on 110 consists of some 200 fixed units and between 40 or 50 moving lights (VL 2000 wash units), 20 of which are committed to the lightbox," says Akerlind. "There were very limited hanging positions for the rest of the lighting rig. Next to no over

Details
The Netherlands - In fulfilling its responsibility to provide fail-safe communications to passengers during times of power outage or other emergency events, the Netherlands Railways recently purchased 110 additional Anchor Audio Minivox portable PA systems to expand on last year's successful placement of 65 units within public transit stations throughout the Netherlands. These handheld portable public address systems help ensure passenger security by providing a quick and effective means of directing stranded riders to areas of safety.

With 2000km of electrified railway and 463 trains, Netherlands Railways (Nederlandse Spoorwegen - NS) has addressed an issue that now impacts transit operators throughout the world.

"NS needed something like a megaphone, but they also wanted the loudspeaker away from the face of the user so that he or she could see what was going on,"

Details
UK - London's Arcola Theatre has launched Arcola Energy, through which the operators aim to make Arcola the world's first carbon neutral theatre. "We will be installing biomass heating, solar panels, fuel cells and state of the art energy saving technologies throughout the building," says executive director Ben Todd.

"We will also create the first centre for new energy technology in the arts. It will be a knowledge incubator with dedicated workspace where engineers can develop initiatives to tackle climate change. Arcola Energy will be a hub for new thinking and cross-fertilisation between art and science, bringing together artistic, entrepreneurial and technological creativity.

"As a theatre we have a longstanding tradition of innovation, inspiration and deep integration with the local community. Working to the same principles, Arcola Energy will integrate

Details
Hong Kong - Already a Guinness World Record for the ' World's Largest Permanent Light and Sound Show ', A Symphony of Lights'has further expanded to include 43 of the city's prominent buildings and skyscrapers.

Engaged by the Hong Kong Tourism Commission, Laservision has recently completed its fourth phase of integrating new buildings into the show in celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

Hong Kong Island now boasts 23 featured buildings while Kowloon's ever increasing contribution now totals 20. The show includes an arsenal of LED fixtures, searchlights, high powered lasers, floodlights, fibre optics, pyrotechnics and an original soundtrack that combine to represent the spirit and energy of Hong Kong. The expanded show was launched by the acting Financial Secretary, Mr Stephen Ip.

Phases three and four have seen the incor

Details
Canada - The three independent rep firms that represented Bosch Communications Systems brands Electro-Voice, Midas and Klark Teknik in Canada have joined forces to create one unified national rep firm: PAG Canada. The three principals are Mark Kulas (KMT Pro Audio), John McArthur (Lebanna Solutions Inc.) and Gilles Elhadad (Acoustik GE Inc).

"PAG means Pacific Atlantic Group, because we now consistently cover Canada from the Pacific to the Atlantic," says president and co-principal Mark Kulas.

"It was strange," adds John McArthur, VP sales and marketing and second principal in PAG Canada, "We rep'd the same Bosch Communications Systems brands, but competed with each other in our own old territories. Now we can help each other, focusing on the vertical markets in which each of us has strengths."

Gilles Elhadad, third principal and VP of operation

Details
UK - PLASA has announced the four contenders for the first Gottelier Award, to be presented at this year's PLASA Show (9-12 September, Earls Court, London).

Named in honour of the late Tony Gottelier, the industry innovator and commentator who passed away in 2006, the Gottelier Award is aimed at those members of our industry who have made significant and sustained contributions to the advancement of entertainment, presentation or installation technology - whether in audio, lighting, rigging, staging, or any other related field.

Following a six-week period of gathering nominations from across the industry, the shortlist of leading nominees can now be revealed, ready for the voting process to begin.

The nominees are as follows (in alphabetical order):

• Tony Andrews is a highly regarded designer and manufacturer of high quality point source loudspeaker systems, w

Details
Switzerland - The Gaswerk is one of the hippest clubs in Winterthur, Switzerland. Named after the former local gas works that it had been, the Gaswerk today is the location of all kinds of different events including theatre, musicals, movies and band contests, and it is a favoured venue for touring rock and punk bands.

The heart of the club is the main hall that can hold 600-700 visitors and that is equipped with a mobile stage, lighting and PA. As for the PA, the Gaswerk-association that is taking care of the management, hospitality and technique of the location, has chosen a Cohedra Compact from HK Audio.

Sound technician Raphael Sieber explains why: "There were three essential criteria. First of all the sound, of course, but also especially the flexibility of the system and also the looks of it. It was necessary that the system could be used for theatre productions as

Details
Qatar - Creative Events, part of Qatar's Creative Communication Group, has acquired, through Executive Audio, a pallet load of Lab.gruppen's FP+ Series FP 10000Qs.

The new amplifiers will power the company's inventory of EAW loudspeaker systems including EAW KF760 and KF730 line arrays, KF850s, SB1000s and many more.

"After extensive research into top audio brands the world over, we decided to stick to Lab.gruppen to power our loudspeaker systems, " stated Jalal K. Dudin, director of Creative Events.

Creative Events is a full-service events, entertainment and production company based in Qatar. One of the many large projects that they've undertaken recently was the Doha Asian Games 2006, where they supplied audiovisual systems for more than 110 sports venues.

(Jim Evans)

Details
USA - When fans of country music got together at the CMA Music Festival in Nashville (formerly known as Fan Fair), grandMA was centre stage. Lighting/production designer Mike Swinford used five grandMA consoles and three grandMA video servers to cover the concert portion of the four-day celebration. The CMA Music Festival, presented annually by the Country Music Association features more than 70 hours of concerts.

"The show is the centrepiece of a huge music festival that draws fans from all over the world," says lighting director/programmer Mark Butts. "When ABC started to broadcast it a few years ago it really upped the ante in terms of design and production. For us, the show is an interesting hybrid of on-the-fly, festival-style lighting and tightly-cued, precise television lighting. It's difficult trying to work in both worlds simultaneously, but it sure keeps

Details
USA - Norah Jones and The Handsome Band are once again on the road, carrying a sound system built around Meyer Sound's Milo curvilinear array loudspeaker and supplied by Colorado Spring-based Audio Analysts, Jones's longtime sound company. Jones is performing in intimate, mid-sized theatres and concert halls in support of her latest album, Not Too Late.

The system consists of two arrays of 12 Milo cabinets, plus two 700-HP subwoofers per side to cover the low end. Four M1D ultra-compact curvilinear array loudspeakers are deployed for front-fill, with four CQ-2 narrow coverage main loudspeakers providing additional fill. Depending on the size and rigging scheme of the venue, the system can be scaled down to suit each room's specific needs.

"Norah was one of the first artists to take Milo on tour, " says FOH engineer Lee Moro. "The system was absolutely per

Details
Ireland - Oxegen 2007 returned to Punchestown Racecourse in County Kildare this month when 80,000 people arrived to see a strong line-up of established acts and up-and-coming bands on several stages.

One of the stages was the Dance Arena, where Dublin-based total production company EQ Audio & Events fielded a powerful Nexo Geo D vertical tangent array to enable some of the world's best known DJ's and turntablists, such as Frankie Knuckles Jr, Deep Dish, DJ Shadow, Felix da Housecat and Erol Alkan to present a heady mix of disco, house, electro and synth.

Shay Hannon, MD EQ Audio & Events, had become an adopter of Nexo's Alpha systems soon after setting up EQ Audio & Events seven years ago, and he admits he was eagerly looking forward to flying the Geo D system in front of 80,000 people at Punchestown - thanks to a co-operative effort with Liverpool-based Adlib Audio who augmen

Details
Falkland Islands - BBC Outside Broadcasts built a fly-away production gallery in a tractor shed at San Carlos on the Falkland Islands last month, to capture and link live pictures and sound for a Remembrance Service to mark the 25th anniversary of the conflict.

Live coverage from the San Carlos service, attended by veterans and currently-serving soldiers, was sent via satellite and fed into live coverage of the service taking place at the Horse Guards in London's Whitehall.

For senior sound supervisor Tim Davies, there were a number of important considerations, since the crew would be working in arduous conditions, with limited electricity supply. High on the list were reduced freight costs and equipment reliability.

As the hub of his signal chain he chose a Light Viper, lightweight fibre optic digital audio snake from Kelsey Acoustics. This was configured as a 32 x 8 system

Details
USA - Clair ShowCo Chicago has just completed the design and integration of an advanced audio system for Norwegian Cruise Lines new Theatre-In-The Round in Hawaii. The system features components from Harman Pro Group companies, JBL Professional, dbx and AKG integrated with HiQnet configuration and control protocol.

Fire eaters, hula dancers, and South Pacific singers and performers on the main stage of the new venue are reinforced by a HiQnet system featuring 16 JBL Professional VRX line arrays configured in a circle above the stage, eight JBL Control 29 loudspeakers, 16 JBL Control 25 loudspeakers, and four self-powered JBL VP Series subwoofers. Three dbx 4800 processors are on the system along with AKG wireless microphones.

Harry Witz, general manager of Clair ShowCo Chicago designed and implemented the system. "With all the components on one system architect, HiQnet, I

Details
UK / Italy - Sennheiser UK has announced that as of 23 July 2007, it is the sole UK distributor for Italian high-end pro audio amplifier manufacturer Powersoft.

Based in Florence, since its formation in 1995 Powersoft has become one of Europe's market leaders in rack-mountable digital amplification, providing products for a huge range of applications from large-scale tours and permanent installations to portable, versatile PA systems. Combined with high quality audio response and a documented history of reliability, the deal is another welcome addition to Sennheiser UK's growing roster of distribution partners, the company says.

"We're delighted to add Powersoft to our portfolio of brands," explained Sennheiser UK general manager, Philip Massey. "Having spoken to many end-users over the past few months, Powersoft's reputation for versatility, sonic excellence an

Details
UK - Allen & Heath's digital iLive system was the mixer of choice for the recent Till the Cows Come Home festival, a small grassroots event which began life as a friends' get together, and has evolved simply through word-of-mouth into one of the UK's fastest-growing small festivals, and a significant date on the UK festival calendar.

Held annually over two days in July on a remote farm near Bedford, more than 30 bands played on the festival's main stage this year. London-based Autograph Sales provided the PA system, which comprised Allen & Heath's digital iDR10 stage rack with iLive-144 control surface managing FOH and monitors, Meyer Sound concert series MSL-4 long throw loudspeakers alongside EM Acoustics MSE118 concert series subwoofers, complemented by the EM Acoustics i12 Ultra Low Frequency subwoofers. On stage monitoring was the EM M-12 monitor system and Meyer Sou

Details
UK - Paradigm Audio Visual has assisted system integrators Pixel Inspiration in the first phase of a contract to supply Manchester Airport with 79 of the 84" dnp New Wide Angle rear projection displays, in a mixture of 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios.

Forming part of the Airport's digital signage upgrade at their check-in desks, the screens were specified by consultant Tom Batey, while Pixel Inspiration carried out the installation of the displays, working in conjunction with Panasonic PT-D3500 single chip DLP projectors.

Since the Airport will not be using the screens as a revenue generator, their choice of concept was based on a combination of high clarity, relatively low capital outlay and predictable cost of ownership (with weight and engineering considerations).

Paradigm AV director Greg Jeffreys comments: "This is proving to be one of our most technically-challeng

  1. JBL in Rostock protest concert
  2. Star Events delivers in O2 opening week
  3. Meyer Sound dances on ice
  4. Chauvet LEDs rock Ozzfest
  5. Keith Urban goes home with Adamson
  6. More power for events in SA
Page 900 of 1813

Latest Issue. . .