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UK - The first tour for Adlib's new dV-DOSC system was with Gabrielle, who has just had a run of UK theatres and concert halls. The system was specified by FOH engineer Jamie Butterworth, who comments: "It is an ideal high-definition system for the type of venues on the itinerary," adding that Adlib came up with a good deal and also assigned two of their top crew - Steve Pattison and James Neale - to the project.

The standard system configuration was 12 boxes a side for left and right arrays, combined with four dV Subs on the floor along with eight of the new high output SB28 double 18" subs. The system was driven with the new LA8 DSP-laden amplifiers which are also part of Adlib's recent L-Acoustics investment.

Butterworth - also the tour's production manager - specified the Digidesign D-Show Venue FOH console, on which he utilised all the onboard effects, plus

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UK - Litestructures Studios has kicked off 2008 with a series of concert production rehearsals from Editors, Westlife and X Factor Live.

While X Factor rehearsed in the Studio, the Litestructures stage and set department were busy putting the finishing touches on a custom stage set for Westlife. Litestructures has built Westlife's stage sets for the past five years, but this year's was the biggest yet with a 72ft wide, 40ft deep and 12ft high stage. It also featured Litestructures' 3.5m high modular climbing leg lift made of LitePro 4 Heavy Duty truss which was specially designed for the show.

Fresh from their US tour, Editors dropped into Litestructures Studios for two days in February to prepare for their European tour which started on 26 February in Glasgow.

(Jim Evans)

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The closure of the latest incarnation of London's Marquee Club is a sad occasion that marks the end of another chapter in the venue's colourful 50-year history. Readers may care to reflect that in the month it first opened its doors, April 1958, stereo long playing records (LPs) went on sale for the first time and after two years on Broadway, My Fair Lady opened successfully at the Drury Lane Theatre, London, and VERA, the UK's first video recorder was used by the BBC during a transmission of the current affairs programme Panorama.

Meyer Sound's expansion plans for its operations in Germany is another welcome indicator that the German economy is easing intro better shape after a long time in the doldrums. It has not been without its problems - social and economic - since the heady days of re-unification but it's looking healthy now. And Meyer can expect stiff competition

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UK - Sound designer Derrick Zieba has used the same successful formula for the BRIT Awards for the last three years, casting virtually the same crew of engineers, staying with the PA systems supplier Britannia Row Productions, and flying substantial amounts of Electro-Voice X-Line array systems for the benefit of the British music industry as it celebrates the year's achievements in London's Earls Court.

As in 2007, the full width of the Earls Court arena was filled by a double stage, which allowed producers to flip-flop between live performances on the 'Glam' stage and the 'Punk' stage, with the presenters Sharon and Ozzy Osbourne in the centre. According to Zieba, the show turned out to be "my best BRITs ever; we delivered an event for everyone, and still managed to develop a real stage show for each artist from Mika who opened the evening, to Sir Paul McCartney who close

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USA - Arup is providing theatre consulting and acoustic design services to Sn°hetta, interior architect for the Ashland Center at the Brooklyn Arts Tower, in the BAM Cultural District of New York.

The new centre is part of a commercial development designed by Behnisch Architects and Studio MDA, providing street-level retail space with a high-rise residential tower. The plinth houses the performance, studio spaces, administration and technical support program for the cultural component of the development.

Arup is leading the programming and planning process for the fit-out of the new centre with architect Sn°hetta. A main flexible performance space with facilities for dance and movement, and an inventory of large studios for rehearsal, workshops and production creation is being planned by all the stakeholders of the organisation, including the client, the Downtown Brook

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Spain - The long-established Bikini Club in central Barcelona is one of the city's renowned live venues for indie and alternative rock acts, and has been a devoted user of Nexo sound systems for the last 12 years. Recently the club has installed Nexo's new Geo D line array and changed over to an entirely digital infrastructure throughout, with the help of its regular equipment supplier Doscientos Veinte Sonido.

Bikini's artists now perform completely in the digital domain, using a new EtherSound-based network that carries the audio signal from microphone to loudspeaker without any loss of quality. According to the club's resident sound engineer Robert Perez, the results are astonishing. "When you hear the system, it sounds so much better than anything you could compare it to, including our old set-up. We have a lot of visiting engineers coming through here with the touring

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UK - US blues icon, Joe Bonamassa is currently on the European leg of a world tour with a touring PA rig based around Allen & Heath's iLive digital mixing system and a WZ312M compact dedicated monitor mixer.

Bonamassa's FOH engineer, Jay Phebus, recently started using an iLive system, comprising an iDR10 mix rack and iLive-112 control surface, completing an intensive four-month tour of America, as well as dates in Holland and Russia, last autumn with the system. Impressed with the flexibility, easy load in and set up, and sound quality, Phebus is using the same system for the current European tour.

In addition to the standard RAB, DSP, and CPU modules, the iDR10 rack is loaded with nine individually selected module cards - four input modules providing 32 inputs, three output modules providing 24 outputs, and two multi-digital output modules providing 32 channels of ADAT, enabl

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UK - Founded in 1916, the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) is the only Higher Education institution in the UK specialising in the study of Asia, Africa and the Near and Middle East.

With the largest concentration in Europe of academic staff concerned with Africa, Asia and the Middle East, SOAS has a roll of more than 4,300 students, 40% of whom are on postgraduate or research programmes.

This places huge demand on the facility's Brunei Lecture Theatre, situated on their Bloomsbury campus, by the 300 staff members. And since the 290-seat facility is also hired out to third parties, the wear and tear on the technical infrastructure, seven days a week, is extreme.

Located within the Brunei Gallery, the Lecture Theatre was built in the early 1990's, and according to AV-IT analysts, Gary Hammond and Denson Abrahams, by last year the technology

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UK - Exactly 500 hours after the stroke of midnight that saw in the New Year, car manufacturer Fiat introduced its new 500 model at the London Eye. The event, which was produced by innovision, who were brought on board by project co-ordinator Arc Worldwide, saw PRG Europe supplying lighting and services throughout the site, which included the Eye itself and main stage, plus two VIP areas and the roadway leading to the site.

One of the new Fiats was driven into one of the pods and lit by lighting designer Paul Cook using PixelLine and Palco LED lighting, while in every second pod, MAC 2000 wash luminaires provided sparkle for thousands of onlookers and invited guests. On the stage in adjoining Jubilee Gardens, Cook lit performances by Mika and The Feeling, and, along the roadway up through the gardens to the site, he replaced the permanent blue floodlighting with Fiat's corporate

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UK - Marquee Audio is in administration. The Shepperton-based supply, distribution and install operation which has been in business for 20 years, is understood to have been experiencing financial difficulties.

Robert Keys of Tenon Recovery was appointed joint administrator of the company by the High Court last month. "This move effectively bubble wraps the company to protect it from its creditors and give it some breathing space in which to sort out its affairs," says Keys.

The administrators are in talks with potential purchasers of the company and its constituent parts and report some interest from within the industry.

There are three levels of creditors - chargeholders such as banks that have issued secured loans, employees and general trade creditors. How much anyone gets will be determined by how much the company or its parts are sold for.

Marquee Audio mana

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USA - Chris Brown recently completed a multi-city US tour, which ended just one week prior to his appearance on the 50th Annual Grammy Awards telecast last month.

J&R Audio of Las Vegas, NV, handled the audio production for Brown's tour exclusively. Rick Camp, a long-time Pro Tools user and J&R's senior audio consultant, says: "As an FOH engineer by trade and a Pro Tools user since 1997, it just made sense for me to recommend using Venue live. I had mixed a couple of one-offs on the D-Show about two years ago and fell in love with it. The D-Show software is [also] very intuitive. Its flow is that of an analogue console for the most part.

"Virtual Soundcheck gives the artist a chance to stand with the engineer at front of house and critique the mix and also the band's performance during sound check," Camp explains. "It allows for tweaking the comps and gates

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UK - Man-of-the moment Mark Ronson, who recently received a Grammy for his role as producer on Amy Winehouse's Back to Black album just days before winning a BRIT Award as Best Male Artist for his own release Version, has recently completed a tour of the UK with his own band.

Ronson's 12-piece band, including string and brass sections, plays with a variety of guest vocalists - rarely the same bill twice. In the UK alone, the guest list has included Amy Winehouse, Adele, Tim Burgess of the Charlatans, rapper Rhymefest, and Australian vocalist Daniel Merriweather. One of the few faces always to be found in the same place is front-of-house engineer Matthew Kettle, sitting behind a DigiDesign D-Show mixing a Nexo GEO T line array system, supplied by SSE Audio Group.

Kettle, who is a regular user of Nexo's GEO technology, has specified a digital network for the show,

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Australia - During the recent APEC summit in Sydney, an entire fleet of yachts sailing through Sydney Harbour were illuminated with SGM Palco 5 fixtures with OEM installed W-DMX receivers.

The exhibition was part of a showcase for the leaders and ministers from 21 APEC economies, displaying the best that Sydney has to offer. The APEC summit involved a series of meetings focused on the discussion of economic, trade, security and environmental topics.

Produced and designed by Mark Hammer of Hammer Lighting, in conjunction with Simon Crow of Chameleon Touring, the sailing display was part of the formal finale event hosted at the Sydney Opera House.

Each of the yachts involved had their sails illuminated by two SGM Palco 5 RGB LEDs with onboard W-DMX receivers, on either side of their sails. The effects included colour changing, rainbow effects, chases and the ability to light u

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Germany - Traditionally taking place at the turn of the year, the international Four Hills competition (or "Vierschanzentournee) ranks alongside the World Championships and Olympic Games as one of the most prestigious events in the winter sports calendar. The most recent competition, which ran from 30 December 2007, to 1 January 2008 in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, was the 56th Vierschanzentournee and featured a new runway, further heightening media interest in the event.

For the tenth year running, the event's organizers relied upon production company TC Showtechnik of Uffing am Staffelsee in Upper Bavaria to provide sound reinforcement. The team, led by managing director Martin Schulze and Stefan Rehthaler, opted once again to use systems from EVI Audio.

This year the centrepiece of TC's sound reinforcement concept was the Electro-Voice XLD compact line array s

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USA - After 15 years of in-depth training for industry professionals, Tomcat USA launched a new series of courses for 2008. A team of instructors and about 70 participants from all over the United States, Canada and Mexico converged on Midland, Texas for the launch of Tomcat's Hoist & Truss workshop and Rigging & Truss workshop.

The Hoist & Truss workshop featured the disassembly and reassembly of a one ton Lodestar as well as a Prostar with Dave Carmack of Columbus McKinnon. Dave Sowa of Tomcat USA led a discussion on control systems and also coached an advanced troubleshooting session. Instruction was rounded out by Dana Bartholomew of Fisher Technical Services, Inc. who gave instruction and demonstrations on automation.

Rocky Paulson, retired president of Stage Rigging Inc., taught safe rigging practices and principles while Morgan Neff of Mine Safety Appliances gave instru

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UK - The Smashing Pumpkins are on their third European run of their current world tour which features six different lighting designs, all based around a central theme of triangles.

The act decided to take some of the lighting equipment from Bandit America, which was seamlessly incorporated with Bandit UK's power distribution and motor systems- thus allowing the current system to meet codes throughout Europe.

"Apart from making the logistics flow, it was a great opportunity to show how inter-continental co-operation offers the client ultimate continuity," says Bandit UK's Lester Cobrin, adding, "It has been a great pleasure for us here in the UK to work with Chris Gratton (production manager) and his team."

Lighting designer Greg Shipley has been working with the band since June 2007. In that time, the lighting design has undergone several metamorphoses. E

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UK - Specialist audio visual distributor AVM has announced a new distribution partnership with Christie. The agreement sees AVM become Christie's distributor for the UK audio visual market and brings its range of single chip and three chip DLP projectors to AVM's channel customers.

Commenting on the new agreement, Mark Nisbet, AVM's managing director said: "Christie is recognised as a pioneer of DLP technology and their success in both professional display applications and in particular d-cinema has earned them and their products an unrivalled reputation for image quality. This expertise is reflected right across their range, and with their bespoke approach to developing projectors designed for individual applications, it means that resellers can offer truly tailored solutions to their customers."

Dale Miller, vice-president EMEA for Christie said: "We've chosen

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UK - Set in the heart of Northamptonshire, Sywell Aerodrome boasts one of the best general aviation airfields in the United Kingdom, as well as an aviation museum and the authentic art deco Aviator Hotel.

While awaiting permission to construct an all-weather runway, which they hope will be serviceable for Winter 2009, Sywell Aerodrome has wasted no time in developing its second hangar into a fully-equipped conference facility.

The contract for Hangar Two (as with Hangar One, developed five years ago) was awarded to Middlesex Sound & Lighting (MSL). The Harrow-based integrators have a relationship with the facility extending back a decade when Sywell Aerodrome managing director, Michael Bletsoe-Brown, first brought them in to equip the Cirrus Room - another function room at the Aviator Hotel.

After returning to install Martin Audio EM architectural speakers into Hangar One, o

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Canada - MDG, Montreal-based fog generators manufacturer, have announced that they have recently moved into new premises.

Located in Montreal North, the new facilities are 24,000sq.ft (2,300sq.m); essentially three times larger than their previous location. The new building has been completely designed to optimise MDG's production line and answer the accelerated growth that the company has known for several years, say the company. The fog generator manufacturer will also be hiring additional staff, who will work at these premises, on "state of the art technologies".

MDG'S customers will be the first to benefit from this expansion, which will allow the company to increase its efforts in R & D for new products. They will have at their disposal a vast showroom where they will be able to appreciate all equipment made available to them by MDG, be it the fog generators or

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Switzerland - Zero 88's Jester consoles are helping the company to continue its expansion into the TV sector with two recent studio installations in Switzerland.

The first installation was for a virtual studio for the French speaking Swiss Television station TSR. This 'blue box' studio has been commissioned by a mobile phone television company to produce news, sport and weather forecast programmes for their network. The 72sq.m studio includes a digital camera and 24 DMX softlights controlled by a Jester 24 console.

The second installation was for Canal 9 TV. Their new studio features 24 tungsten fresnel cyclo lights, 12 DMX softlights, another Jester 24 console plus five Betapack 3 dimmers from Zero 88.

"Both companies were impressed with the Jester consoles", explains Thomas Gottschlich of Swiss Light Consulting. "Firstly, having both a French manual and Fren

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France - The new Lexus launch ceremony at the National Theater in Tokyo, created and staged by Yves Pépin and his ECA2 team as part of a production by the Dentsu agency, has just scooped the Special Prize at the Japan Event Awards, the highest distinction in the Japanese events industry.

This latest award crowns French company ECA2 and Dentsu's collaboration with the world's leading car maker Toyota, for which Yves Pépin and his team had previously produced the Toyota Pavilion at the 2005 Aichi World Expo - an achievement that received the Best Live Event accolade at the 2007 THEA Awards, the most prestigious honours in the global experience industry.

In addition, the Songs of the Sea show in Singapore was in January named Best Tourist Attraction in Southeast Asia by the ASEAN Tourism Forum. This large-scale fantasy spectacular, devised and produced by ECA

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UK - PSL's video display technology was deployed in an innovative musical performances, as non-conformist band The Bays joined with the Heritage Orchestra for the world premiere of a new piece of music which was being written as the musicians played. This hugely ambitious musical challenge was undertaken at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall, as part of the city's Fresh festival.

The Bays famously don't rehearse; their music is improvised and spontaneous, and different at every performance. But this show was edgy, even by their standards. Musicians in the Heritage Orchestra played the notes in real time as they were written by two 'live composers' John Metcalfe and Simon Hale; with the four members of the Bays - drummer Andy Gangadeen, bassist Chris Taylor and keyboard and effects men Jamie Odell and Simon Richmond - joining in, the results prompted Metcalfe and Hale to interact an

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South Africa - Celine Dion kicked off her Taking Chances world tour with nine dates in South Africa, where lighting equipment was supplied by Gearhouse South Africa.

Part of the rig designed by Yves Aucoin, Celine's LD for 19 years, and also the production designer on this tour, involved using Robe ColorSpot 2500E ATs as key lights for the band and central onstage positions. The 12 Robe fixtures were rigged on the downstage edges of two U-shaped trusses. "They are a very bright light and I knew we could count on them," says Aucoin.

t was only his second experience using Robe fixtures. The first had been for a radio show in New York, where most of the moving lights were Robes, and he was impressed with the performance. He adds, "I had also heard a lot of good things about Robe lights."

Aucoin programmed and operated the show using a GrandMA console.

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UK - The Institute of Acoustics has issued a call for papers for its Reproduced Sound 24 Conference, which is to be held at The Old Ship Hotel in Brighton on 20-21 November 2008. This year's event will follow on from the very successful conference held at The Sage, Gateshead in November of last year.

Nick Screen of Duran Audio is part of the conference's organizing committee, and says: "Reproduced Sound is a great opportunity for people with an interest in electro-acoustics and pro audio to come together, share ideas, push forward new concepts and technologies and network with fellow industry professionals and talk about subjects close to our hearts."

The call for papers in now out and the committee is looking for papers covering the following topics:

Auralisation and sound art
Multi-channel sound perception, creation and coding (Ambisonics, Wave Field Synthe

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