Business

Details
UK - Draping specialists J&C Joel won a competitive tender to supply all buildings within the new Arena & Conference Centre Liverpool (ACCL) with theatrical curtains, stage tracking systems, portable chain hoists and truss units, plus a selection of ancillary equipment.

Totalling nearly 200 drapes of varying sizes, it's the Sowerby Bridge based company's largest single contract to date, with the work being delivered in four phases.

J&C Joel project manager Tony Griffiths, worked closely with ACCL production manager Gail Wroth to design curtain requirements for the various areas.

In the main 10,000 capacity Arena itself, the space needed to be turned into a variety of flexible formats including a complete 'black box', the traditional end-on stage D-shape format, in-the-round and sub-divided as a series of individual smaller performance spaces - all with curtains.

The main c

Details
UK - PLASA 08 provides the perfect platform for A.C. Entertainment Technologies Ltd (formerly known as A.C. Lighting Ltd), to reinforce its new name and wide range of industry products and related services.

The company's stand features leading brand innovations from its four specialist divisions - A.C. Lighting, A.C. Audio, A.C. Rigging and A.C. Video - as well as providing specialist knowledge on applications using these technologies. A.C. Lighting will be showcasing a selection of innovations across its range of traditional and intelligent lighting fixtures, control, dimming and power distribution, effects, cables and connectors.

As the worldwide distributor for Chroma-Q, the stand will feature the brand's complete range of LED products for all types of entertainment and architectural lighting applications - including the new Color Span - a configurable, low-profile, ultra-b

Details
Australia - The Frankston Arts Centre is an iconic landmark in one of Melbourne's fastest growing areas. Designed by renowned Australian architect, Daryl Jackson, the Frankston is one of the largest metropolitan and regional arts venues in Australia. It is a major focus for the performing arts in the region with facilities that contribute to the growing stature of local companies and provide a venue for local dance schools, as well as tertiary and secondary student productions.

It was decided that they needed a new world class loudspeaker system to take the venue's bookings and offerings into the next level. The previous system was locally designed and built and had been the in-house system since the venue opened in 1995. When the time came to upgrade, venue sound technician and long time fan of d&b audiotechnik systems, Ben Thompson contacted Simon Moran of Optim Audio who ulti

Details
China - With the slogan "One World, One Dream" all nations were invited by the People's Republic of China to the Summer Olympics 2008, officially known as the Games of the XXIX Olympiad. The Opening Ceremony has been held on August 8th in the Beijing National Stadium, - the "Bird's Nest" - which can seat as many as 91,000 spectators. More than 2,300 DMX controlled fixtures transformed the stadium into a never before seen sea of lights.

Clay Paky Alpha Wash 1200 played a key role in colouring the various scenes for what will be remembered as one of the most spectacular, colourful and thrilling ceremonies of the beginning of this century.

"These are the Games of the records, so is the Opening Ceremony", said Sha Xiao Lan, lighting designer of the Opening and Closing Ceremony. "To control this never before seen rig of lights I chose the grandMA

Details
USA - The Church at Pinnacle Hills is one of a growing number of houses of worship whose word reaches well beyond its immediate area of northwest Arkansas. With a regular series of webcasts, podcasts and broadcasts via the Daystar Television Network, the services at Pinnacle Hills are heard and seen by viewers across the country and across the world.

On stage in the church's sanctuary, the performers rely on Community M12 monitors to hear themselves. The M12s are part of the church's recently updated sound system, designed by Dallas-based Acoustic Dimensions. As Acoustic Dimensions' Ryan Knox observes, the M12 monitors were selected both for their powerful performance, as well as for their low on-camera profile.

"The M-12 is a camera-friendly, low profile stage monitor that throws further upstage than many comparable solutions," says Knox. "It works well on stag

Details
UK - Stage Electrics has recently provided all technical support, arc roofing for the festival dance house, power distribution, lighting and crew for the annual Towersey Village Folk Festival.

Once a year the little town of Towersey in Oxfordshire, with a population of 400, becomes engulfed with festival-goers, keen to soak up the five-day festival's atmosphere. Towersey is now in its 44th year, and has again attracted the cream of folk and acoustic music artists including The Commitments, who opened the show during the August Bank Holiday weekend. The festival also includes a showground, a wide range of trade stalls and catering venues. Daily visitors to this year's festival topped 2,500, with a further 3,500 choosing to camp.

Stage Electrics has been heavily involved with the festival for 15 years, and is also a main sponsor. Steve Heap, director of the festival comments: &q

Details
USA - FocusTrack, the production lighting documentation system, is currently helping three shows with their Broadway transfers, all three taking advantage of the system's ability to precisely document the lighting in order to allow its faithful re-creation and then long-term maintenance.

Billy Elliot, lit by Rick Fisher and programmed by Vic Smerdon, has been using FocusTrack since the show opened in London in 2005. The show is controlled by a Strand 500-series console; FocusTrack imported the show data and generated a list of the focus positions actually used by each light; it then controlled the console to allow a photograph of each lamp focus, together with a written description, to be added. This left the production team with a complete record of the components that make up the show lighting, which has already allowed them to create the Australian production of Bil

Details
UK - UK mixer manufacturer, Allen & Heath, has made a significant change to its distribution structure in the UK by appointing John Hornby Skewes & Co. Ltd. (JHS) as the exclusive distributor for the PA and ZED Series of small format A&H mixers.

"Since adding the ZED series to the range, Allen & Heath's products are now more diverse than ever with consoles for touring systems to bedroom DJ's. Because of this, it was vital we found the correct distribution vehicle to cater for such diversity," explains A&H Director of Sales, Bob Goleniowski.

"Recently we have been examining how to broaden our reach in the UK MI sector. Knowing the JHS team well, it was clear they were ideal for the role. The products fit seamlessly into their portfolio, and with an 11-strong sales force on the ground servicing the UK, JHS was the logical choice to take the brand forward."

Details
UK - JBL's new Control Contractor 300 ceiling speakers have received their UK baptism in a new-build, multi-room Chinese restaurant in Bristol.

Situated in the Harbourside regeneration area, Zen is a luxurious, glass-fronted building on Millennium Square that caters for up to 400. The design mixes old and new, combining marbled toilets with chic private dining rooms. Zen artefacts, Chinese paintings and period Chinese furnishings complete the experience.

Owner Suzanna Ho, who also founded Dynasty in the BS1 postal district, is accustomed to renting in potent PA systems for corporate events; and with funky house music added selectively to the eclectic menu at Zen, she again needed a system at the same time capable of producing warm-sounding background music and a medium night club sound.

AET (Abbeymoor Electrical Technical) were recommended to the project by Premier Sound & L

Details
Spain - Rock in Rio has gained a reputation as the largest rock festival in the world, drawing crowds of over a million to the original Brazilian events. In recent years the show has expanded to include festivals in Lisbon, and this year marked the first Rock in Rio festival in Madrid, where more than 300,000 fans enjoyed performances by Bob Dylan, the Police, Shakira, Lenny Kravitz, Jamiroquai, Neil Young, Alanis Morrisette, Franz Ferdinand and other top-name acts.

Brazilian sound company Gabisom provided six Digidesign Venue systems for the event, as well as an Icon D-Control for post production tasks. Four D-Show consoles and two D-Show Profiles were in service at FOH and monitor positions. At the same time, all performances were simultaneously recorded on dual Pro Tools|HD systems, creating preliminary mixes in real time using one of the D-Show Profile consoles, and remixing

Details
UK - Telex/RTS' intercom technology is playing an important role in the refurbished master control room (MCR) at MTV's European headquarters in Camden, North London, which provides switching for three onsite studios and over 50 television channels across the UK, Ireland and mainland Europe.

Based on a 112-port ADAM (Advanced Digital Audio Matrix) frame, with integral RVON (RTS Voice Over Network) VoIP cards, the system is able to connect to desktop panels using Ethernet links, plus three Virtual Key Panels, around the MTV studios complex.

Computer technology is having an increasing influence on broadcast communications and the Virtual Key Panel is a PC interface that replicates the familiar intercom switch panel on a desktop or laptop screen and offers the same functions as the traditional hardware version, with audio reproduced through the onboard soundcard.

Being able to c

Details
UK - Stage Electrics provided staging, lighting, power distribution, sound and crew in support of the annual Trafalgar Square Festival over a three week period from 7 - 23 August. Trafalgar Square Festival is London's annual programme of street arts and performance, set in the heart of the capital.

Part of the festival included a giant screen installed at the foot of Nelson's Column, which played scenes from the Beijing Olympics. The screen showed everything from the opening ceremony in Beijing to the closing ceremony, and the handover to London and captured all of Team GB's successes. The festival had plenty of Chinese inspired performances to accompany the Olympic theme with acts and performances from the Flying Dragon Circus and the Yellow Earth Theatre. Many of the artists taking part in the festival used digital imagery and art as part of their act.

Stage Electrics worked

Details
UK - Featuring internationally renowned surf and skate competitions, the week-long Rip Curl Boardmasters festival held in Newquay Cornwall, also features top line music events at various locations around the beach side town. Three iLive digital systems were used by two PA companies managing the two main music sites.

The main music event is the weekend-long Unleashed which takes place above the beautiful Watergate Bay. This year's event hosted BBC Radio 1's Chris Moyles for a special one-off afternoon show. Local PA company, Impact Sound & Light, managed the sound requirements, selecting an Allen & Heath iLive-112 digital system for the live show and broadcast feed. The Zutons were special guests on the live show, performing an acoustic set to the assembled crowd, in addition to the usual Moyles show elements, such as the mash up sessions, involving a live DJ conte

Details
China - After 17 days of competition, Olympics 2008 ended with another stunning show in the Beijing National Stadium. Similar to the Opening Ceremony, more than 2,300 DMX controlled fixtures were used to create a worthy finish for the Games. Three grandMA full-size plus three grandMA full-size as backup, two grandMA light as well as 46 MA NSPs controlled the lighting rig.

Paul Collison, who was responsible for the control system and broadcast lighting, reported, "It always amazes me that the first time people really focus on the Closing Ceremony is two days after the opening. Beijing was no different. What made things very hard was we only had three nights with the stadium lights off. In total this amounts to only 18 hours of programming.

"Compare this to the six months of programming and thought that goes in to an opening and you start to see my point. For that reas

Details
USA - Barix reports that the Fountain of Life Center, a multi-building 'Spiritual Oasis' spread over 106 acres in Florence, New Jersey, is using a suite of Barix products for a variety of control, automation, security, and audio transport applications.

Barix products are now live in the campus' Life Center, a sports, recreational and fitness centre that opened this spring; Life Center Academy, a private, non-denominational K-12 school; WIFI-AM, a 500-watt Christian radio station; and the worship sanctuary, chapel and 2200-seat auditorium in the main Fountain of Life Center building.

According to Thomas Spadaro, director of technical ministries for Fountain of Life Center, the majority of the technology on campus is funded through donations, and the low cost of the Barix devices are ideal for his budget. Spadaro added that open-standards technology from companies like Barix al

Details
Norway - The new Clarion Hotel Bergen Airport, on the outskirts of Bergen - Norway's second city - is one of the first hotels of its type to be built in Norway. Just 50 yards away from the terminal of Bergen Airport, the hotel is a "music hotel" - with live musicians performing most nights and a distinct musical theme on each of the hotel's floors.

The Clarion also boasts some of the most impressive conference facilities in the country with over 1600sq.m of dedicated floor space across several meeting rooms, handling up to 1200 conference visitors each day. A crucial part of its technical specification was the audio installation, which would be required to facilitate effective multimedia presentations and deliver loudness and clarity in both speech and music. To meet these needs, the specifiers opted for Tannoy's range of premium in-ceiling and surface-mount loudspeake

Details
UAE - United Broadcast & Media Solutions (UBMS), the system house and distributor based in Dubai, is Telex/RTS's new partner in the United Arab Emirates for the broadcasting market.Comments Kamil Swobodzinski, director sales ACT & CCS EMEA, "In order to fulfil our growth path, Telex/RTS relies on strong partners in the Middle East region. I am sure this new partnership with UBMS will push the Telex/RTS portfolio to the next level."

(Jim Evans)

Details
UK - Andrew Lloyd Webber and Charles Hart's Phantom of the Opera, one of the West End's most successful productions, celebrated 21 years at Her Majesty's Theatre in London. The occasion was marked with the installation of a Meyer Sound system featuring the new UPQ-1P wide coverage loudspeaker.

Sound designer Mick Potter handled the audio system, provided by Blitz Audio who purchased the equipment through Meyer Sound dealer Autograph Sales. Using Meyer Sound's Matrix3 audio show control, Potter created a sound design to immerse the audience in a range of ambiences. A Galileo loudspeaker management system with eight Galileo 616 processors provides multiple zones and system DSP.

"The Matrix3 affords a level of control that simply wouldn't be achievable with more conventional components," Potter observes. "For me as a sound designer, it gives me an entirely n

Details
USA - Harman Professional has announced the opening of new field sales offices in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Kuala Lumpur office will be led by David McKinney, who is promoted to senior director of sales, Asia, Harman Professional. The San Juan office will serve Latin America and Canada and will be led by Jaime Albors, who is promoted to senior director of sales, intercontinental, Harman Professional. Both offices will soon add staff in field sales and technical support.

Michael MacDonald, executive vice president of marketing & sales, comments: "Harman Professional owes much of its global success to the contribution of channel partners in Asia, Latin America and Canada. In recognition of this fact and the considerable opportunity presented by emerging markets in Latin America and Asia, we are investing in these new offices in regions that have pr

Details
Poland - Audica Professional loudspeakers and amplifier/controllers have been installed in one of the Warsaw University of Technology's most historic and prestigious rooms, primarily used for conferences and recognized as a flagship conference facility in Warsaw. The University of Technology is the oldest technology university in Poland, founded by the visionary, Stanislaw Staszic.

The system was designed and installed by Tommex, Audica Professional's exclusive distributor for Poland. In addition to requiring the highest possible sound quality, the loudspeakers had to merge technology with the elaborate historic architecture of the room and Tommex proposed Audica MICROline and MICROpoint for their slim unobtrusive shape and neutral colour.

The system in the eight metre high Auditorium uses a distributed system, with ten MICROlines in pairs forming the basis. MICROlines' abilit

Details
UK - AV specialists 2Ci have completed a tour of the UK's festivals, supporting the Guitar Hero Experience with AV technology including the 103" Panasonic Plasma aboard a promotional trailer.

2Ci worked with brand experience company Bugle to create the Guitar Hero Experience, which featured a 103" Panasonic Plasma as the centrepiece to the stage set, where festival goers showed off their skills, rocking out to Rage Against the Machine, the Sex Pistols and the Kaiser Chiefs to name but a few. The most talented of the festival goers were offered special prizes, including the chance to play on the main stage at some festivals.

The 103" Plasma was sourced from trade rental company PSCo, with the company's exclusive Screenlifter which lifts the screen up to 3m in the air at the touch of a button. This was then built into a set to act as a stage backdrop

Details
UK - SSE has provided a Midas XL8 and Klark Teknik DN9696 for Rafi Resurrected, a tribute to legendary Bollywood singer Mohammad Rafi performed by Indian singing superstar Sonu Niigaam and the CBSO (City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra). Rafi was a Bollywood megastar during his 35-year career as a singer on Indian film soundtracks.

SSE's then project manager Rob Hughes - now working for Midas and Klark Teknik's UK distributor Shuttlesound - won the contract to supply the PA and crew for the three shows at the Birmingham Symphony Hall, Manchester Apollo and London Collisium respectively.

Having previously worked with the show's producer Tim Pottier. Hughes had no hesitation in spec'ing the XL8. "Its large channel count, ease of navigation to channels via the VCA and POP groups and high quality audio was such an important factor for such a large show," he says.

Details
UK - As the curtain came down on the Beijing Olympics the spotlight fell on London, host of the next Summer Games in 2012. To celebrate the handing over of the Olympic baton, a star-studded event took place in The Mall in front of Buckingham Palace on 24 August. Broadcast live on the BBC, and graced by the presence of many Olympic medallists, the event climaxed with a celebratory concert featuring artists including Il Divo, The Feeling, Heather Small and Will Young.

Combining the official start of the build up to London 2012 with a celebration of the remarkable success of Team GB in Beijing, the day was also a major success for Sennheiser, working in conjunction with Britannia Row.

All the presenter mics on the day were Sennheiser SKM 5200 handhelds with Neumann KK 105 heads, and those same mics were used by Il Divo and The Feeling.

Heather Small, Sophie Ellis Bextor and Wil

Details
UK - Harlequin has opened an office in Hong Kong to serve countries in the Far East. Headed up by area sales manager, Kasper Nyboe, Harlequin has taken the decision to set up the facility to serve its fast growing markets in the area supported by locally held stock.

The newly formed Harlequin Asia Limited, a subsidiary of British Harlequin, is based in Sheung Wan, Hong Kong.

(Jim Evans)

  1. Shure launches Spanish website
  2. Procon celebrates 20 years in business
  3. Harrah's Chester on track with Community
  4. Hippotizers control TV choir contest
  5. PLASA08 free seminar programme - last chance to book
  6. Hoist UK to distribute CyberHoist
Page 998 of 1813

Latest Issue. . .