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UAE - Martin Professional Exterior 1200 Wash colour changing luminaires are being used to visually enhance the lengthy, anterior façade of Abu Dhabi's Khalidiyah Shopping Mall in the United Arab Emirates. Combining with Martin Exterior 600 colour changers, the Exterior fixtures project a series of multi-chromatic shades onto the building's modern Islamic architecture.

Rising from Abu Dhabi's bustling new city centre, Khalidiyah Mall is a high profile shopping centre whose architectural design combines the traditional with the contemporary. The Mall's concept goes beyond shopping to embrace leisure, entertainment and dining, and includes landscape features like fountains and a summer gardens.

Keeping in line with the Mall's intent of boosting the economic profile of Abu Dhabi, an eye-catching exterior lighting scheme was sought. "We wanted to do something different that w

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Slovakia - Robe moving lights were in action on the Slovakian launch of the new Audi Q5 car which was staged in the ex-Cvernovka (fabric) factory in Bratislava, and produced by Promea for Porsche Interauto Slovakia.

LD Tomas Lecký specified Robe for his moving lights, which were rigged on a combination of flown trusses and an 8m high ground support system measuring 24 x 10m that was installed onto one of the derelict factory's old halls. The off-beat location was transformed into a highly atmospheric temporary showcase area in which to reveal the various Q5 models.

He used a total of 10 Robe ColorSpot 1200E ATs, 16 Robe ColorWash 1200E ATs, 12 Robe ColorMix 575 ATs and four Robe Scan 575 XTs. There was also a large LED video wall in the hall.

The Robes, along with all the other lighting and audio equipment for the show was supplied by Q-99. Lighting was programmed and run f

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USA - The entertainment industry has again named Bandit Lites as 'Lighting Company of the Year'. The awards ceremony took place on 30 January 2009 at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles. Hosted by Comedian Jeff Garcia, the event also featured notable celebrity presenters such as Steven Adler (of Guns N Roses), Steve Harwell (of Smash Mouth) and Davy Jones (of the Monkees).

The awards ceremony closed out the 2009 CIC Convention. Held at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles, the annual three-day event seeks to facilitate the exchange of ideas between key decision makers, enhance the flow of information among professionals, and make a positive contribution toward enriching the concert industry's health.

Bandit chairman of the board, Michael T. Strickland and general manager, Dizzy Gosnell were there to accept this honour on behalf of Bandit Lites. This is the fourth

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UK - A new Swiss vegetarian restaurant concept arrived in London recently, and immediately took up occupancy in two prime sites. The first tibits opened in October in London's West End, followed a month later by Europe's largest, inner city shopping mall, The Westfield London Shopping Centre in West London.

Both restaurants have been equipped with 100V line loudspeakers and amplification from QSC Audio - to meet a specification originally drawn up by audio consultant, Christian Beusch of Tonstudio Beusch, who has overseen all the Swiss-based installations.

In the UK, the installation work was handled by experienced sound and light design company, ESL, who were introduced to the project by main electrical contractor, Morgan Cass.

In both sites ESL has used multiples of QSC's Acoustic Design AD-S52T and AD-S32T full-range loudspeakers - 12 and 10 respectively being wall

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USA - The Joint Training Initiative of The ESTA Foundation and USITT has announced Eos Console Training for Basic/Intermediate Programmers. This two-day course, offered 1 and 2 June 2009, is designed to help beginning and intermediate level programmers advance their professional proficiency with the Eos console. The course will be held at the Century Theatre at Electronic Theatre Controls in Middleton, WI and will be conducted by Anne Valentino, Eos product manager and Steve Aldrich, southeast field project coordinator.

This event is limited in size and will be open to ESTA and USITT members only. Sessions will be hosted and co-produced by ETC. Attendees should have prior experience with automated luminaries and a general familiarity with lighting consoles (Eos experience is not necessary). In addition, they should have working knowledge of the DMX 512 communication protocol, fi

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India - Wyclef Jean, multi-platinum hip-hop artist, made an appearance on stage at the Venkestshawara Farm House in Pune (Maharashtra, Western India), on December 8, 2008, with EAW's KF760 line array speaker systems, provided by Mumbai-based Rich Audio.

"For FOH, we flew two KF760 line array modules, plus two KF761 line array modules per site with optimal angles of boxes," recalled Lee Braganza, Rich Audio FOH and System Engineer. "The technical result was that the sound in the venue was perfect with no slap backs. To achieve this, we used two EAW UX8800 digital signal processors with presets for different sound zones."

The EAW processors, along with amplifiers from Crown Audio, were networked to a wireless tablet Laptop, which was equipped with EAW's Smaart Live to provide system correction according to venue and complete system management.

Richie Bragan

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USA - Touring for the first time since 2003, AC/DC are once again on the road with their Black Ice tour. The X-Array system for the tour, consisting of 96 Electro-Voice X-Array cabinets driven by P3000 amplifiers, was designed by long-time Electro-Voice user and consultant Harry Witz of Clair Global, the man behind some of the largest PA system designs of all time.

Analog-centric AC/DC also favours the sound of Midas mixing consoles. The tour's console spec includes a vintage Pro 40 and a Heritage 4000 operated by Front of House Engineer Paul "Pab" Boothroyd and monitor engineer Mike Adams, respectively. A Klark Teknik DN9696 is archiving the shows. The latest digital offering from Midas, the PRO6, is utilised at FOH for opening acts.

(Jim Evans)

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USA - February marks three notable TV broadcasts watched around the globe: Super Bowl XLIII won by the Pittsburgh Steelers who defeated the Arizona Cardinals held Sunday, February 1 at the home of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Raymond James Stadium, in Tampa, Florida; the 51st Annual Grammy Awards on February 8 at the Staple Center in Los Angeles; and the 81st Academy Awards at the Kodak Theater on Sunday, February 22.

ATK Audiotek (Valencia, Ca.) will once again spearhead audio production for all three extravaganzas. ATK has been supplying audio production services for the Super Bowl since 1998 and for XLIII, they have chosen two Yamaha PM5Ds for audio coverage at the stadium. Faith Hill performed at the Pre-Game Show and Jennifer Hudson sang the National Anthem.

The Super Bowl Half-Time show received an assist by long-time Bruce Springsteen sound company, Audio Analysts (Colorad

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USA - Best known for his smooth, dynamic vocals and romantic ballads, Luis Miguel has been one of the most popular singers in Latin America since the early 1980s. During his career Miguel won four Latin Grammy Awards, five Grammy Awards and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at the age of 26. Down to the present day he has sold approximately 100 million albums. Currently Miguel is on tour accompanied by a lighting design from Danny Nolan and a grandMA system.

Nolan said: "Luis Miguel's show design is made up of a large 80' x 30' back low-res panel. In front of the low-res is a 20' x 15' HD LED screen with Barco MiTRIX modules across the front of all the stage. In the air there are several arc trusses with 92 x pixel pars, 80 x moving lights, e.g. 23 x Vari*Lite VL3000 Spot, and two truss spots. Everything is controlled via fibre optic cable by a grandMA full-size

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Americas - Mexican pop superstars Los Temerarious continue their tour of the US, Central and South America with over 120 shows planned for 2009 and a lighting design by Fabian Boggino that includes over 80 Robe moving lights. He has worked for Los Temerarious since 1998 and this is their first tour in three years.

Equipment for the US legs of the tour is being supplied by Paradign Production Services from Florida, and Robe fixtures were originally recommended to Boggino by Paradign's George Valdez, who also programmed the show with Boggino, using a grandMA full size console.

"George is the principal of Paradign and a very knowledgeable LD in his own right," states Boggino. "So I completely trusted his judgement when he suggested I use Robe's ColorSpot and ColorWash 1200E AT units for the first time". Once Valdez had demo'd the fixtures, Boggino was very imp

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Neanderthal News - A musical experience with a difference is being previewed at the National Museum Wales in Cardiff - an attempt to recreate the sound of the Neanderthals. Jazz composer Simon Thorne was given the task of creating the "soundscape" to provide a musical backdrop to some of the ancient exhibits on display. The musician says the work is "probably the most unusual" he has undertaken.

There has been strong interest in the composition and it will go on a separate live tour later in the year. Neanderthal man existed side by side with early homo sapiens before becoming extinct some 30,000 years ago. Despite having a reputation for lacking intelligence, recent research suggests the Neanderthals were a lot more resourceful and innovative than was first thought. Thorne said: "Given that Neanderthal man's brain was about the same size as ours, and mu

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UK - PLASA's forthcoming AGM and Members Lunch is expected to attract a strong turnout in June, on the back of another influential year for the organisation.

PLASA's momentum is certainly growing: its membership base is expanding, its range of services is strengthening and its member networking events are increasing, making the AGM and Members Lunch an important event at which members can come together to discuss solutions and approaches to the current situation.

PLASA is highly active at an industry-level too: its political policy continues to give the entertainment and installation technology sectors a strong profile in Government circles and the organisation is about to announce the next stage in its skills strategy, focusing on the development of a portfolio of qualifications designed to enhance the skills-base of the sector.

It is also just a few months away from the la

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USA - Clay Paky Alpha Beam 300 fixtures are currently on tour with AC/DC. Upstaging, Inc. supplied all lighting for the tour, which includes 48 Clay Paky Alpha Beam 300 fixtures, in addition to providing their Chicago facility to erect the entire rig in house for pre-programming. Lighting design was done by Patrick Woodroffe and Dave Hill. The design places the Alpha Beam 300s all over the stage, with 12 across the front of the stage, 12 on the backline and another 24 on the upstage truss.

Lighting director and co-designer Cosmo Wilson remarked, "We actually started out with 24 Alpha Beams, but were so blown away that we doubled them and now have 48. What is most impressive is the brightness. Also, I am a big ACL guy, and these are stunning for that purpose, the fact that I can make the beams tighter and smaller is excellent. I love that I can have gobos in a wash light! Th

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USA - As a well established church with a blend of progressive and traditional programmes, Mid-Way Baptist Church recently completed a significant facility upgrade that included the installation of a new and considerably more versatile sound reinforcement system. Music plays a vital role in the church's worship services, so to accommodate a choir of roughly 70 voices, a praise and worship band with six to eight vocalists plus electronic drums, bass, guitar, keyboard, and horns, church management sought to install a sound system with concert level performance attributes. They found what they were searching for with a series of loudspeaker enclosures from D.A.S. Audio's Variant product line.

Orlando, FL-based Owens Audio Video Design was contracted to handle the design and installation of Mid-Way Baptist Church's upgraded sound system. Bob Owens, designer and president of Owens Au

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UK - Turbosound has appointed a new distributor to handle its interests in the rapidly expanding Nigerian market and surrounding countries.

Based in the country's capital Abuja, Kayima-Chris Company provides sales & distribution, rental, sound design, installation, sound engineering, training and consultancy services for the professional audio market, serving both the Nigerian and international markets.

"My first contact with a Turbosound system was at LaScala in King's Cross, London. For me the experience can be summed up as 'breathtaking'," says Isioma C Odukwe, the company's managing director.

"Bringing Turbosound to the Nigerian pro audio market is a landmark achievement for us at Kayima-Chris. With a growing market and consequential growth in professionalism, more people are beginning to appreciate and seek better options for audio systems.

"By bec

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UAE - Dubai's latest mega-project, the Atlantis Hotel, hosted a lavish opening party in November. This one-night celebration for 2,000 elite VIP guests including actors, musicians and politicians, was set to be the most expensive private party ever staged. According to press reports, the cost was estimated at around $32 million (£16 million). The firework display was planned by Grucci's, which also organized the displays for the Beijing Olympics. Lighting Designer Raymond Thompson used a grandMA to run the show.

Multiple Clay Paky Alpha Spot HPE1200 and Alpha Wash 1200 moving lights, plus 150 ETC Source Fours were used for the light show. Syncrolites were also scattered around the hotel making it a light show to remember. A giant HD video projection sequence visualised the story of Atlantis, featuring the rising of the mythological city from the Arabian Gulf.

Cory Fitzge

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UK - City Theatrical has provided more SHoW DMX equipment to specialist lighting contractor Howard Eaton Lighting for Cameron Mackintosh's new production of Oliver! now playing at The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, in London's West End.

SHoW DMX is used on the production to provide DMX control to dimmers and smoke machines mounted on a large scenic flying piece, which would otherwise have entailed a complex and troublesome cable run to the already crowded theatre flying grid.

For many years, WDS Wireless Data System, SHoW DMX's forerunner, provided London's West End shows with wireless DMX, and the new technology of SHoW DMX is rapidly establishing itself in London, on Broadway, in Las Vegas, and in other venues around the world.

The production lighting designer for Oliver! is Paule Constable, and the senior production electrician is Gerry Amies. Lighting equipment

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USA - For the 51st GRAMMY Awards Show, Audio-Technica supplied over 250 of its microphones, including an impressive array of hard-wired mics and Artist Elite 5000 Series UHF Wireless Systems.

The team working on this year's GRAMMYs featured many top-tier contributors who returned to ensure the success of this landmark event. The sound system was provided by ATK AudioTek with FOH (front-of-house) Engineers Ron Reaves and Mikael Stewart, while the broadcast audio was supervised by Phil Ramone and Hank Neuberger, leading members of the Producers & Engineers Wing of The Recording Academy. New York-based XM Productions/Effanel Music were onsite with their L7 remote truck to create the music mix, facilitated by music mixers John Harris and Eric Schilling.

For the home audience, CBS once again delivered the most advanced form of HDTV, with 1,080 lines of picture resolution and 5.1-ch

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USA - Roger Daltrey and Pete Townsend, founding members The Who, have used Shure microphones onstage for more than 40 years. Their energetic live shows are often highlighted by Daltrey swinging his microphone - a standard Shure SM58® - over his head in wide arcs. Now, the rockers famous for punishing their equipment explain their loyalty to the microphones that have been taking it for so long in the new Shure Reason Why advertising campaign.

The band is just one of the artists appearing in the campaign, which features performers talking candidly about why they have remained faithful to Shure microphones throughout their careers. Other performers appearing in the series include Maroon 5, Brad Paisley, G. Love, Martina McBride, and The Black Crowes. Each ad also promotes the artist's latest album release, concert tour, and website.

"Performers all over the world

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UK - Recent industry news headlines claiming that Ofcom has made assurances to the PMSE (Programme Making & Special Events) sector about its future use of spectrum, as well as promises of compensation for equipment made obsolete by the changes, have been greeted with caution by PLASA.

The claims in the news give the impression that Ofcom will make suitable alternative spectrum available UK-wide for the PMSE sector, and that compensation or 'funding' will be made available so that users of the spectrum do not have to bear the costs of replacing radio microphone equipment.

However, PLASA's technical resources manager Ron Bonner, a member of the BEIRG (British Entertainment Industry Radio Group) steering committee which is campaigning against Ofcom's proposed measures, says that we should remain very wary of Ofcom's plans. He told L&SI: "The recent headlines should be treate

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Slovakia - The Slovakian staff of Mercedes-Benz held their Christmas party in the Park of Culture in Bratislava. LASA, a rental company based in the city, was responsible for the equipment and a Cobra-4 line array system from Dynacord provided the sound.

The main PA comprised eight Cobra-PHW, four Cobra-4-Top, and two Cobra-4-Far enclosures. Stanislav Lehen of LASA cited a number of reasons for his decision to invest in a Cobra-4, "For one thing, Cobra-4 provides outstanding sound quality. It also provides easy handling and enormous flexibility: with Dynacord's Cobra system, anyone can provide sound reinforcement for small, medium-sized, and even large events."

To counteract the long reverberation time of the main hall in the Park of Culture, LASA set up two delay lines (at 35 and 50m). Mercedes-Benz was so pleased with the results of their Christmas party with Cobra

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USA - The HBO open signal presentation of 'We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration' at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC served as the nation's televised kickoff of the 56th Presidential Inauguration. Captured live at the National Mall, the event drew hundreds of thousands to see and hear a lineup including Bruce Springsteen, Beyonce, U2, Sheryl Crow, Shakira, James Taylor, Stevie Wonder, and others.

Sound reinforcement for the concert was courtesy of Clair Global and was mixed-for-air by veteran television production mixer Ed Greene. Wireless chosen for the event included 16 channels of Shure UR4D systems, using various combinations of bodypack and handheld transmitters, many of which sported SM58 capsules.

The Clair system spanned two miles from the Lincoln Memorial steps to the Capitol using a combination of the Lititz, Pennsylvania-based company's i5 and i3 enclosu

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USA - Southern California-based Sound Image Inc. has agreed to purchase over 800 I-Tech HD amplifiers for its tour sound business. "Our customers are extremely demanding and I-Tech HD gives Sound Image the ability to take our system performance to unprecedented levels," stated Dave Shadoan, president of Sound Image Inc. "At Sound Image we have always prided ourselves on providing the best sound possible to the clients we serve."

Sound Image's touring division is known as a provider of premium live sound systems, working with major artists such as Rascal Flatts, Jimmy Buffett, Eric Clapton, and Taylor Swift to name a few.

At its core, I-Tech HD features a new user-inspired DSP engine co-developed with BSS called OmniDriveHD. The new processing engine features Linear Phase FIR filters that offer "unrivaled crossover performance for sonically pure tunings

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USA - Shure Incorporated has selected Highway Marketing of Dallas, TX, as its new sales representative in the mid and south central United States. The company will be responsible for sales of the complete Shure line of professional audio products to retailers and systems contractors in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas.

"Scott Baker, Steve Simmons, and the entire staff at Highway Marketing bring several decades of combined experience and proven success in our industry to our team of independent sales reps," said Jim Schanz, director of US field sales for Shure. "They have a thorough understanding of our constantly evolving industry from the perspective of dealers and manufacturers. We are confident they will continue their success and help grow our business in the region."

"Highway Marketing is thrilled to be representing Shure," said Baker

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