Business

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UK - South London-based event technical production specialist PR Live supplied audio, video, lighting and staging for the 2016 Master Investor Show at the Business Design Centre in London, which attracted a record 4,500 delegates, 100 exhibiting companies and featured over 50 presentations by CEOs, founders and investment gurus.

PR Live has looked after the technical requirements for the last 14 years working directly for the client Ex Events and this year provided widescreen video and a sound system for the main plenary area and sound / AV systems for three breakout rooms and screens and control for many of the exhibition stands.

Ian Coull, PR Live's MD was delighted to be working on the show again. "It has been interesting and inspirational to see the event grow and expand and itself invest in increased production values over the years," he commented.

PR Live's crew

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Germany - Snap, Culture Beat, Haddaway, Captain Hollywood Project and Right Said Fred are familiar names to people who went to parties in the 1990s. These and many other artists are on tour in Germany with an event called Die MEGA 90er Live. Atlantis Audio took charge of the technical lighting equipment on behalf of Dresden-based LTI, and once again requested products from Lightpower's stock.

Among the various lights used on the tour were 16 Clay Paky Sharpys and 15 Clay Paky A.leda B-EYE K20s, in addition to two grandMA2 full-size consoles, two MA 4Port Nodes, and two MA plus MK2 Video Processing Units (VPUs).

Volkmar Kusch, the owner of Atlantis Audio, was thrilled yet again with the performance of the products, commenting, "The MA system is simply extraordinary. We built the whole setup with two full-size grandMA2 consoles. Martin Pech dealt with the show lightin

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UK - Lighting and visuals rental specialist HSL has invested again in more Martin Pro MAC Viper Wash DXs and MAC Aura XB moving lights, also more grandMA2 consoles for the latest Il Divo UK and European tour.

The tour sees the band present their smouldering Amor & Pasi

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USA - LD Freddy Thompson of JDI Productions was looking for more than speed when he put together the rig for the recent national tour by Killswitch Engage. In keeping with the hardcore spirit of his clients, who were named one of "The Greatest Metal Bands of All Time" by MTV, Thompson wanted nothing less than full throttle power from his floor package. He got this with a high force rig that relied heavily on the intense output of Rogue moving fixtures, Nexus panels, Legend 230SR Beams and Vesuvio foggers from Chauvet Professional.

"Practical things always have to be on your mind when you create a floor package," said Thompson. "So everything we did had to be quick and easy, but that wasn't our only thought. We never want to go to a venue and just add lights to the house rig, we want to have a real impact on the set by creating a more dimensional look."

Thompson did this in

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UK - Serious Stages kicked off the festival season with BBC Radio 1's Big Weekend, at Exeter's Powderham Castle, 28-29 May 2016.

BBC Radio 1's Big Weekend is the largest free ticketed music event in Europe and is held in a different UK location each year, with Exeter's Powderham Castle hosting this year's festival. Serious Stages supplied stages, decking and event structures to house production equipment and artists including Coldplay, Mumford & Sons, Bastille, Biffy Clyro and Jess Glynne.

The main stage was a Serious Stages 25m Space Roof, with a 15m trim height, flanked by two 12m goalposts, from which video screens and PA speakers were hung. Serious Stages also supplied and installed a clear-span structure for the main stage front-of-house, along with delay towers, follow spot pods and the assisted viewing platform with accessibility ramps.

In other areas, Serious a

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Vietnam - Proel's newly appointed distributor Viet Thai An Trading Co. Ltd. organised a product seminar and demonstration of Axiom professional loudspeaker products in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi in March. Technical sales support engineer Daniele Massaccesi, in a format that has proved successful in opening new markets to the Axiom brand, introduced the company's 25-year history in manufacturing, and the solutions offered by Axiom loudspeaker systems.

The first day was largely devoted to training of the internal sales and technical support staff, introducing them to an overview of the products in the Axiom range and their applications. The second day's proceedings provided a more detailed presentation of the entire Axiom product catalogue.

On the third day an outdoor demo was staged at the Cultural House of Thanh Xuan District, which has a capacity of 1500 people, with pr

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Japan - Tokyo's New National Theatre (NNTT) has recently installed a 32-channel TiMax2 SoundHub-S32 and TiMax Tracker system with six TT Sensors and 32 TT Tags, for adaptable provision of automated vocal localisation and audio showcontrol in both the main Playhouse auditorium and also the smaller 'Pit' theatre.

The multi-tasking system was specified by Kunio Watanabe, manager of the NNTT's audio division, who contacted SCA Sound Solutions in search of effective and natural vocal tracking and immersive audio spatialisation.

Watanabe commented, "We now have a very natural and smooth sound imaging for the actors' voices, without the feeling of it being a sound 'effect', by which I mean, the audience could feel the individual voice at the exact position of the individual singer, not from left, right and centre speakers. This may sound obvious, but other systems do not give thi

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USA - Based in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, Najafi Design Group prides itself on creating designs that truly complete the experience while immortalizing the moment. So when they were approached by Cleft Clips to create an entirely new technical design for Funny or Die, lighting and event designer Sohail e. Najafi was confident his team could completely transform The Historic Scoot Inn.

Wanting to consolidate two main elements of their typical production design, a detailed scenic backdrop and high resolution video wall for connect playback, Najafi found a new more cost-effective and dynamic solution, the FLEXCurve 8mm high resolution curved LED video wall from PixelFLEX.

"We first started designing for Cleft Clips in Los Angeles for various comedy specials over the past few years," began Najafi. "When they brought us back this year, they asked us to manage the technical produ

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Belgium - Sound specialist 4ears is using a range of DPA Microphones to deliver "the perfect sound quality" for a diverse range of live music events. The company has also been working with Belgian band SX, who used DPA's d:facto Vocal Microphones with great success at a concert at the Ancienne Belgique concert hall in Brussels.

Headed by experienced broadcast/live sound engineer and production manager, Peter Vandergoten, 4ears provides sound mixing and recording equipment to many top Belgian acts and events, such as Salvatore Adamo, Ghinzu, Absynthe Minded, Night of the Proms and Rock Werchter. Over the years, Vandergoten has built up an impressive collection of DPA microphones, including eight d:vote 4099 Instrument Microphones that are regularly used for both rock and classical productions.

"Many bands that I work with combine acoustic instruments in a 'rock' setup," say

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USA - Full Sail University in Winter Park, Florida, has installed a comprehensive system of Focusrite RedNet Dante-networked audio converters and interfaces in its Full Sail Live 1 building, which is home to the university's Show Production Bachelor of Science degree programme.

Incorporating RedNet MP8R 8-channel Mic Pre and A/D converters, RedNet D64R 64-Channel MADI-Dante Bridges, RedNet HD32R Pro Tools | HD/HDX Bridges and RedNet 2 16-channel remote-controlled analogue interfaces, the new Focusrite system not only provides networking throughout the facility, but also offers students practical experience with the Dante Audio-over-IP protocol.

Full Sail Live 1 encompasses a large production space and a variety of ancillary show production-related rooms in a facility where students learn about sound reinforcement, lighting, live video and multimedia, automated lighting, co

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South Africa - When the television audience heard that The Voice would come to South Africa, there was a huge response and expectation. For Chris De Lancey from Multi-Media who was awarded the technical supply for The Voice Angola by production Co AMPN, South Africa and Nigeria, it has been a relief to see the show raise the bar for local televised shows and to meet international standards. The show was recorded at Sasani Studios, Johannesburg.

"First tentative discussions around The Voice began late in 2013, and December of that year, draft 1 budgets were being produced. Two years later it was on us," said Chris.

"When I eventually got sign off I was both elated and terrified at the same time," Chris shares. "I don't think I slept for four days before I could speak to anyone and say, 'Right, let's start talking and dealing with this.'

Realising th

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China - Production company, Hunan Broadcasting System recently purchased an Allen & Heath GLD-112 digital mixer with AR2412 and AB168 IO racks to manage its live entertainment shows, starting with the most popular entertainment show in China, Super Girl.

New for the returning season, the final six episodes of Super Girl were broadcast live on imgo.TV, an Internet TV platform affiliated to Hunan, with more than 35m active viewers per day. The shows featured performances from final competing contestants with commentary from five professional judges on stage, plus two guest performing artists.

The biggest technical challenge was handling the mixture of handheld and headset microphones and various open mics, which was managed by GLD's Automatic Mic Mixing (AMM) feature.

"The AMM feature is just fantastic, making GLD a perfect choice for TV broadcast applicati

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USA - Missouri's Pleasant Valley Church has invested in 120 of the award-winning Chroma-Q Inspire colour-mixing LED house lights, to provide an immersive worship environment for its congregation, and dramatically reduce the venue's running costs.

Pleasant Valley Baptist Church (PVBC) is on the north side of the Kansas City metropolitan area, and has a weekly attendance of around 4,000 people. The Church has existed since the 1940s at various locations, but was purpose-built at its current location in 1997.

PVBC has three different styles of worship service happening every weekend in the same room - the main Worship Centre - meaning that flexibility and reliability of the lighting system is very important.

Kansas City-based worship lighting installations specialists, Stark Raving Solutions provided an LED house light 'shoot out' in collaboration with North American ligh

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UK - Since it was founded almost 40 years ago, Tara Arts has become one of Britain's most renowned theatre companies. Its productions allow diverse voices to be heard on stage, creating work that fuses East and Western cultures.

The company recently moved into a new home in Wandsworth, known as the Tara Theatre. This will house a 100-seat auditorium and a separate studio space. With its strong reputation in theatre, they approached White Light, a company local to them, to invest in the very latest lighting technology.

Tom Kingdon, technical and operations manager at Tara, comments, "We are really excited about the new Tara Theatre and the great mix of work this space will allow us to bring to audiences, both old and new. Our intention is for the building to showcase some of the most original work in contemporary theatre. Therefore, it's important that the equipment we have

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South Africa - Lighting designer Christopher Bolton from Keystone Productions used 180 Robe fixtures for the Ghoema Music Awards staged at the Joburg Theatre.

The Ghoema Awards recognises exceptional achievement in the Afrikaans Music Industry in South Africa. Chris was appointed by Joshua Cutts of Visual Frontier to light and programme the awards for their client, Idea Candy, a creative production company. As the show was recorded for Kyknet, a South African television channel, Chris worked closely with stage director Barry Pretorius and camera director Eugene Naidoo.

The Robe rig included eight Robe BMFL Blades, 24 x Pointes, 12 x Robin 800 LEDWash, 12 x Robin 600 LEDWash, 12 x Robin 1000 LEDBeam, 21 x Robin 100 LEDBeam, 22 x Robin MMX Spots and 70 x Robe LEDForce 18 RGBW Parcans. Control was on the MA platform with two grandMA2 light consoles, one MA2 NPU and one MA VPU

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Germany - Enhancing the sound in old buildings to match modern expectations is a common task for contemporary systems integrators. This is particularly true of houses of worship, where the different elements of praise often need a versatile sound reinforcement system in a space that was originally designed for purely acoustic sound. The latest in a series of German installations shows, again, that Yamaha's Commercial Installation Solutions (CIS) range can make a real difference.

Stadtkirche Aalen is a 250-year-old Protestant church in in the town of Aalen, southern Germany. Built on the site of an earlier church whose tower collapsed in 1765, it is considered unusual for being a Protestant church with a Baroque interior and ceiling frescoes. It is the latest of many Yamaha audio systems that have been specified and installed in a house of worship by Steinheim-based Klartext AV

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UK - Symphotech was entrusted to oversee noise monitoring at X Music Festival, which took place at Cardiff's Bute Park, 3-4 June 2016.

X Music Festival is Wales' largest music festival and runs for two days across three stages. Launched in 2015, the festival's first year received a significant amount of noise complaints and the local council requested a professional noise consultancy was brought in to ensure the event met license conditions and festival noise control obligations.

The organisers and the production company, 11th Hour Events, were keen to take their responsibility seriously and brought in Symphotech to ensure noise levels didn't affect local residents. As well as creating a noise plan for the event, Symphotech was also on site throughout the festival to monitor sound levels around the perimeter and all three stages.

Before the event, Symphotech was on-sit

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UK - Alcons Audio has appointed InSynergy as its new UK distributor and, with the company's systems having recently been installed at several prestigious theatres around the world, it's appropriate that the first trade event InSynergy will be exhibiting at is London's ABTT Theatre Show.

InSynergy is a new Lancashire-based distribution and installation business, set up by Steve Badham, who has a long association with Alcons. Steve is taking a very proactive approach with the Alcons brand, complementing InSynergy's presence at the ABTT show with setting up a programme of structured demo sessions and training for potential customers.

"Having worked with Alcons in the past, I know both the company and products very well," says Steve. "I truly believe that the performance of Alcons products is unmatched by any other system. The pro-ribbon high frequency drivers and matched elec

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USA - Before a recent performance at San Francisco's legendary Great American Music Hall, Nada Surf frontman Matthew Caws joked with the sell-out crowd about being on a "20-year tour". Since breaking through with their 1996 hit Popular the New York City-based indie rockers have (with one notable two-year exception) maintained a relentless touring schedule.

Typical of this hard-driving pace is the group's current You Know Who You Are tour, which covers 35 US cities plus stops throughout Europe. Keeping up with Nada Surf on the cross-country American leg of its tour is a collection of Rogue and Nexus fixtures from Chauvet Professional.

Packed in a trailer towed behind the band's bus, the all-Chauvet rig includes four Rogue R1 Spot moving fixtures and six Nexus 4x1 RGB linear LED washes. "They are travelling very well," said Dinah Miller, the tour's lighting designer,

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USA - On the north end of the Las Vegas strip, deep inside the SLS Hotel & Casino - formerly the Sahara of Ocean's Eleven and Rat Pack fame - is the Foundry: a new state-of-the-art concert venue. It's odd but impressive layout - three stories tall, far wider than deep with two of the three main bars flanking the spacious stage at a considerable distance - makes for challenging sound reinforcement.

The space's brief existence as LiFE Nightclub tested a distributed, million-box solution, and the results were not good. SLS hired JR Sound Company to design a system that would place the Foundry demonstrably above Las Vegas' burgeoning contemporary (i.e. not nostalgic) concert scene. Their forward-thinking plan deftly sidestepped repeated appeals from promoters and industry insiders to go with a line-array solution. Instead, point source Danley SH-96HO mains, SH-95HO & SH-95 fills,

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UK - With 2016 marking the Diamond Anniversary of The Duke of Edinburgh's Award, the charity is undertaking a variety of special fundraising events and initiatives during the year. The charity, which aims to transform the lives of young people through volunteering, physical, expedition, skill and residential challenges, held a gala event in early June at Stoke Park in Buckinghamshire.

Celebrating the 60th anniversary, the Diamonds Are Forever Gala was held in the presence of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, and Their Royal Highnesses The Earl and Countess of Wessex, and included a dinner and entertainment including a performance from Sir Tom Jones.

The event was produced by Jeremy Hartley of Entertainment Industries, with production design by Nicoline L. Refsing of Rockart Design, who has previously delivered stage designs for major events such as The BRIT Awards, League of Lege

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The Netherlands - With expectations of audio quality from both audiences and performers throughout the world continually rising, the question of how to make venues used for drama and amplified music truly suitable for classical and acoustic music is being increasingly asked. A Yamaha AFC3 acoustic enhancement system has provided the answer at a historic theatre in the Netherlands.

The ongoing, rapid development of digital audio technology for recorded music has had a direct effect on raising expectations of the quality of live sound. Yamaha's AFC3 uses Digital Signal Processing (DSP) to enhance the acoustics of a space - both in the auditorium and on stage - by regenerating the acoustic energy, which precisely tailors the acoustics to both the venue and individual performances.

Nicknamed 'The Old Lady', the 102-year old Parkgebouw in Rijssen, Netherlands is well-establishe

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Belgium - Clouseau, Belgium's maverick and most successful pop / rock band are back on the road this summer with a new album Clouseau Danst, a new sonic dynamic with the addition of a four-piece horn section, plus a vibrant new set and lighting design from Painting with Light.

The production design is a collaboration between Belgium based Painting with Light's Luc Peumans and Paco Mispelters. Luc's creative relationship with the band goes back many years, and this year Luc asked Paco onboard specifically to craft the lighting, which again has introduced new ideas and perspective to the visual equation.

Paco listened to the new album which introduces a dancier groove to Clouseau's extensive and diverse existing catalogue and discussed his initial ideas with Luc.

The lighting brief included utilizing eight ribbon lifts that had appeared on the 2014 tour and proved

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Russia - Moscow's Helikon Opera has invested in almost 100 Clay Paky fixtures as part of a modernisation of the venue.

The newly restored main stage opened with a gala concert in November 2015 after many years of reconstruction and refurbishment.

Clay Paky's long term Russian distributor, DOKA Centre preprared the specification and recommended the Clay Paky fixtures to the theatre.

"This was a very interesting project to work on - the new building is fantastic and the Helikon Opera is housed in the historical center of Moscow," says Vasily Litvin, DOKA's brand manager for Clay Paky equipment.

In the new building's smaller hall, Doka specified six Alpha Profile 700 ST, six A.leda B-EYE K20; 14x Sharpy; and 18x A.leda B-EYE K10, alongside the relevant flight cases and foam shells.

In the bigger hall, DOKA supplied six Alpha Spot HPE 1200, 16x Alpha Spot QWO800, s

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