UK - Glaswegian Gerry Cinnamon is a singer-songwriter, acoustic guitarist and harmonica player whose star has been steadily rising in recent years. Since 2014 he’s released 10 singles and two albums, the second of which (2020’s The Bonny) debuted at number one in the UK and Irish Albums Charts.
Martin Capaldi and Will Nicholson (monitors and FOH respectively) worked extensively with Cinnamon through 2021 as live performances got going again post-COVID (see LSi December 2021 for more on this). The shows were some of the first in the UK to use DiGiCo’s new Quantum 338 at FOH, with an SD12 on stage, both supplied as part of the audio package by the production’s rental compa

USA - Tony Bennett recently took to the stage for the One Last Time concerts at New York’s Radio City Music Hall alongside long-time friend and collaborator Lady Gaga. As this is likely to be the last time audiences see Bennett perform live, the concerts were captured and aired as a CBS special on 28 November 2021. Grammy Award-winning audio engineers Jody Elff and John Harris of Harris-Elff Audio Resources (HEAR) selected a variety of DPA Microphones for the orchestral recording.
“The audience was full of love for Tony Bennett, and it was a powerful couple of nights of music,” says Elff. “We were live on-stage at Radio City Music Hall, one of the greatest venues in the world, with a large orchestral ensemble. We also had Tony’s jazz ensemble and Lady Gaga’s rhythm section on-stage, in addition to full string and brass sections, a harp and a few woodwinds.

UAE - Christie 1DLP laser projectors are engaging guests with a variety of visuals in the Canada Pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai. The 1,364sq.m (pavilion, located in the Sustainability District, welcomes guests with art installations, an interactive light and sound experience, and a 360-degree theatre.
EllisDon, a Canadian contracting company, with Lord Cultural Resources, NGX Interactive and kubik maltbie as strategic partners, was awarded the contract to design, build and maintain the pavilion, and worked with kubik maltbie, which engaged Christie partner Electrosonic to deliver the AV systems and Eos Lightmedia to deliver the interactive lighting systems for the public presentation spaces within the pavilion.
With the theme The Future in Mind, the pavilion encompasses outdoor and indoor elements, with AV systems throughout the pavilion designed, installed, commi

Finland - Genelec has made its Aural ID software technology available in an easy-to-use DAW plug-in format.
Using simple video footage supplied by the user via the free Aural ID Creator mobile app, Genelec will then analyse the way the user’s head, external ear and upper body affect and colour the audio arriving from all directions. This effect is unique to every individual and is called the Head-Related Transfer Function (HRTF). Aural ID’s cloud-based calculation engine then models the user’s own head and upper torso features to calculate their personal HRTF, and this information enables precise rendering of audio in any direction within the Aural ID plug-in, which is available in VST, AAX and AU formats for easy integration into any DAW.
Aimed primarily at audio professionals working in music, film, broadcast, game audio design and academic research, Aural ID

South Africa - Having the right equipment for recording is of utmost importance to Amazing Discoveries Ministries Africa. The organisation is in the studio every day to produce content that is delivered over six video and three podcast platforms. That list of equipment has now been expanded to include DPA Microphones, thanks to a recent upgrade project with Prosound.
With nearly 100,000 subscribers on YouTube alone, Amazing Discoveries Ministries Africa has a large audience to serve. Its studio setup has grown over the years from equipment primarily used to service large-scale live events that could get the job done, to dedicated recording gear.
“The right equipment for the recording is of utmost importance, as the better the initial recording, the less time we spend in post-production editing,” explains Fanie Fourie from Amazing Discoveries Ministries Africa. “T

Spain - On 17 January, the Art Nouveau jewel in Barcelona’s theatrical crown, the Palau de la Música Catalana, played host to the inaugural ESLAND awards gala. Billed as the ‘Grammys for streamers’ in the Spanish-speaking world, and hosted by streaming star of YouTube and Twitch TheGrefg, the three-hour gala, celebrating the best in content creation and streaming in 2021 throughout Spain and Latin America, was itself streamed live on its own Twitch channel.
Sound reinforcement for the event in the historic auditorium was provided by just four of Amate Audio’s latest Xcellence series X102FD self-powered point source systems and four accompanying X18T compact subs; with a couple of Nítid series N26 systems as front-fills.
An advanced performance compact two 10” design, the X102FD is capable of continuous output levels of up to136dB SPL - equivalent to four co

Europe - In a live session from London on 27 January (17:00 CET), d&b’s Ralf Zuleeg will chat to Dom Bilkey, National Theatre London’s head of sound and video, about d&b Soundscape.
Bilkey will discuss his experience using Soundscape on Lehman Trilogy, Death of a Salesman, and more. Plus, there’ll be a live Q&A straight after the session.
Further details are available at https://www.dbaudio.com/global/en/events/db-live/.

UK - Recently launched U.K. manufacturer Optimal Audio has announced the appointment of Erikson Pro as its exclusive distributor in Canada.
Erikson Pro, part of JAM Industries, distributes a range of brands to the audio and lighting sector, including Allen & Heath, Audient, Chauvet Professional and Martin Audio. Through an extensive network of exclusive representatives, the company maintains close relationships with resellers, consultants and professionals across the sector, priding itself on the high standards and responsiveness of its customer service and technical support.
Dom Harter, managing director of Optimal Audio, comments: "We're delighted to be partnering with Erikson in what is a large and important market. As part of the Focusrite Group, we’re familiar with Erikson’s excellent work with our sister brand Martin Audio, and consequently approach this

UK - Gloucester Cathedral is a building with many historic treasures. The cathedral, which dates to the year 1089, has centuries of history and craftsmanship on display - including important architectural features that are considered some of the best in Europe. The cathedral is also a favourite of Harry Potter fans as the cloisters served as the location for various Hogwarts scenes in the films.
Maintaining a Grade I-listed building is challenging, and upgrades to onsite technology must be carefully considered and planned to prevent damage. When the cathedral decided to upgrade its audio capabilities, it turned to the flexibility, scalability, and low-impact installation benefits synonymous with Audinate’s Dante.
The Dante platform is a complete AVoIP solution that allows audio, video and control data to be transported over standard 1GB ethernet networks.
Whe

USA - Lectrosonics has revealed that its DBSM single-battery/DBSMD dual-battery bodypack transmitters have been nominated as a finalist for the 37th Annual NAMM Technical Excellence & Creativity (TEC) Awards for Technical Achievement in the category of Wireless Technology. The NAMM TEC awards recognize innovative product design and excellence in audio and sound production, with outstanding technical achievement including 21 categories which span across the professional audio product spectrum. A panel of respected industry voters from pro audio publications as well as members of professional music, technical and creative organizations, along with select NAMM members evaluate each entry before selecting the finalists.
The DBSM/DBSMD transmitters are compatible with Lectrosonics DSQD digital receiver, DCHR digital portable receiver, and DCR822 compact dual channel digital

Singapore - Pixotope has announced two new hires in their Asia Pacific leadership team.
Matthew Ma, former employee of Amazon Web Services and Avid, joins the company as general manager for North Asia. Matthew will be directly responsible for driving regional sales and advising on the regional functions of marketing operations, including developing distribution channels and building strategic relationships. The key locations for North Asia include China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan.
Matthew states, “I am delighted to start a new chapter with Pixotope in this exciting period for Virtual Production. Having worked with the North Asia market for media and web technologies for many years, a key focus for this role will be building relationships with partners and ensuring consistent growth as Pixotope expands further across the region.”
With more tha

Europe - K-array has announced the promotion of Francesco Maffei to area sales manager for EMEA. In his new position, Francesco will oversee the company’s sales and marketing activities and initiatives throughout Europe, Middle East and Africa.
Francesco Maffei has been a long standing member of the K-array family with an extensive knowledge of the products, brand and has been an integral part of the growth of K-array over the last 20 years.
President of K-array Alessandro Tatini says: “We’re delighted that Francesco is taking the reins on EMEA. His deep understanding of the brand which he has helped to build over the years, our products, business know-how and leadership skills, will further strengthen K-array in EMEA with our story of passion, innovation and performance, in the exciting era ahead.”
Francesco Maffei comments: “I am really excited to ta

Europe - The ESM312 is the latest - and most powerful - addition to KV2 Audio’s range of stage monitors. Aimed at large scale stage monitoring applications, the ESM312 is a high output full-range low profile 3-way, passive monitoring solution. Features include two bass reflex-loaded 12” neodymium woofers, a single horn loaded 6” mid-range woofer and a 1” compression driver in a compact, Baltic birch cabinet.
KV2’s most powerful stage monitor yet, the ESM312 delivers 133dB sustained output, and 136dB peak with very high dynamic range. A 1” compression driver with a complex geometry phase plug and a neodymium magnetic structure ensures ‘astonishing output for its size, exceptionally low distortion and extended frequency response’. The ESM312 also features dual 12” woofers with sophisticated voice coil technology and neodymium magnetic motor structure for dram

UK - Eric ‘EZ’ Wade, who runs production management company, EZ Services, has been touring UK theatres and clubs with the rapper, Little Simz - with active support from sound system supplier, Entec Live.
This is a new relationship which has quickly kicked into overdrive, after the West London technical services company had been strongly recommended. Wade was introduced to Entec head of sound Dan Scantlebury by James ‘Kedge’ Kerridge, monitor engineer for Little Simz and monitor tech on another Entec act, Gorillaz. This was at the beginning of the year as rehearsals were about to begin. Fittingly, Kedge had also served his apprenticeship at Entec, and so was able to provide the recommendation based on his own experience.
“I had worked with various production companies and was always struggling to find the right relationship. It was generally Entec’s approach

USA - It’s been a difficult and challenging two years for concert and event spaces during the COVID pandemic, but what’s emerging at the other end of a long, gloomy tunnel is a new, more sonically shaped generation of venues. The Factory, which anchors a new entertainment and dining destination known as The District in the St. Louis suburb of Chesterfield, is an example of that dynamic.
The recently-opened 52,000sq.ft venue can hold between 2,350 and 3,400 concertgoers or event attendees in flexible dance floor and fixed-seating configurations that face a huge 60ft-wide stage. But what sets The Factory further apart is the scale of its L-Acoustics PA system, which provides complete coverage for every audience member no matter where they are seated or standing in the large performance hall.
“The Factory is built on the most valuable real estate in the region and t

South Korea - In 2018, South Korean construction company Hoban Co. began moves to take over Resom Resort from its creditors at a cost of $224m after being named as the preferred bidder. Resom owns three resorts in Chungcheong Province in Korea - including Splas Resom, a membership spa resort and Forest Resom, situated in a dense tree forest, which seeks to provide healing through nature and water.
A tender was issued for refurbishment of the existing Splas facility - as well as the construction of a new building - and Martin Audio distributor, Sama Sound, partnered with its dealer, Asea Sound, to submit the successful bid.
Sama Sound product manager, Edan Kwon, stated that the speakers had originally been specified with another brand. “And so we worked hard to get this changed to Martin Audio. With the help of a presentation we were able to show the company and its e

USA - Powersoft has moved offices to a larger and more suitable space in Flanders, New Jersey, for the increasing requirements of the company. This expansion has been supported by the appointment of Sara Schiffler as the new business development manager for the Americas.
The new location in New Jersey has the benefits of dedicated private offices, demo/training space, a lab area and is only 45 minutes away from Newark airport. Powersoft’s previous headquarters, more geared towards early-stage companies, was on the fourth floor with shared amenities and without any direct access to loading bays.
“Our new headquarters significantly improves our ability to host our customers and dealers for training, demonstrations and seminars,” says Tom Knesel, general manager at Powersoft US. “The atmosphere is far more relaxed for our employees, and we have almost tripled the

South Korea - Seoul-based Ingang Audio Co has been appointed as the South Korean distributor for Optocore and BroaMan with immediate effect.
Established in 2006 under president Joo Hong Chang and CEO Steve Kim, Ingang Audio has built a portfolio of global pro audio brands, including Meyer Sound, Calrec, Countryman, Samson and Lectrosonics.
Both Chang and technical director, Eric Han had known Optocore and BroaMan for many years and the latter has received Optocore training. The company had also developed a good relationship with Optocore distribution sales manager, Dawid Somló and the tech team during earlier project development.
“Ingang had been talking with us for long time,” explains Somló. “They are an excellent pro audio company with a good infrastructure. They are keen to develop their portfolio with our video transporting systems and also add them

Europe - Yamaha has launched the RUio16-D/VST Rack Pro solution, which allows users to add VST3 plug-ins to any Dante-based audio system and is ‘small, light and rugged enough to be part of every sound engineer’s toolkit’.
Measuring 180 x 125 x 42mm, the low-latency RUio16-D can be connected to a Windows PC or Apple Mac computer via USB, working seamlessly with VST Rack Pro software (licence included), to easily add VST3 plugin functionality to Dante-based audio systems. It radically expands the range of sound creation options in any live sound situation, for streaming and many other audio applications. As well as digital audio systems, it can also be used with analogue mixing consoles.
The straightforward Mac / PC user interface of VST Rack Pro makes it simple to use VST3 plugins, even in the most pressurized live situations, allowing performers to use the same

Indonesia - The 16th National Paralympic Games were hosted in Indonesia last year from 2-13 November at the Mandala Stadium in Jayapura, Papua. Clear-Com’s Indonesian-based Partner, 86 Inc., was contacted by the organising committee of the Opening and Closing Ceremonies (OCC) to assist with the show management and live broadcast communications for the complex events. 86 Inc. recommended a solution based around Clear-Com’s HelixNet Digital Network Partyline and FreeSpeak II Digital Wireless Intercom.
“The OCC, the Paralympics COVID task force, and the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology (MCIT) of Indonesia all had different concerns needing to be addressed by the comms system,” explained Dino Gonggalang, CEO, 86 Inc.
The OCC’s concerns were related to logistics given the overall scale of the event - in one of the key moments of the show, 950 d

China - The new Shanghai Astronomy Museum, now the world’s largest museum devoted to the celestial sciences, echoes the ‘music of the spheres’ with its bold curvilinear exterior devoid of any straight lines or right angles. On the inside, the museum’s two primary venues enhance stellar visual programs with complementary Meyer Sound immersive audio systems supplied by Shanghai Broad Future Electro Technology Company.
Designed by Ennead Architects of New York, the 39,000sq.m museum encloses three main exhibition zones - Home, Cosmos, and Odyssey - with the free-flowing architecture encompassing three dominant architectural features: Oculus, Inverted Dome, and Sphere.
Occupying the interior of the Sphere is the 8K Dome Theater, which hosts an audience of 250 for a 20-minute all-enveloping spectacle covering 4.6bn years of cosmic evolution.
Designed using Mey

Poland - Opened in September 2021 and situated in the largest district of the capital city of Warsaw, Poland’s new purpose-built Ursynów Cultural Centre Alternatywy (Alternatives) was commissioned to provide a versatile public space ‘representing the very best in modern innovation’.
The venue’s name, which references a popular 1980’s Polish television series, Alternatywy 4, was selected through a competition amongst residents and encapsulated the centre’s vision of offering a rich and varied cultural programme for the entire community. Crucial to achieving its goal and pivotal to the project's success was the audio system design featuring breakthrough technology in the form of L-Acoustics L-ISA Immersive Hyperreal Sound - specified and installed by Audio Plus.
“The South-West Warsaw community had waited a long time for a decent cultural centre,”

USA - Fulcrum Acoustic has announced Scott Pizzo will join as the U.S national sales manager. In this role, Pizzo will be responsible for overseeing the US sales rep network and coordinating the activities of Fulcrum’s rep force.
“Scott and I first worked together at EAW back in the early 2000s,” says Fulcrum Acoustic director of sales Todd Foster. “When we decided we were ready to expand the team, Scott was the first call that I made. He brings an impressive knowledge of the industry with him, and we are excited for his expertise as we look ahead.”
Scott is joining us at the perfect time,” says Fulcrum Acoustic president Stephen Siegel. “Todd Foster has done a tremendous job single-handedly managing our North American sales effort since 2013. Now, the growing interest in our products presents us with more opportunities than he can manage alone. Todd and

Turkey - To advertise the launch of the Istanbul Financial Centre (IFC) in January, Istanbul film production company Autonomy partnered with Formula 1 on a dynamic commercial featuring virtual production by MGX Studios and powered by the disguise Extended Reality (xR) workflow.
Holding 1.4m square metres of office space, a shopping mall, conference and exhibition centre and a five-star hotel, the IFC is a founding partner of the Formula 1 Rolex Turkish Grand Prix 2021. The metaphor of the IFC as a Formula 1 race car “driving forward the world of finance” provided a high-energy scenario for a commercial promoting its imminent opening.
The commercial features extreme close-ups of a Formula 1 race car cockpit, complete with revving sound design, as the vehicle speeds through Istanbul and glimpses of the IFC are reflected on the driver’s helmet visor.
Since t

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