Israel - API has recently added Tel Aviv-based dealer AudioLab to its network. The company specializes in pro audio gear and computer systems for studios, production, recording, and sound editing. The dedicated team at AudioLab understands the needs of musicians and producers and offers the highest quality audio gear and solutions to their customers.
AudioLab Owner Oren Alsheich says, "We at AudioLab have made it our goal to bring the best high-end brands to the Israeli pro audio market. We are excited about representing API, a company we have always had tremendous respect for as well as faith in their products."
China - With a live audience of 80,000, the recent final of the first series of Sing China was a production on a massive scale and needed an audio system that provided total reliability and sufficient processing power. To fulfil both these requirements, a total of nine DiGiCo digital mixing consoles were specified by the show's broadcaster, Zhejiang Television.
Sing China is based on The Voice of Holland, the concept being to find new singing talent (solo or duets) drawn from public auditions. In China, the show stopped using foreign copyright in 2016, changed its name to Sing China, and became one of the most popular singing competitions in the country.
The final was held at the Birds Nest, which was originally designed as the main stadium for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games in the Olympic Green Village in Beijing's Chaoyang District, and deploy
France - The Live Vibration Tour is the main event promoted by radio station Vibration, involving some of the most famous national artists - such as Soprano, Black M, and Fréro Delavega. This year's edition included five concerts in the cities of Orléans, Le Mans, Tours, Bourges and Blois, which took place 14-24 September.
Rental company XCPH took care of most of the technical aspects of the tour and provided an RCF audio system for the second year in a row. Several HDL20-A had been used to cover a crowd of over 8000 people in 2015; however, this year Vibration anticipated higher attendance, therefore XCPH suggested the use of HDL50-A, the latest addition to the D Line.
The HDL50-A is an active three-way line array module with a built-in 2200W RMS digital amplifier, with 2x12'' woofers, four symmetrical 6.5'' midranges and two 2'' drivers. For all five dates
UK - Scotland's live events and festivals sector throw its weight behind the third edition of the hugely successful PLASA Focus Glasgow, which returns to the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre (SECC) on 18-19 January, 2017.
The event will again offer live product demonstrations, the latest technological innovations from a wealth of manufacturers and distributors, alongside a packed two-day programme of informative, relevant and educational seminars.
The events and festivals sector is a major contributor to the Scottish economy - both locally and internationally and this year Scotland has taken steps to invest in the future of the industry with the unveiling last month of a 10-year collaborative strategy to significantly grow this £3.5 billion industry.
The result of an 18-month consultation process involving the Scottish Government, VisitScotland, Scottish
USA - Located in Clarksville, just northeast of Nashville, Austin Peay State University is the fastest-growing university in Tennessee. Its football team - the Governors - plays at the 10,000-seat Fortera Stadium, which was built 70 years ago and was, until recently, known as Governors Stadium.
The name change coincided with a massive facilities upgrade, which included a new four-story home-side structure with modern seating, suites, concessions, athletic training facilities, and more. Local AV integrator Lowrance Sound Company (LSC) designed and installed a new, modern sound system to complement the upgraded facilities, relying on Ashly Audio's affordable nX-Series multi-channel amplifiers.
"This was a huge, multi-million-dollar renovation to Governors Stadium, but as so often happens, they failed to think of a corresponding upgrade to the sound system until the entire bu
UK - Shure UK has awarded the second annual Shure Rental Partner of the Year Award to Cardiff-based Stage Sound Services. The award was established in 2015 to recognise the efforts and achievements of Shure rental partners across the UK, with the first accolade going to Wigwam Acoustics.
Stage Sound Services received this year's award in recognition of their commitment and dedication to excellence in delivering the best outcomes for their customers. With particular note to their adoption of new wireless systems, Stage Sound Services have fully embraced the diverse range of Shure products to deliver exceptional results - often under challenging circumstances.
The award was presented to Stage Sound Services MD, Phil Hurley by Shure UK Pro Audio Group manager, Tuomo Tolonen and Shure UK Area Sales Manager, Stuart Moots.
"Over the course of this year, we've really seen Sta
UK - Sennheiser has announced that its Sound Academy training programme is heading to The Warehouse in Glasgow on 8 November 2016 for its latest Wireless Mics and Monitoring Essentials courses.
Run by Sennheiser's Andrew Lillywhite and Tim Sherratt, the course is aimed at both new and existing users of wireless microphones and in-ear monitor systems, including sound engineers, live event professionals, students, apprentices, sales people and AV technicians who want to further their understanding of the area.
The course will provide the skills and confidence to operate multichannel wireless systems, covering acoustics and electro-technology, wireless mics and monitoring, antenna technology, microphone technology, frequency management and wireless monitoring.
Each course offers a combination of classroom training, which includes hands-on practical modules and eLearning,
Europe - Optocore is offering its customers a unique opportunity to trade in their old 'E'-designated devices for the renowned and more efficient R-series products.
The company has announced how users can derive the maximum benefit from this replacement programme and update now to the newer, state-of-the-art R-devices.
Customers wishing to make the exchange before the end of 2016 will qualify for an 18% discount and they will receive the replacement R series model at the special price by return.
Says Optocore: "This unique trade-in discount will provide users with many advantages, designed to make the new portfolio the fibre network for the pro-audio industry. This includes lowest power consumption; open standards compatibility; maximum flexibility and scalability; lowest latency in the industry; five-year warranty;a of fans, and therefore no noise - and all the
UK - Baldwin Boxall has announced that its popular Omnicare EVC system can now be extended to include up to 8,064 outstations. The company admits that it is 'extremely unlikely' that a system on this scale would be needed, but it does mean that previous limitations no longer exist.
Known as 'OmnicarePLUS', the system provides a touchscreen interface as the master point of control, with local areas taken care of via standard style panels.
Should a site require it, additional touchscreen control points can be added to the system; enabling placement in alternative control or security rooms. These will be 'slave' or 'mimic' panels unless full control is transferred due to comprise of the master control point or as required by the user(s).
Each local area control panel can handle up to 64 outstations and these can be any combination of any of the outstation types available
Turkey - Turkish popstar Ajda Pekkan completed a series of special concerts in prestigious venues across the country touring with a 30-strong band. Allen & Heath's dLive digital mixing systems, comprising two S7000 Surfaces and DM64 MixRacks, managed FOH, monitors and recording.
The shows took place at Harbiye Cemil Topuzlu Amphitheatre in Istanbul, Bodrum Amphitheatre and Izmir International Arena.
Ajda Pekkan's production manager & FOH engineer, Inanc Yenidogan, specified dLive for the tour. The band used stereo IEMs plus side-fills and mono sub monitor mixes for the drummer and bass player, requiring up to 60 mono auxes. Additional auxes were routed over Dante to the FOH DM64 MixRack as an output expander. All the shows were recorded via M-Dante on a Mac DVS.
"We made the most of the interlinking possibilities of dLive," says monitor engineer, Wayne Nigel Gittens. "
The Netherlands - Full service provider to the radio broadcast industry, Broadcast Partners, has become the latest member of the ever-growing RAVENNA partner community. Headquartered in Terneuzen in the Netherlands, Broadcast Partners also has offices in in Hilversum, the hub of media-based industry in the Netherlands, and in Leipzig in Germany.
The company provides broadcast technology products, software solutions, consultancy and network operation services for radio stations, production companies and governments.
Broadcast Partners' R&D manager, René van de Kolk, is pleased to see the company become the latest RAVENNA partner. "IP is becoming more and more prevalent in the media industry, if not to say standard in certain environments," he said. "As full service provider to the industry, it's therefore our job to ensure that we remain at the forefront of innovatio
USA - Football is king in Dodge City, Kansas, where the high school's Red Demons and the community college's Conquistadors play at the centrally-located Memorial Stadium. With home and visitor bleacher seating for 5,000 fans, Memorial also hosts soccer games, track and field meets, and other large community events.
McClelland Sound of Wichita, Kansas, designed numerous systems of varying complexity, performance, and price using Danley Direct 3D modelling software to upgrade the sound reinforcement system, ultimately arriving at the simplicity of a single Danley Sound Labs J1-94 Jericho Synergy Horn mounted on an I-beam in the end zone and powered by two of their DNA 20K4 Pro amplifiers.
McClelland Sound had installed the previous distributed sound reinforcement system, which met the facility's needs at the time, but as game-day production technology evolved, expectations f
UK - The annual DiGiCo Rental Company of the Year Quiz saw the pro audio world come together to do battle to claim the title of brainiest audio rental company in the UK.
Amongst the action James 'Al Murray' Gordon and Dave 'white wine for the ladies' Webster guided the teams through the evening with a series of questions that taxed the knowledge of the participants and a raffle, with prizes donated by the teams, that achieved a record breaking result.
Each year, DiGiCo looks to support the industry with the funds raised during the night. This year, the newly re-branded Backup, the Technical Entertainment charity was selected as the recipient. Backup (previously- Behind the Scenes UK) is a UK charity specifically created to give support to anyone working in the Live Events industry who may need it.
DiGiCo has been a long-time advocate of Behind the Scenes UK and when th
UAE - Nexo's Engineering Support Team has partnered with Dubai-based pro-audio specialist V.V.& Sons to host a special audio design training seminar, the first of its kind in the Middle East.
Distributor of Nexo sound reinforcement products in UAE, the Pro AV Division of V.V.& Sons invited more than 20 AV design engineers to the day-long event, which was anchored by Nexo's Nicholas Poitrenaud and Alain Boone. Nominally dedicated to Nexo's proprietary NS-1 design software suite, the syllabus related to every loudspeaker product in Nexo's current portfolio - PS Series, Geo S and Geo M, the STM Series of modular line array, and the latest super-compact ID Series.
"The target of this special session was to give engineers an overview of NS-1 by using a complete system design project in a theatre," summarised Poitrenaud. Along the way, this gave the trainers the chance to cover
Greece - Built from 1842 to 1862, Athens Metropolitan Cathedral is the cathedral church of the Archbishopric of Athens and all of Greece. This important landmark was severely damaged by earthquakes in 1981 and 1999. Several years of renovations, including structural support and maintenance of the decoration of the temple, were completed in July 2016.
As part of the restoration project, Athens-based ABAS (Automation Broadcasting Audio Security) was appointed to install a new sound system that would deliver high quality, intelligible sound while merging acceptably with the attractive architecture of the historic building. The beautiful interior is highly reverberant, due to its great height and reflective surfaces, making the acoustics a challenge for voice transmission.
To achieve the high intelligibility desired, ABAS' acoustic engineers designed and installed a system usi
UK - Capital Sound Hire, for more than three decades ranked among the UK's leading sound rental companies, has announced a significant new investment in Meyer Sound's Leopard compact linear line array, the newest and smallest member of the powerful Leo Family. Recently delivered to Capital Sound's London headquarters at Wimbledon were 24 Leopard loudspeakers, eight companion 900-LFC low frequency control elements and eight UPJ-1P loudspeakers.
"At Capital Sound we've had a long and successful relationship with Meyer Sound," says Capital's general manager Paul Timmins, "and now we expect Leopard will open us to an even wider range of clients and venues. It's a perfect solution for theatre-size touring, for supplemental side hangs in arenas or for ground-stacked applications for entertainment or corporate events."
Timmins notes that the new system was put to work immediately
Bat Out of Hell - The Jim Steinman musical Bat Out of Hell will receive its world premiere in the UK next summer at the London Coliseum. Featuring a book by Steinman and Stuart Beattie, with music and lyrics by Steinman, the musical includes songs such as I Would Do Anything for Love and Bat Out of Hell.
Old Gold - Elvis Presley has overtaken Madonna to claim the most number one albums by a solo artist. The Wonder Of You features Elvis' voice above an orchestral score performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. It sold 63,500 copies after being released last week. Elvis' number one albums also span the longest period of time by the same artist. There are 60 years between his first - Elvis Presley Rock N' Roll in 1956 - and this latest release. It comes almost 40 years since he died in August 1977.
UK - The Laser Grafix UK team has welcomed a familiar face back to the family, Richard Hawkins. After training as an aircraft engineer, Richard joined Laser Grafix in 1994 working his way up from the hire department to the technical sales department and eventually as the event production manager, when he left in 2004.
In his absence from the Laser Grafix family, Richard Hawkins mentions, "I have kept in touch with the fascinating change in laser products and equipment in the past years. Long gone are the days of very heavy, power and water hungry equipment to produce just a few watts of laser light; where now you can get huge amounts of power from something no larger than a briefcase."
In Richard's 22 years in the industry, he has been involved with numerous high calibre events such as managing the technical production for the inauguration of the Shard in London. The proje
USA - The COLORado 3 Solo from Chauvet Professional fills a wide range of roles in a lighting designer's tool chest, thanks in part to its impressively wide (8? to 45?) zoom range. The intense output from its three 40W RGBW engines, along with its full IP65-rated power and DMX connections, add even more to this LED fixture's versatility.
"We developed the COLORado 3 Solo with the idea of offering our customers an affordable fixture that can perform multiple functions very well," said Albert Chauvet, CEO of Chauvet. "This fixture is equally effective as an arena stage wash as it is for close-up camera work, because of its wide, smooth and very fast zoom range. Also, because it is IP rated, it can be used indoors or out."
The advanced zooming optics designed into the COLORado 3 Solo allow its three high-output LED engines to produce a single homogenized beam. This output, co
UK - Midas provided all the power as Vevo Halloween hit Bramley-Moore Dock, Liverpool on 29 October, for 3,400 ticketholders and millions of others via the video hosting service's website.
Set in a dockside warehouse, with the stage in an adjoining temporary structure, the 12,000sq.m site was painstakingly dressed to the theme 'Phobias', which was reflected in the fans', and the bands', fancy dress.
Ipswich-based Midas supplied a turnkey power generation, mains cabling and distro solution. It included a pair of synched 500 kVAs for performances from Aurora, Blossoms, Izzy Bizu, Jack Garrett and Zara Larson, together with a 220 and a 116 kVA for production, across the five-day build and the show.
Dave Noble, Midas' managing director, said, "Broadcast was equally important, so Vevo Halloween was much more than a straight-ahead gig. On a wet and windy dock, with a whole l
Ireland - EPIC Ireland is the first digital-only museum in the world, featuring 20 multi-media galleries where visitors are immersed in the history of the Irish Diaspora, through Epson's state of the art projector technology and a range of other unique AV installations. Located in the brick vaults of The CHQ building in Dublin's Docklands, EPIC Ireland is a dramatic interactive visitor experience, showcasing the unique journey of Irish people around the world.
Working with Epson and Rockbrook Engineering, one of Ireland's largest systems integration firms, EPIC Ireland has installed 33 EB-G6970WU installation projectors which enable visitors to have a truly immersive experience in the museum. The projectors are a powerful 6,000-lumen WUXGA installation projector with 3LCD technology, and have been used to create impactful displays of each theme of the exhibition in superior cl
UK - Brought in as part of the Pinewood MBS Lighting ongoing investment across an array of new equipment, the company's sizable collection of super bright ARRI SkyPanel LED softlights recently made a brief return to their Pinewood base, only to be prepped ready for immediate despatch.
Proven as a popular choice with both cinematographers and crew, PMBS have over the past few months provided the low energy panels to an impressive roster of clients, including: Greig Fraser ASC and Gaffer David Smith on Rogue One, Steve Yedlin ASC and Gaffer Jamie Mills, on Episode VIII, Ben Seresin ASC, BSC and gaffer Pat Sweeney on The Mummy, Paul Cameron ASC and gaffer Mark Clayton on The Commuter, Seamus McGarvey BSC and gaffer Lee Walters on Life.
As rental specialists, the PMBS team are well versed in the importance of preparation and maintenance. To c