UK - Rental and installation specialists LED Creative worked with the crew at Version 2 to help illuminate the annual charity concert held in the grounds of hosts Sue and David Formosa’s Chorleywood home.
Now in its sixteenth year, Music by Twilight features a broad mix of talent, including local acts. The concerts have raised over £400,000 for the charity and this year’s show was another resounding success with all proceeds going towards the funding of TCT units in NHS hospitals.
Providing their Sigma Pulse Wands and Fairground fixtures plus Byte Controllers, the LED Creative team were able to help add colour, shape and movement to the lighting design for the event. With limited access to the site, the ‘plug and play’ Sigma fixtures were an ideal creativ

Doctor Atomic, a collaboration between composer John Adams and librettist and stage director Peter Sellars, focuses on the events leading up to the first atomic bomb test in the summer of 1945 and is set in Los Alamos, New Mexico, barely 20 miles from the Santa Fe Opera, which is presenting its new production through 16 August.
In advance of production rehearsals, Santa Fe Opera’s audio/visual director, Karl G. Kern, increased the company’s inventory of Lectrosonics Digital Hybrid Wireless technology to 30 channels, adding 18 SSM super slight micro belt-pack transmitters and three six-channel Venue2 receivers to its existing stock of SMDa transmitters and Venue receivers.
“The quality of Lectrosonics’ products is by far superior,” says Kern of the purchase decision. “They’ve got a very low noise floor and very solid RF, so it helps you to get a very clear

China - When the audio system in Hong Kong’s City Hall began to fall short of its duty, the powers that be called on DMT Pro, Clair Brothers’ Chinese distributor to upgrade the old system in the 463-seat city hall theatre and bring it into the new millennium.
After a thorough review of the venue with specific attention paid to addressing acoustical challenges not overcome by the old system, DMT decided to install an L-C-R Clair Brothers system, which consists of two Clair Brothers kiT 12+ two-way, self-powered speakers for each of the L-C-R channels, and two kiT-Sub-mini+ single drive self-powered subwoofers, all supported by two Lake LM44 digital processors. Says Ricky Wan, sales manager at DMT, “The speakers have a DSP function, but for a greater degree of fine tuning we also installed the Lake processors.”
“We are very impressed with the quality of Clair

UK - Theatres Trust has extended the booking period for our Early Bird offer so you now have until Friday 24 August to take advantage of the discounted rate ( http://bit.ly/Adaptandthrive ).
Titled 'Adapt and Thrive', the conference, which takes place on 16 October at the Lyric Hammersmith, looks at new models for theatre buildings and new ways of funding.
Through a mixture of inspiring plenaries and lively breakout sessions, the conference w

UK - Registration is now open for ISCEx which takes place 5-6 March 2019 at Combe Abbey (https://www.isce.org.uk/iscex-event/)
If you’re working in commercial audio system design, integration, project management or sales, ISCEx provides opportunities to learn, engage and discuss commercial audio solutions in an intimate, non-imposing environment.
ISCEx is a multi-faceted event that includes seminars, training, networking dinner and an exhibition of the audio industries leading manufacturers and distributors. There are plenty of opportunities to meet up with industry colleagues, share ideas and discuss projects in informal environments.
(Jim Evans)

Italy - For the eighth year running, Music Inside Rimini (MIR) and LIVE welcomed a host of lighting companies including High End Systems to take part in the annual Italian event Live You Play. LIVE events began in 2010 with a resolution to provide visitors with the chance to experience audio, lighting, video and installation technologies from a live performance on stage. This year, there was both a virtual and a live show organised at the event.
Lighting designer Trevor Burk organised the structure of High End Systems fixtures in the virtual show whilst lighting programmer Francesco De Cave arranged the design of the same fixtures for music band ‘POP deluxe’ in the live show.
Francesco emphasised how “programming the lighting whilst showing the fixtures’ capability to the audience without losing the main focus – the show itself – was not an easy job

USA - This year’s Electric Daisy Carnival, known to most as EDC, powered into action with a three-day flagship festival in Las Vegas, Nevada. Winner of the Festival of the Year award at the Electronic Music Awards 2017, EDC has grown since its 1991 launch to become one of the world’s leading electronic dance music festivals, and this year’s event, held in the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, cemented EDC’s position as North America’s largest EDM festival.
Over 400,000 visitors flocked to Vegas and EDC organiser called upon Tenfeet to help deliver visuals to match festival goers’ expectations. Working alongside Insomniac and LEG, Tenfeet was responsible for the lighting design, media control and supply, as well as programming and operating. Following on from the Vegas event, EDC goes global with Tenfeet adjusting the design into a touring version.
Tenfeet knows Gre

USA - Formed in 1996 in Palm Desert, California, the Queens of the Stone Age developed a style of riff-oriented, heavy rock music. Their sound has since evolved to incorporate a variety of different styles and influences, including working with Nirvana drummer and Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl, and Screaming Trees frontman Mark Lanegan who has been a steady contributor to the band.
For all this time Josh Homme, Troy Van Leeuwen, Michael Shuman, Dean Fertita and Jon Theodore have been a constant in the worldwide Rock’n’Roll circus, touring and performing old and new songs, always dedicated to keeping the spirit of innovation and autonomy alive and moving forward.
This motivation also applies to lighting designer Emmanuelle ‘Gigi’ Pedron who has given the band a unique look onstage. Using a grandMA2 full-size as her creative tool of choice, she has also transf
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High End Systems Halcyon Silent builds on ETC’s legacy of fanless automated fixtures by incorporating features from the highly sought-after Halcyon family. Halcyon Silent perfectly balances silent operation with brilliant output of 18,400 lumens and high-impact features. 

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USA - It’s a 4th July tradition: the Boston Pops Fireworks Spectacular at the Edward A. Hatch Memorial Shell on the Esplanade along the banks of the Charles River in Boston. The event featured the celebrated orchestra, under the direction of conductor Keith Lockhart. This year, Michael Berger of LA-based Full Flood utilised Claypaky Scenius Unico and Mythos 2 fixtures, supplied by 4Wall, to support the production.
The Independence Day spectacular showcased an all-women guest line-up featuring Emmy award-winning Fight Song artist Rachel Platten, Rhiannon Giddens of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, Amy Ray and Emily Saliers of the Indigo Girls, and Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Awards-winner, Rita Moreno.
“We needed to make the orchestra the star of the show and provide opportunities for the guest artists to shine as well,” says Full Flood’s Micahel Be

USA - The 32-city North American leg of Erasure’s World Be Gone tour takes place on multiple levels, literally and figuratively. Made up entirely of LED linear fixtures, the matrix-like set features a collection of tiered mini-stages. Vince Clarke plays keyboard in an upper centre-stage cubicle, flanked by kinetic dancers on slightly lower portals, while his partner in the synth-pop duo, Andy Bell, holds forth on the floor, his vocals soaring above it all.
Weaving the complex set together, while supporting the full scope of Erasure’s music, is balanced Matt Waterfield-designed lightshow run on a ChamSys MagicQ MQ80 with a MagicQ Extra Wing.
Waterfield is drawing on the output of some 230 fixtures supplied by Christie Lites in his show for the tour, which is in support of Erasure’s 17th studio album. “I have been designing for Erasure since 2017,” he sa

The Netherlands - At the end of July, 50 Dutch engineers got the opportunity to enjoy a demonstration of Yamaha’s Rivage PM7 digital mixing system at Hilversum’s Wisseloord Studio.
Wisseloord Studio is likened to ‘the Dutch Abbey Road’ having seen an array of major musicians record at its premises. Those include Afrojack, Chris Brown, Elton John, Foo Fighters, Metallica, Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney, Steve Aoki, Sting, U2 and many more.
On 30 July, attendees were welcomed to Wisseloord with a tour of the studio complex, including its renowned mastering room, conducted by the studios’ chief creative officer Malik Berrabah. This was followed by an introduction to the Rivage PM7 system in Studio 2, conducted by Yamaha’s Ruben van der Goor and Jan Prins.
All were then invited through to Studio 1, where Jamiroquai FOH engineer Rick Pope was waiting with

UK - Video production company Media Flare has added three Hippotizer V4 Boreal+ Media Servers to its hire stock of nine Hippotizer V4 and Hippotizer V4+ media servers.
Media Flare’s freelance TV lighting designer Tom Sutherland comments: "Our Hippos have never let us down, and with the V4+ models' new features and enhancements providing even more creative flexibility, for us it was the only way to go. It's great that I can rely on a media server which can cover such a range of productions and budgets."
Freelancer programmer Nick Hansen adds: "Hippotizer Media Servers are so user-friendly. The Output Manager side is incredibly powerful and flexible, enabling us to handle things when a show's technical needs can change quickly during production. Also, we are really excited by the potential of Notch, which we will definitely be using on future projects to manipulate c

UK - One of the highlights of the UK summer season is the Henley Festival - a traditional black tie event for Martin Audio partner RG Jones Sound Engineering, spread over five days.
The company has serviced the event for 36 years, and in recent times they have fine-tuned their coverage of the main stages with Martin Audio MLA components, including the tricky Floating Stage.
As festival technical manager and head of sound, Jim Lambert, says: “The Floating Stage has always been a challenge in that the front to back of the arena is only approximately 30m, but it is extremely wide, and with the introduction of general admission tickets outside the arena we are being asked to cover a width of something like 100m. The MLA Compacts more than rise to this challenge and yet also enable us to keep to the fairly strict off-site noise limits set by the Council.”
It agai

USA - High End Systems has announced the finalists for the 2018 Hog Factor USA Collegiate Lighting Programming Competition. First held in North America in 2015, Hog Factor has become a leading global lighting contest.
Over 60 teams registered for Phase One, each providing a performance lighting piece programmed on a Hog or Hog 4 PC. The collegiate teams were judged by a diverse panel of High End Systems and ETC employees to produce the three Hog Factor finalists.
The three finalist teams are SolaTartan from Carnegie Mellon University, The Pig Ears from California State University Long Beach and Brown Sugar from Southern Methodist University.
Phase Two will see these teams programming a performance lighting piece based on High End Systems' 2018 LDI booth design. These teams will then be invited to perform their shows live at LDI on the ETC / High End Systems booth

Australia - Bosch has entered into a distribution partnership with Jands. Jands will provide sales and support for a select range of Bosch’s pro sound installation audio products from Dynacord and Electro-Voice, including the new IPX multi-channel installation DSP power amplifiers, EVID and EVC Series loudspeakers and the EV Innovations range.
Chris Dellenty, general manager - Oceania, Bosch Security and Safety Systems, comments: “Bosch is well known for our commitment to excellent service and support and by entering into partnership with a strategic national distributor like Jands, who have the expertise to support the needs of the customer, we will continue to provide the quality products and services that people expect when they buy Dynacord and Electro-Voice. Our Prosound team are excited by this alliance, and we look forward to a prosperous long-term relationship.

UK - PLASA Show, the worldwide event for entertainment technology, is returning to London Olympia on 16-18 September with a whole host of industry leaders and influential brands primed to deliver popular products, inspirational talks and expert training.
The exhibitor list has been rapidly growing with international brands spanning lighting, audio, AV, rigging and staging, and the programme is filling up fast with critical updates, exclusive panels and the latest projects.
In association with LSi, respected lighting designer Rob Halliday and entertainment architects Stufish will present Giudizio Universale - Michelangelo and the Secrets of the Sistine Chapel, revealing the technical secrets of this stunning €9m immersive stage show created by Marco Balich, now at the Auditorium Conciliazione in Rome. Having worked on the show, Rob Halliday will discu

Secondary Ticketing - Ticketmaster is closing its secondary ticketing websites Seatwave and Get Me In in a bid to combat touts. The sites, which allow you to offload unwanted tickets, have frequently been exploited by so-called professional sellers who hike up the prices. "We know that fans are tired of seeing others snap up tickets just to resell for a profit on secondary websites, so we have taken action," said Andrew Parsons, head of Ticketmaster UK.
In their place, people will be allowed to sell tickets directly on Ticketmaster, where a simple click will release tickets back into the market. Unlike the current system, users will only be allowed to charge the original price or less - though there will be a 15% surcharge on every ticket to cover booking fees paid by the seller (£7.50 for a ticket that costs £50).
Ticketmaster has also vowed to be transparent about

UK - Allen & Heath is now shipping the hotly anticipated Dante card for its SQ series.
SQ is the first compact mixer to provide a full 64x64 channel, 96kHz interface to a Dante network.
SQ product manager, Keith Johnson, comments: “We’re delighted to make the SQ Dante card available to the many, many SQ customers who’ve been waiting patiently for this release. Our R&D team has been working with the good folks at Audinate on a custom implementation of Dante HC to deliver a high channel count, 96kHz solution that takes full advantage of SQ’s XCVI FPGA core.”
Any SQ mixer fitted with the SQ Dante card can now connect to 96kHz amplifiers, interfaces and other devices on a Dante network without unnecessary sample rate conversion or added latency. In addition to facilitating system integration, the new card enables digital splits and affordable mult

UK - Elation will be showcasing at PLASA Stand H40 the Smarty Hybrid, a full featured CMY colour mixing spot, beam and wash fixture. At the heart of the fixture is the new Platinum lamp using ‘FLEX’ technology which offers a "smartly” designed discharge lamp/ballast package (6,000 hour lamp life) for high output / compact performance at an efficient and affordable price point.
Elation continues to expand its award-winning Artiste series of creative moving heads. At PLASA, look for the Artiste Picasso, a theatrical-grade luminaire that 'connects art to engineering'. One of the brightest and most feature-rich profile LED lighting fixtures on the market today, it is a high-output (22,000 lumens), feature-packed (zoom, framing, CMY, CTO, gobo wheels, animation, prisms, frost and more) yet compact profile light featuring a new high-power 600W Cool White LED engine.

UK - The beautiful surroundings of Kew Gardens in south-west London, containing the world’s biggest Victorian glasshouse, provided the backdrop for the facility’s annual six-day music festival, aptly titled Kew The Music.
Now a consolidated part of London’s summer festival tapestry, for the past four years rental company Capital Sound and their loudspeaker partner Martin Audio have enjoyed a growing presence on the site.
Working with promoter, Stuart Galbraith from Kilimanjaro Live, and production manager, LarMac Live director Ian Greenway, they tailored the sound system for the clientele that typically brings picnics and folding chairs to the Royal Botanic Gardens to witness a succession of concerts that this year included Steps, Björn Again, Gypsy Kings, 2Cellos, The Human League, Boyzone and Jools Holland.
Despite having a number of Martin Audio

South Africa - DWR Distribution, the Signify distributor in Africa, reports that Philips Showline SL Punchlite 220 luminaires and a Philips Strand 200 Plus console have been installed in the Conservatory Hall at the North-West University School of Music and Conservatory in Potchefstroom. The new equipment will compliment all the concerts and music productions, such as the cabaret and annual pantomime.
Dr. Yvonne-Marié Brand, acting director of the NWU School of Music & Conservatory, comments: “The new equipment is a huge upgrade and has greatly improved the lighting in the hall. More light, no noise! We are really impressed with it.”
Headed by Andi Rodgers, DWR Distribution installed three lighting bars on which 12 Philips SL Punchlite 200s were hung, with a Philips Strand 200 Plus console for control.
Brand adds: “The feedback from the technical crew

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