Robe - Leaderboard - 27 Aug25 - Jan26
Area 4 - Banner - Sept 2025

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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

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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

Area 4 - Banner - Sept 2025

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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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UK - Lighting designer and LSi columnist Rob Halliday remembers the late Francis Reid, who sadly passed away on 9th June, aged 86 . . .

"(I wrote this five years ago, as a gift to Francis on his 80th birthday. Following the news of his passing last week, it feels like deserves a wider audience, with just a very sad change of tense...)

Every month as I sat down to write about another classic product, a wave of guilt swept across me: I was the wrong man for the job. There was someone out me who could write better, light better and, for good measure, lived through more of the products that are now classics (and many, many less good ones besides!) Maybe Classic Gear would have been better in the hands of Francis Reid. Or maybe that age, that experience means something different: that we should actually have considered Francis himself a classic!

The qualifications? Well, th

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USA - In February, ETC expanded its research efforts, creating the Advance Research Group (ARG) to uncover new technologies and boost current product capabilities. ETC has hired Wendy Luedtke to join the ARG as a product technology specialist. She will work closely with lighting professionals to identify their most important issues, helping the ARG develop technology that tackles their problems and opens new possibilities.

"The ARG facilitates innovation, allowing new ideas to be explored in every area of R&D," describes ETC CEO Fred Foster. "With Wendy coming on board, we can be certain that we're developing the right tools for lighting designers to use in the real world."

One of the first projects the ARG has been working on involves LED colour control. Last year's award-winning Eos v2.3 software upgrade is just the beginning of an initiative to revolutionise colour cont

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Germany - Green Hippo has announced that Denis Hessberger, has joined Green Hippo as freelance product specialist from June 2016.

Denis has a strong background in the world of lighting and video programming & design. "As a long time Hippotizer user I am excited to pursue this new challenge and am looking forward to support existing and new users from a user perspective, while bridging the gap between users and development," he says.

Denis's role will be product specialist, meeting and engaging with both current and potential German users; liaising with both development and the marketing team to ensure that the Hippotizer media server range and all its newest features are bought directly to German customers.

Green Hippo product manager Ryan Brown states, "The German market is important to us and we're delighted to have someone of Denis's experience and knowledge. He has

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UK - KMR Audio has announced Mesanovic Microphones latest offering, the Model 2A Active Ribbon Microphone.

The Mesanovic Model 2A is an active adaptation of the Model 2 passive ribbon microphone and uses the same signature motor structure and resonator plates helping capture any source with detail.

The active circuit in the Model 2A provides high output, extremely low self-noise and works with any mic preamp. The 48V phantom power circuit works as an impedance buffer to avoid any colouration.

(Jim Evans)

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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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USA - The Grammy-nominated band Disturbed recently hit the top of the Billboard charts with its cover of Simon and Garfunkel's Sounds of Silence.

The versatility of their 2015 Immortalised album is on full display in the North American tour supporting the LP; not just in the music performed on stage, but also in the multi-facet lightshow designed by Matt Mills with a set design by Sooner Routhier. The design conveyed a range of moods in support of the quartet's music, thanks in part to a fully articulated truss system that moved throughout the concert, and the versatility of 22 STRIKE 4 multi-formatted warm white fixtures from Chauvet Professional.

"We had lighting that could change moods and create different look to reflect the wide scope of the band's music," said Mills, who was the programmer and lighting director when the band last toured in 2010-11. "The

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Australia - During the Vivid Sydney 2016 festival, the famous Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA) in The Rocks has become a giant canvas for the energy of the creative process. Multimedia art collective, Danny Rose, teamed up with Western Sydney Artist, Huseyin Sami, to create an illusion of the MCA fa

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UK - Internationally renowned fine art auctioneers Sotheby's has installed 16 channels of Shure's flagship digital ULX-D wireless microphone system at its London HQ in New Bond Street. Hornchurch-based AV consultant KEL Sound & Vision carried out the system design and installation, and the equipment was sold through Essex-based AV retailer AudioLogic.

"Sotheby's was using an older wireless microphone system in its auction galleries, but wanted to bring it up to date," explains Chris Gutteridge, technical director at KEL Sound & Vision. "The HQ at New Bond Street is much more extensive than it appears from the street, covering several floors and extending right through to St George Street behind the shop fronts on both roads. They were having a few timing problems using their old analogue system, and also wanted to extend their use of wireless across the whole site.

"They w

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New Zealand - NW Group, the trans-Tasman live production specialists with offices across Australia and New Zealand, has won a 10-year contract as full-service technical providers to PWV (Positively Wellington Venues), a business unit of the Wellington City Council that manages five major venues.

"We're providing, lighting, AV, sound, crewing, production management, IT support, and rigging," said Paul O'Brien, technical operations director and head of lighting for NW Group in Wellington. "We're setting up a new office in the city. For the NW Group this is a start-up venture. We're building a new team to service the contract. As head of lighting, I'm also overseeing all the new lighting installations."

The venues now under NW Group's technical management include two proscenium arch theatres (The St James Theatre and The Opera House), a concert hall (The Michael Fowler Centre

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UK - Lighting designer Chris Thoms working for ZEROdB Live created the lightshow for the latest live extravaganza by leading club brand Hospitality which was staged at London's O2 Academy Brixton - a project on which he utilized Robe Pointes, LEDWash 600s and MMX Spots as the main moving lights.

Chris has operated and collaborated on the Hospitality Brixton production design since 2012. For this one, he and ZEROdB Live founder and production manager Rob Stanley wanted something new, fresh and different that was a departure from the hi-res 'big-telly-style' video look that has come to characterise so many events. After much brain-storming, they came up with the 'Fingers of Rock'.

Essentially the design evoked an old-school rock 'n' roll spatiality with a ceiling of lights above the artist, ticking the design brief boxes by going a bit retro and putting the emphasis firmly b

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Canada - Barco has acquired MTT Innovation Inc., based in Vancouver, Canada. MTT is a developer of next-generation projection technology with expertise in high dynamic range, applied imaging algorithms, advanced colour science and specialized hardware development.

"With this investment, we are augmenting our expertise in the field of High Dynamic Range technology. This underpins our long-term leadership in projection technology." said Eric Van Zele, president and CEO at Barco. "MTT's technology is still in a research phase and will need further de-risking and development over the years to come. We welcome MTT's team to Barco and look forward to many years of successful collaboration as applications for high dynamic range & new illumination technologies spread to end markets such as Cinema, ProAV, simulation, automotive, and virtual reality."

Commented Anders Ballestad, CEO

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