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14 March 2016

Gary Maguire of StudioSpares commented: "Studiospares deals with a large number of installation companies on a daily basis. We wanted a premium speaker line to complement our value range, so we can offer our installer base a solution based on budget. Having looked at many different brands, the Ohm speaker range ticked all the right boxes". Gareth Coleman of Ohm, who has been instrumental in setting up the partnership, said: "Studiospares has a long-standing reputation in the industry for providing great customer service as well as having a great team of technically

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14 March 2016

The spotlight of last year's event was focused on the Ambra Night location in San Teodoro, whose technical setup was designed by Quadra Luce & Design, the same company that installed its resident sound reinforcement system featuring Proel Edge speakers.

Sunandbass confirmed the quality and the versatility of Ambra Night's sound systems which adjusted well to the percussive musical genre. Quadra Luce & Design were asked by the festival's organizers and influential to provide an additional, higher SPL sound system for a second dance floor and decided to specify a Turbosound Aspect system.

The system features four Turbosound Aspect TA-500tpoint source 3-way tri-amped full range loudspeakers, four T

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14 March 2016

With a pay-per-view broadcast to 35 countries and an in house audience of over 70,000, WrestleMania is serious sports entertainment. Produced by WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment), the yearly show has become the pinnacle event in sports entertainment.

Long time production designer for WWE is Jason Robinson who taps into his years of experience to light WWE events year long. Robinson works with WWE executive producer Kevin Dunn on design and themes for WrestleMania events with this year's look less thematic and more from the world of high tech.

Playing a major role in this year's set design were Martin Professional LC

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14 March 2016

Newsboys FOH mixer John O'Neal comments: "We are pretty particular about sound, right down to the microphones in our workbox. [Monitor engineer] Jeff Nolte and I began discussing our desire for some new microphones. Primarily, we wanted to go in a different direction with our drum kit - we had been using the same cardioid dynamic instrument mics on our toms and snare drum for the last six or seven years. The old mics weren't broken, so it wasn't like we had to ma

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14 March 2016

One Big Weekend saw 51 live bands and 25 DJ sets play across four stages to 40,000 people on each day. Sennheiser UK's support team of Andy Lillywhite and Mark Saunders - a familiar sight at festivals throughout the UK - were on hand to lend technical assistance and expertise to Britannia Row and Adlib Audio, who respectively provided the audio equipment for the Main and In New Music We Trust (INMWT) stages.

The event saw a key milestone in the run up to the Channel 69 to 38 frequency switchover - the

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14 March 2016

It will become a meeting place where educational and training programs can be held on a regular basis, complementing the existing workshops, seminars and training courses that the d&b partners frequently run throughout the country.

Gaelle Poullavec who runs the office, Juanma da Cassus who is in charge of the support and service and manager David Roselló say they are looking forward to having this new facility where they can not only extend a bigger w

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14 March 2016

Half-price online registration offers visitors the chance to not only save money but to avoid the registration queues and receive regular updates from PLASA Events about new product launches, the expanding seminar programme and new show features.

With 50% of all PLASA 2011 exhibitors based internationally, it's the best opportunity to see all the industry's big names under one roof - plus several names that are new or returning for PLASA 2011 - including Batmink, Capture Sweden, Eclipse Iluminación y Sonido, S., Focusrite, Lydrommet, RGGLED and State Automation.

In addition to new products, an expanded seminar programme and interactive feature areas, t

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14 March 2016

When Willie Williams, lighting designer for U2's 360 Tour, wanted to incorporate the space shuttle Endeavour's Mission Commander Mark Kelly singing "A Beautiful Day" lyrics into U2 concert footage for their show in Seattle, Washington on 5 June, he called James 'Winky' Fairorth at Tait Towers, in Lititz, Pennsylvania. Tait Towers, who provided the staging for the ground?breaking 360 Tour, has been collaborating with U2 on projects since the mid?1980s. In terms of knowledge and speed, Williams knew Tait was a great ally.

Fairorth, upon agreeing to be a part of this one?of?a?kind opportunity, told Williams, "Only if we can talk to roc

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14 March 2016

Chris Kempton's lighting specification relies on a wide and varied selection of equipment including a range of Clay Paky Alpha Beam 700s, Alpha Wash 1200s and Alpha Wash 700s.

In use for the first time was a new chrome version of the Alpha Beam 700. Developed for TV sets and interiors, the shiny chrome finish is designed to help the luminaire become less visible to the eye by reflecting light and blending into its surrounding environment.

The Alpha Beam 700 has become one of the most popular tools for television lighting work in the UK and abroad.

(Jim

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14 March 2016

"You'd be extremely hard-pressed to find another fixture on the market right now that produces this much raw output from a head this compact," said one of the judges. "The Sharpy's speed comes close to rivalling that of its moving mirror predecessors."

Another judge said that the Sharpy's output "can stand up in outdoor venues against much larger-scale fixtures."

The awards were presented at a ceremony in New York on 24 May 2011, following the Broadway Lighting Master Classes, held annually by Live Design magazine.

Clay Paky's Francesco Romagnoli and A.C.T. Lighting's Bob Gordon were on hand to receive the prize from Liv

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14 March 2016

Held for the past few years at the Bercy in Paris, this year the Nuit de la Saint-Patrick show moved to the Musikhall in Rennes. The5000-capacity venue witnessed performances by over 100 artists in a show that lasted for over three hours, the concert being so popular that the Saturday evening show was repeated the following afternoon.

Combining traditional and contemporary performers, both amateur and professional, changeover

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14 March 2016

"In July we record our new album and then after that we will tour solidly until the end of the year on trains, buses and planes," said Troy Kemp. "Whatever we have to do to get our band all over Australia - it never stops. So we're really stoked that Jands are helping us out with our audio gear, in fact we couldn't be happier."

The duo was delighted to receive Shure ULX wireless guitar systems which have allowed them much more freedom onstage - something that is a huge benefit for such dynamic and active performers.

"The freedom to move onstage is amazing as you're not stuck with a 20ft guitar lead," commented Kemp. "We jump around quite a bit and I spin around every now and then so if I h

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14 March 2016

On-Off, a long time Midas analogue customer, was chosen to provide both the sound system and the engineers. The18 bands played for just five and half hours, making the timing of the whole evening crucial, and this was a large factor in selecting the Midas digital technology. The setup was manned by On-Off's team of professionals, who managed to achieve an impressive changeover time of just three minutes between acts.

"It was an obvious choice to use our PRO6s as in addition to being able to cope with an event of this complexity,

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14 March 2016

This year's seminars took place in early June at Ashton Court, near Bristol and (most appropriately for the live music industry) Knebworth House in Hertfordshire. With a bare minimum of advertising, news of the events was so well-received that Sennheiser UK had to freeze the online registration site several days before the first one.

"Hosting last year's event at an attractive venue which people would remember worked very well," says Ken Morrison, business area manager at Sennheiser UK. "We wanted to reach a

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14 March 2016

The Manchester company collected both the Existing Performance Improvement award and best of the best Energy Innovation Grand Prix award. The Grand Prix Award is given to the company judges believed to have shown the greatest overall innovation.

MHA Lighting impressed the judges with "its unique use of LEDs for low level lighting, which use 70-80% less electricity than conventional lamps". MHA's patented LED technology shines light sideways into an encapsulation and reflects outwards to avoid direct contact with eyes. Further features include zero maintenance, safe close proximity applications, no flicker, their application for workplaces such as hospitals, and significant annual savings.

The awards ceremony was held at the Hilto

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14 March 2016

For the Opening Ceremonies, Kvant provided a spectacular laser show using 34 8W output green lasers and 34 Flashbacks, with effects update on Flashback via LiveQuick. Martin Vozar created the design.

Shelly Li, sales manager for Wireless Solution said, "Kvant did a beautiful laser display for the Asian Olympics. I spoke with them during testing and they were very pleased with the stability of the W

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14 March 2016

"We have two grandMA2 full-size running the latest version software - the first time we've taken the grandMA2 on tour," says Fitzgerald. "We're using overhead and double-hung diagonal trusses and have a pretty well-rounded lighting inventory."

FitzGerald has been "working with grandMA for a while" and has teamed with A.C.T "to tweak and get it perfect. It's been a good process - grandMA2 is different from grandMA, and I'm very pleased with it and like where it's going. The macros make things go much faster, I have three times as many playbacks for more flexibilit

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14 March 2016

The 5000m2 Copenhagen venue has been a focus of Denmark's quest to become one of the leading lights in Scandinavian music, the 1800-capacity main hall playing host to some of the city's highest profile concerts, with the smaller three allowing a wide range of performances.

Already equipped with three DiGiCo D5s, the addition of an SD7 to the Koncerthuset has allowed more complex productions to be staged.

"Although the D5s have been performing very well, we needed a console with a lot more outputs for in-ear monitors, Aviom systems and Roland M-48 personal

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14 March 2016

The completely sold out two-day event returned to the summer festival calendar in a new location, Houghton Hall near Kings Lynn, Norfolk.

Overkill at Glade 2011 was project managed for CPL by Nick Diacre from the Bristol office. It is the second year that CPL has supplied the complete stage production package to Overkill and the fifth year that Diacre has been involved. Performers inc;luded Eskimo, African Hitech, The DJ Producer, Ed Rush, MachineDrum, Jacky Murda, 2 Bad Mice and many others.

The venue was a 20m dome from Gaia Nova, which was a challenging space in which to work in from a technical angle, with everything having to be rig

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14 March 2016

"We have been dealing with LTH for more than 10 years and every time I'm pleased to renew our distribution agreement," says Besio. "Every year is a new challenge ,with new targets and the LTH team is always ahead my expectations.

"After having consolidated our position as one of the leading theatre manufacturers ," continues Besio, " we have decided to focus our attention on the architectural market and as a consequence of our common effort more than 200 pieces of 150W CDM discharge Cyclorama , LDR Rima 150w, have been used for lighting the stands of the Siemes group of companies in all the most important exhibitions around Germany . A special thanks should go to Motion Light (LTH agent) for assisting LTH.&

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14 March 2016

Stageco's project director Dirk de Decker planned the custom built stage in consultation with the tour production manager Chris Vaughan, show designer Es Devlin and technical designer Malcolm Birkett.

Initial sketches for the stage were designed in October 2010 and final sign-off was only given in January, which left a very short time scale to create the materials for a show of this size. While Stageco's designs barely changed, the technical production and scenic elements continued to evolve and final information regarding weight loadings was provided with a short timescale, so Stageco created a structure with plenty of headroom in regards to its tolerances.

The main stage system was framed by a giant 'Big Man', who

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14 March 2016

Lighting for the show, designed by Nick Whitehouse with Steven Douglas touring as lighting director, relies heavily on Vari*Lite fixtures - 84 x VL3500 Wash, 84 x VL3000 Spot, four VL3500 FX and 30 x VL500.

"With the variety of lenses that we are using - both internal and clear external - we can get everything from two VL3500 Wash fixtures covering the whole stage to really narrow pin spots," remarked Steven Douglas. "The colours are also so rich. It's pretty much the same with the VL 3000 which both Nick

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14 March 2016

The venue, featuring contemporary casino, The Dining Room restaurant, bars and cocktail lounge has been reopened on two floors in Mayfair's Old Park Lane - 30 years after it closed - and now joins the portfolio of London Clubs International in a partnership with Playboy Enterprises International.

It is in The Cottontail Lounge, where the legendary playboy bunnies administer table service to their premium weekend guests, that two 5m diameter SGM LED ceiling starbursts, each comprising 866 tiny 34mm white LED balls, change the atmosphere by dramatically colour washing the venue through the spectrum of the rainbow. This is accompanied by a vertical SGM LED curtain at the rear, the reflection of which adds further depth and dimension to the space.

In total just under 2500 balls have

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14 March 2016

Last year, SSE used digital systems exclusively for monitors for the first time at many of the UK's top festivals. PM5D-RH consoles were deployed at the monitor positions of Download, High Voltage, Lovebox, Oxegen, Global Gathering, T4 On the Beach, Field Day, Summer Sundae and at both V Festival sites.

So successful was the change that SSE Hire is doing the same this year and has invested in five additional PM5D-RHs, bringing SSE's total inventory to 10, plus several rackmount DSP5Ds.

"The all-digital setups were a real success story last year," says SSE sales manager Alex Penn. "It was an easy decision to invest in further PM5D-RHs as our festival and touring commitments grow ever bigg