Fame Again - A new production of Fame - the Musical is to tour the UK next year, directed by Gary Lloyd whose credits include Thriller Live, and who is also choreographer of the production, which is produced by Bill Kenwright. It will open at the New Wimbledon Theatre on 20 February, 2014. The full tour schedule and cast have yet to be announced. Since it was first performed in London in 1995, Fame, which is based on the film and television series of the same name, has had seven West End runs.
Fair Play - Eurovision organisers have announced changes to the song contest's jury rules, amid allegations of bribery. From next year, the names of each country's jury will be revealed ahead of the competition in an effort to increase openness and accountability. For the first time, individual juror scores will also be published immediately after the final. The
UK - October will see the PLASA debut for :entertaining sustainability, the knowledge-sharing portal and sustainability consultancy for the live entertainment industry.
Technical director, Tim Atkinson, and creative director, Ruth Atkinson, will be on hand to talk to you about any sustainability niggles you might be having in your building - whether you're in a performance space or an industry supplier.
With an emphasis on practical solutions, :entertaining sustainability is happy to talk to you about the measurement and management of building and process performance, as well as taking you through the benefits of a full building audit backed by our unique industry experience.
Also on view will be entertainingsustainability.com - the free online network for industry professionals to exchange news, information and knowledge about products, equipment and experience in the field
UK - August Bank Holiday 2013 saw the Galtres Parklands Festival take place in the picturesque surroundings of Duncombe Park, Helmsley. With its slogan being Beer Cider Music Fun Food KV2 Audio loudspeakers ensured that festival goers experienced the music aspect to its fullest in three of the festival's live spaces.
With all technical and production duties overseen by York based events specialists Camel Event Production, KV2 Audio loudspeakers were used on the Black Howl stage, the Arts Barge stage and, most importantly if the festivals slogan is to be taken literally, the Firkin beer tent stage - home to 300 firkins of fine ale.
The Black Howl Stage was situated within a large circus top and focussed on a wide range of acoustic orientated artists - ranging from solo singer-songwriters to full on rock and roll bands. One of KV2 Audio's ES Systems was used for Front of
UK - The final two sessions to be announced at the 4th annual PLASA Rigging Conference both examine aspects of international rigging standards at the event on 7-8 October 2013 at ExCeL London.
Codes of Practice - The Next Steps, presented by Lori Rubinstein, director of membership, skills and standards, PLASA, and Michele Enright, qualifications manager, PLASA, will highlight the calls from the rigging community for an international code of practice for rigging. Many countries are keen to harmonise what they do and are concerned with international parity and, as the worldwide voice of entertainment technology, PLASA has taken the first steps towards creating a template for an international code of practice for entertainment rigging. The session will include an overview of the initiative and attendees will be invited to give feedback on the proposed content outline.
India - The Guru Tegh Bahadur Memorial structure in New Delhi has been brought to life with a stunning light show - featuring fixtures from PR Lighting. The newly programmed show is the result of a design from the attraction's lighting director, Himanshu Sabharwal, in conjunction with Modern Stage Service's Varinder Wadhwa.
This architectural marvel, situated on the main highway, gives an insight into the life and teachings of the ninth Guru of the Sikhs and the illumination has been described as "world class".
Modern Stage Service (MSS) - PR Lighting's Indian distributor - was brought in as a result of the company's long association with Mr. Sabharwal, and Wadhwa specified 16 XR300 Beam and 12 PR-8802's. Mounted on both the ground and the structure itself, they are triggered into action daily after dark from an Avolites Titan Mobile in conjunction with a Dataton Wat
Spain - At the beginning of 2013, Barcelona's most iconic building and the city's most important tourist attraction, the Gaudi-designed church La Sagrada Familia, received a new audio system. An essential part of the system was a number of Denon professional units, supplied by D&M Pro's Spanish distributor, Gaplasa S.A.
With its striking architecture, the Sagrada Familia is a particularly sensitive structure. Considerable care had to be taken with the installation, so the church's custodians contacted Gaplasa, having heard of their success with a number of other sensitive installations in the area, including those at Barcelona Cathedral and Basilica de Montserrat.
"Along with a number of other companies, we were invited to look at how the church's problems could be solved," says Gaplasa's Óscar Valero. "Ultimately, the project we proposed was deemed the best so
USA - Production and lighting designer Justin Geiger of Impulse Creative Group has been handling the visual look on Pitbull's live shows for nearly two years. For the rapper's current Global Warmingtour, Geiger has turned to the Martin MAC Viper family of moving heads to impress fans across the world.
Geiger is one of the first LDs in the U.S. to use the MAC Viper Quadray, Viper AirFX and Viper Profiles on the same stage. "The time it took from when we received the fixtures until they were up in the rig was literally only a few minutes," Geiger says. "The Vipers look fantastic and work really well on this high-energy club show. I use other lights on tour and it's such a relief to have Vipers because of the amazing gobos and optics. They're some of the best I've seen."
Geiger became familiar with the new family of luminaires through production house C
Italy - Paul McCartney's Out There tour recently landed in the Arena di Verona, the historic Roman amphitheatre that for thousands of years has provided entertainment spectacles for the people of Verona.
Touring logistics meant that Paul McCartney's regular PA system could not make the Verona date so local supplier Amandla Productions stepped in to provide a Martin Audio MLA system, supported by All Access, the owners of Italy's largest MLA rig.
Paul McCartney's long standing FOH engineer Paul 'Pab' Boothroyd' was at the helm for the show, ably assisted by his touring system tech Chris Nicholls. Both were impressed by the system's performance.
"I had heard a lot of good things about the new Martin Audio rig and was happy to use it for this show," stated Boothroyd. "Everybody was really happy with the show, the coverage was great and the detail and clari
UK - World-renowned English rapper and singer-songwriter, Example, has spent the summer playing a series of festival dates beneath a uniquely designed lighting rig constructed from James Thomas Engineering's new JT Truss.
The newly-launched JT Truss was chosen by lighting designer Graham 'Grum' Leesmith who needed to re-create a smaller, 'festival-friendly' version of the one he used on Example's international arena tour.
The truss is configured as two 4.5m diameter octagonal lighting rigs with each octagon composed of eight 1.5m sections of JT40 truss. These are joined by custom-made 45° corners and suspended above the stage where they form the main part of the full flown tour rig.
In addition to being major design features, each octagon needed to be strong enough to support a substantial lighting rig of PixelRange SmartLines, PixelRange PixelSmarts, Clay Paky Sharpys,
Macau - The Board of Directors at J&C Joel Limited has announced the opening of their fifth overseas office, located in Macau, which will be headed up by Fiona Blackett, managing director of J&C Joel Hong Kong.
The opening of the office represents J&C Joel's further commitment to the region and provides a Macau base for the growing business in the Las Vegas of the Far East.
The new office will allow J&C Joel to expand its ever-growing services to the region, specialising in flame retardant fabrics, drapery and stage machinery for the theatre and event industries.
"J&C Joel are looking forward to the opportunities this new office will provide while servicing their already established client base," says the company.
USA - Lighting designer Don Weeks utilised Robe LEDWash 600s for the most recent US leg of l progressive rock band Yes's 2013 / 2014 international tour, for which they are performing three classic albums - The Yes Album', Close To The Edge and Going For The One in their entirety.
New York-state based Weeks has worked for Yes for two years. The creative starting point for this tour was based on a design first created in spring 2012, which presented a starker and more scaled back stage set up than in the past, with no scenic element, and just an upstage video screen.
The idea was to supplement the locally supplied lighting rigs at each venue with a compliment of 'specials' which included 15 x LEDWash 600s.
The venues were a mix of small to large theatres, casinos and some amphitheatres, so they needed something that would adapt and work in all of these spa
UK - Manchester based lighting rental specialist dbn supplied a production lighting design, lighting equipment and crew to the three day 2013 Ramsbottom Festival organised by The Met (arts centre, Bury) in association with Bridgewater Hall, and staged at Ramsbottom Cricket Ground in Ramsbottom near Bury.
dbn's project manager Nick Buckley oversaw the operation to light the main stage, which was headlined by I Am Kloot, Richard Hawley and Sinead O'Connor and enjoyed by 6500 people across the weekend. dbn also provided lighting and effects kit for two smaller stages.
The Main Stage lighting design was based on last year's very successful format and the need to accommodate multiple genres of music and performance as well as presenting a set up that was straightforward, flexible and versatile enough for any visiting LDs to work with.
UK - Trilogy has announced the installation of its Gemini intercom system and Mentor XL sync pulse and test signal generators (SPG/TSG) at Birmingham City University.
Configured to accurately replicate a full, professional production facility, the 64-port Gemini intercom system is deployed at the university's state-of-the-art Media Centre.
Based at the newly opened Parkside Building, the Media Centre is home to the largest broadcast facility in the UK's university sector, featuring four television studios, including a dedicated 2000 sq ft Green Screen studio, one of the largest in the UK. In addition to the TV studios the Gemini intercom system connects six radio studios and other technical areas such as sound recording studios, post-production facilities and editing suites, a colour grading suite, 4k screening facilities and hundreds of PC and Apple-based multimedia workstati
UK - The BA (Hons) Lighting Design programme at Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance in Outer London and German Light Products (GLP) are collaborating on enhancing training for the next generation of lighting designers and technicians.
GLP's Udo Künzler and Mark Ravenhill have supplied the college with six Impression90 LED moving heads on a long term loan. The units have been installed in the college's unique lighting training and research laboratories, and are available to the lighting design students for projects as well as to augment their designs for a range of innovative lighting projects.
Rose Bruford and GLP are collaborating on developing a close partnership, working together to provide the best possible training to students and professionals. This new partnership has been made possible by lighting designer Patrick Woodroffe, who is an Honorary Fellow of th
USA - Lighting designer, Chris Reade is touring non-stop using a Jands Vista T2 console and S1 wing to control lighting for platinum selling country music artist, Dierks Bentley on the Miranda Lambert and Dierks Bentley: Locked & Reloaded Tour.
Spanning across most of 2013, the Locked & Reloaded Tour is an action-packed event featuring two of country music's hottest artists; and for this Reade needs a powerful, reliable and rock solid system to control the show.
First introduced to the Jands Vista platform in 2008, Reade was immediately impressed with its simple, powerful operation - quickly adopting the technology as his preferred choice of control. Since then Chris has purchased his own Vista T2, S1 and M1 consoles, and hasn't looked back since!
Reade's lighting design perfectly complements the set design by Bruce Rodgers of Tribe Inc, which is both large and ambitious - i
Sweden - LumenRadio confirms that leading moving light and LED manufacturer Robe lighting has been appointed distributor for the CRMX brand in Czech Republic and Slovak Republic.
Robe and LumenRadio have been working closely for a long period of time. With more and more customers requiring a trustworthy wireless DMX/RDM system to use alongside the Robin products in the Czech and Slovakian markets, the new cooperation was a natural step.
Robe's sales manager for Czech Republic and Slovak Republic, Petr Kolmacka says, "Since we offer LumenRadio's OEM modules in most of the Robin fixtures, customers are asking for the boxed products as well. We have already received requirements for LumenRadio demo systems from some of the largest theatres and TV studios in the area.
"One of the largest theatres in the Czech Republic, the Jiri Myron Theatre (the Moravian-Silesian Nati
UK - The eagerly anticipated shortlists of lighting designers nominated for a much-coveted Knight of Illumination Award have been announced.
Established to celebrate outstanding achievements in British lighting design in the sectors of TV, Theatre and Concert Touring and Events, the awards are voted on by panels of professional reviewers who work in each of the specific sectors.
"It's been the most popular Knight of Illumination awards to date with an unprecedented number of submissions across the categories Theatre, Television and Concert Touring and Events," says KOI Co-ordinator Durham Marenghi. "This year KOI organisers have been inundated with submissions of stunning lighting design work, all of which deserve the highest recognition for their creativity."
So without further ado, and in alphabetical order, the following are the shortlists for each cat
UK - PLASA London 2013, which takes place at ExCeL London from 6-9 October 2013, is putting out a final call for entries for the 2013 PLASA Awards for Innovation, before the deadline of Friday 27 September. More than 25 entries, ranging from audio interfaces and lighting controls to Ethernet switches and luminaires have been approved so far. The winners will be announced at a ceremony in the new AudioLab Arena on Monday 7 October at 6.00pm.
The PLASA Awards for Innovation recognise products that advance the industry by demonstrating a new style of thinking, improving technical practice or taking a key step forward in terms of safety. All successfully vetted products are judged against one another on the strength of their innovation alone.
Companies and products in the running include:
• Altman Lighting (STAND F40) - UV LED Spectra CYC - A 100W cyclorama/wall wash lumina
Norway - The Oslo Concert Hall (Norwegian: Oslo Konserthus) in Norway has relied on the durability of its Meyer Sound equipment since 1986. A quarter century after installing eight UPA-1 and two USW-1 conventionally powered loudspeakers, the venue again turned to a Meyer Sound solution when it came time for an upgrade. As a result, a Mica line array loudspeaker system was supplied and installed by Oslo-based AVAB CAC.
The 1,404-capacity Oslo Concert Hall regularly features a diverse schedule of classical, blues, jazz, and rock performances. The hall's legacy Meyer Sound equipment has proven its worth, and venue management was ready for a system with more power and flexibility.
"I think it's unique that our UPA-1 system was so old yet sounded so good," says Jan Olsen Skare, long-time production manager of Oslo Concert Hall. "Now with the Mica, we have a system th
USA - Masque Sound continues its Broadway run by providing a custom audio equipment package for the new production of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie.
The Glass Menagerie, starring Cherry Jones, Zachary Quinto, and Celia Keenan-Bolger, is directed by John Tiffany and the Tony Award-winning creative team behind ONCE, and tells the story of Amanda Wingfield, a Southern belle past her prime who lives with her two grown children in a small apartment in St. Louis.
For sound designer Clive Goodwin, there were two main goals: To make the play sound as natural as possible and to ensure that the whole audience, even members seated in the very back of the mezzanine, could clearly hear Nico Muhly's beautiful composition. "Nico's music sets the theme for the show," says Goodwin. "The Glass Menagerie is a memory play about the character T
UK - The first SSL Live console are now shipping. The first three consoles all shipped to U.K.-based global tour production company Britannia Row for use on Peter Gabriel's forthcoming European Back to Front tour and another two shipped to SGroup in France for the imminent Amel Bent tour. Console manufacturing production for 2013 has been sold out since July, and details of the new commercial partner network for SSL Live are available in the 'Where to Buy' section of the SSL website, says the company.
SSL's CEO, Antony David, says, "The on-schedule completion of the new Live console is an important milestone for SSL. This has been one of the biggest developments we have undertaken for some time and marks the first application of our new Tempest digital platform. We have been very encouraged by the response from mix engineers, rental companies and our channel partners
UK - The Guildhall School of Music & Drama will celebrate the opening of their new building, Milton Court, with a concert and reception on 26 September. Milton Court will provide much needed additional teaching space for the School and will complement their existing facilities on Silk Street.
The £89m centre brings together several distinct performance spaces under one roof to provide world-class performing arts facilities and an ideal environment for students to learn and practice their craft. The Concert Hall will also be used by the Barbican and its artistic partners, including performances from the Barbican's two new Associate Ensembles, the Academy of Ancient Music and Britten Sinfonia.
Milton Court is located at the heart of the City of London, occupying the first six floors of The Heron, a new 40-storey residential tower originally conceived by David Walker Archit
Sweden - Behind every concert and every TV show we see, behind every play of lights on the stage of a theatre that leaves us admired, behind the effects of a skilful lighting of urban architecture or a space for the public, there is always a big deployment of sophisticated technologies. Not all shows, however, have the same ability to excite us, some are great and exciting, others are dull and monotonous.
What makes the difference is the lighting designer, the artist who uses light as a creative tool and plays with the rhythm of the music or the atmosphere of a theatre piece. For the lighting designer, projectors are like the brushes for a painter and his art is to shape the light, adapting it to the needs of each show.
Patrick Woodroffe is one of the most famous lighting designers in the world since many years and shines with his art the most famous artists, the stars of the
UK - Event organiser Rouge Events called upon Capital Sound to deploy a Martin Audio MLA system for this year's Live by the Lake - a combination of pop and classical music presented by English Heritage at North London's Kenwood House. The event took place over several weekends during August.
This was Capital's first year at Kenwood and, as with many of its projects this year, understanding the sensitivity of the site and noise pollution issues was key.
With the MLA system having been used successfully for this purpose at a number of events, including British Summer Time in Hyde Park, Capital project manager, Robin Conway, knew that specifying MLA on all PA positions would give maximum controllability of both on- and off-site levels.
For having staged concerts at the site for more than 50 years, Kenwood House has historically struggled with sound containment and has been dogg