UK - With the arrival of the new JBL Professional VTX V20 line array system in the UK this month, UK distributor Sound Technology Ltd hosted a listening event at LH2 Studios London on Tuesday 15th July, presented by the designer of the system, Paul Bauman.

An impressive number of leading UK rental companies and engineers were in attendance to see and hear the next generation line array which features numerous technical innovations and 'extraordinary attention to detail' designed for touring sound and fixed installations.

The event kicked off with Paul Bauman describing the development of the VTX system, highlighting in particular the revolutionary D2 HF driver, Differential Drive woofers, high component density, lightweight and flexible design, and completely redesigned super-fast suspension and transport system.

Visitors were then able to listen to the system and evaluate t

USA - The 79-year-old Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) in Ashland has chosen Meyer Sound MIna line array loudspeakers to anchor the first full reinforcement setup in its 1,190-seat, outdoor Allen Elizabethan Theatre. With a stage house and thrust stage originally built for non-amplified performances, the theatre now benefits from an architecturally pleasing audio solution that heightens vocal clarity and musicality for the audience, while making performing easier for the actors.

"The Meyer Sound system has completely changed the experience for both artists and audience," says Bill Rauch, artistic director of OSF. "The amplification is so subtle in the Shakespeare plays that the audience often cannot tell the actors are amplified, but they appreciate hearing and understanding every word."

The move to a full reinforcement system was prompted by several facto

UK - Vaughan Sound Installations Ltd (t/a PAI Group) have completed an impressive, large-scale audio-visual integration project for the Life Sciences Hub Wales in Cardiff Bay.

The client required a substantial array of specialist future-proof technology, with the Welsh Government supporting the fit-out as well as the rental cost for the first five years as part of its £100m Life Sciences Investment Fund. Occupying an entire 12,000 sq. ft. floor, state-of-the-art solutions were needed across areas including a presentation space, boardroom, four meeting rooms, CEO office, and multimedia pod.

Integral to the £2.2m fit-out works, Vaughan Sound was tasked with specifying and installing a range of audio, display, projection, centralised video recording, live streaming and video conferencing systems, along with all dedicated cabling and infrastructure, to deliver a full t

USA - After putting a new K2 loudspeaker system through its paces - including a recent trek on Vampire Weekend's North American tour leg - Thunder Audio, Inc. has expanded its inventory with a large-format K1 system from L-Acoustics.

According to Thunder Audio business development manager Greg Snyder, the company is currently taking delivery of 48 K1 enclosures, as well as bringing the rest of its total L-Acoustics inventory up to 36 K2 and 24 KARA elements, 18 K1-SB and 34 SB28 subs, six ARCS II and 22 LA-RAK, each loaded with three LA8 amplified controllers. An additional 48 K2 are also on order for the first quarter of 2015.

"K1 has become the industry's first choice for live audio reinforcement systems, but K2 is the reason we finally became a member of the L-Acoustics family," says Snyder. "It's a stellar system for arena tours, like Vampire Weekend, as wel

UK - The PLASA Foundation has announced the formation of Behind the Scenes UK to provide financial assistance to entertainment technology professionals, or their immediate family, who are seriously ill or injured. Grants may be used for basic living costs, some medical related expenses, transportation, retraining, or funerals. Since issuing its first grant in the spring of 2006, Behind the Scenes in North America has provided almost half a million dollars to our colleagues in need. These grants have brought help and hope to these individuals during some of their darkest hours.

Behind the Scenes has a very wide remit. Anyone is eligible for assistance who has earned their living in the industry for at least five years, whether behind the curtain, behind the camera, on the road, or working for companies that manufacture or supply entertainment technology products and services. The

UK - The annual British Army Household Division's Beating Retreat ceremony is a spectacular pageant of music, military precision, horses, cannon and fireworks. Dating back to the 1690s, nowadays the most modern production technology is used on the event including, this year, a DiGiCo SD8.

This year's ceremony took place in London's Horse Guards Parade on the evenings of 11 and 12 June, featuring music from the Massed Bands and Corps of Drums of Her Majesty The Queen's Household Division, combining 250 foot guards and mounted cavalry musicians with the gun carriages of The King's Troop Royal Horse Artillery. Choral accompaniment was supplied by the Royal Choral Society, with guest appearances from The Troupe de Marine Band and Band of the Legion d'Etrangere (Foreign Legion) from France and Canada's Vancouver Police Pipe Band.

The event's guest of honour and salute taker was Col

UK - To support their tenth album, American rock band Pearl Jam has taken to the road for their international tour Lightning Bolt.

Working with video director Blue Leach for Pearl Jam Inc. Creative Technology (CT) provided the video equipment to complement Blue's visual directing for the 12 date European leg of Pearl Jam's international tour. Until this tour, Pearl Jam has never toured with cameras and screens, however Blue quickly established a creative connection with the band after warm up shows in London, Ontario and Wrigley Field in Chicago last July (2013).

Renowned for having a streamlined stage presence and historically performing with no video support until now, the superb live photography element captured Pearl Jam's explosive stage performance which featured predominantly black and white camera shots.

To visually enhance the shows CT provided IMAG Screens w

USA - Recently, The Sextant Group, a national independent technology consulting firm specializing in the planning and design of learning, communications and entertainment facilities and systems, was contracted to specify a sound system for the new Convocation Centre at Mount Aloysius College in central Pennsylvania. The Sextant Group selected an option that was new for them: a RoomMatch sound system from Bose Professional Systems.

The system consists of 17 RoomMatch loudspeakers divided into one five-speaker array (RM5505, RM7010, RM9010, RM9020, and RM12040 modules) that covers the main floor, and six separate two-module RM7040/RM9020 arrays covering the bleacher seating on both sides of the floor. The speaker arrays are all powered by five PowerMatch PM8500N amplifiers and were installed by the Pittsburgh office of Cleveland, Ohio-based SoundCom Systems.

The school's new Con

The Netherlandds - Commissioned by the Basel-based Anne Frank Foundation, Anne is the first production at the new, purpose-built Theater Amsterdam. Only the second time that one of the most famous and poignant accounts to emerge from the Second World War has been adapted for stage, Yamaha and Steinberg technology is ensuring the impact of the sound matches that of the large scale visuals.

Anne relates the story of the Jewish Frank family's hiding from Nazi occupiers in Amsterdam, as told through the famous diary of their teenage daughter, using life-sized, 75 ton reproductions of the Frank family's original Amsterdam home and the annexe where they hid for 26 months.

The show continues an emerging tradition in the Benelux countries of theatre productions on a huge scale. Sound design is by Jeroen ten Brinke, who took theatre sound to new levels with the revolving

Germany - On 15 July 2014, the football world champions landed at Berlin's Tegel airport. They were given a rapturous welcome by the waiting fans and journalists. World champion sound as the players left the plane and on the visitors' terrace was provided by eight LSP 500 PRO from Sennheiser.

At 10:08 precisely, the specially chartered Lufthansa Boeing 747 from Rio de Janeiro with the 23 German world champions on board touched down in Berlin. The triumphant national squad was given a rapturous reception by Tegel Airport staff, airline employees, journalists and hundreds of jubilant onlookers.

Eight Sennheiser LSP 500 PRO supplied by Bärlin Team operating on behalf of Berlin Airports ensured that the welcome addresses for the players could be clearly heard by all those present. Four LSP 500 PRO were located on the apron area and a further four were set up on the visitors' terr

USA - Everyone knows that the focus of Nevada hotels is on gambling, right? That is, of course, unless that establishment is the new Whitney Peak Hotel in Reno. The absence of gaming may be unusual in a Nevada hotel, but then again, how many luxury boutique hotels feature the 164-foot-tall exterior climbing wall and interior climbing boulders found at Whitney Peak?

Occupying a building that once housed the iconic Fitzgerald's Hotel and Casino, a Reno landmark, Whitney Peak is the result of an extensive, carefully planned and well-executed renovation that relied heavily on lighting throughout the facility to create a transformative and memorable experience for guests.

The spacious first floor that been occupied by slot machines and table games when the site was Fitzgerald's, now houses Heritage, a farm-to-table restaurant that features locally sourced food and is inspired by Re

UK - UK Live is a new series of one-day festivals held during June at three locations around the country. Capital Sound was tasked with providing audio systems for both the NE Live and SW Live sites.

NE Live was held at Sunderland's Stadium of Light football ground with around 30,000 attending, whilst SW Live was held on the beach at Weston Super Mare for 15,000 with the crowds at both sites enjoying sets from headline act Jessie J, along with Jason Derulo, Rizzle Kicks, The Saturdays, The Vamps, Union J, Katy B, Rixton and Neon Jungle.

"We supplied large MLA systems at both venues," explains Paul Timmins, Capital's general manager. "At Sunderland we deployed a four-hang MLA rig and a twin-hang MLA rig at Weston-super-Mare with out-hangs of MLA Compact. Control was via twin avid Profile consoles at FOH and twin Yamaha PM5d consoles on monitors."

Capital a

Mexico - Elation Professional's Mexican partner, ADIMSA, has supplied Elation LED lighting fixtures to Inbursa Aquarium (Acuario Inbursa) in Mexico City, fulfilling product specification, on-site supervision, and lighting fixture programming duties for the world-class aquarium in collaboration with lighting designer Cynthia Ortiz.

Owned by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, Inbursa features 230 species of sea life across 11,500sq.ft of space and is one of the largest aquariums in the world. Officially opened in June of this year, the building consists of four levels, all but one underground. The tour begins at the lowest floor, which represents the bottom of the sea with pirate ship and sharks, and ascends through coral reef and a manta ray pool to the Beach and Rainforest, culminating on the ground floor at one of the venue's main attractions, the Penguinarium.

Lighting designe

Italy - The first Radio Italia Live concert was held in 2012 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Radio Italia. On that occasion, the well-known radio station organized the show in Piazza Duomo in Milan for the first time. An amazing 150,000 plus people turned out for the event, which was broadcast live on Radio Italia and Video Italia and repeated on Italia 1.

Since then, the organisation has decided to turn the Radio Italia Live concert into a regular event at the beginning of Milan's summer calendar, and today it is one of the few public showcases for Italian music with top-ranking performers. In 2014, Biagio Antonacci, Laura Pausini, Elisa, Negramaro, Edoardo Bennato, Emma, Claudio Baglioni and Alex Britti were on stage.

Giancarlo Toscani, who was in charge of the lighting design, graphic design and art direction, explained reports, "The first to the third years were

UK - Lighting and visuals rental specialist HSL supplied equipment for a bold, vibrant interactive lighting installation work, Control t'force, created by lighting designer James Bawn, that illuminated the 330m high Emley Moor Mast in west Yorkshire UK, which is the tallest freestanding structure in the UK, an iconic local landmark and the main UHF transmitter for most of the county.

Specially commissioned by TG Events on behalf of Kirklees Council as part of Hypervelocity, the five-day grand final of the 100-day 2014 Yorkshire Festival, the Control t'force project which ran over two evenings, also celebrated the start of the 2014 Tour de France cycle race in Yorkshire.

James has been involved in some previous architectural lighting projects for the council and when his ideas for lighting the Emley Moor broadcast transmitting station mast (currently owned

Brazil - When Spanish tenor and conductor Plácido Domingo took to the stage for the Concert in Rio, honouring the close of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, television audiences received a crystal clear sound thanks to DPA Microphones' d:dicate recording microphones. Performing at the HSBC Arena Stage in Rio de Janeiro on Friday, 11 July, Domingo was accompanied by Puerto Rican soprano Ana María Martínez, Chinese pianist Lang Lang and the Brazilian Symphony Orchestra.

With the entire world watching, Grammy Award-winner Jesse Lewis, audio producer for the live international broadcast of the concert, knew he needed reliable microphones for the broadcast of the performance, which was aired live from the massive arena. He turned to DPA Microphones for its range of d:dicate mics, including the 4006 Omnidirectional, 4011 Cardioid and 4041 Large Diaphragm solutions.

"For a venue of th

Switzerland - A Nexo Geo S system has been installed into the new BCV Concert Hall in Lausanne, a classy new addition to the Swiss music education scene.

BCV Concert Hall is part of the HEMU University of Music Lausanne, the 152-year-old music school, founded in the Romandy district of western Switzerland in 1861 as the Conservatoire de Lausanne, which is renowned for its highly qualified faculty members, challenging programme of studies and firm commitment to music on regional, national and international levels.

Designed by prominent Swiss architects Burckhardt and Partners, the hall is sponsored by the Banque Cantonale Vaudoise (BCV) Swiss bank and other local arts patrons, and is located in the Flon in central Lausanne, a district which underwent extensive rehabilitation in the late nineties and now throbs with life and culture.

The 300-capacity hall is to be shared betwe

Australia - The Academy nightclub in Canberra, Australia is benefiting from a new Robe moving light installation which was supplied by locally based Elite Sound & Light and is designed to ensure that their popular EDM club nights and visiting live artists can enjoy the very best lighting and visual experiences.

Elite's Darren Russell was asked to propose a design and his primary concern was to spec fixtures that would give the flexibility and variety of effects needed for long periods of operation, that would enable the club to have a completely different look and feel according to its programme that night.

The Academy is the largest club in Canberra and is right in the heart of the city. It has an 800 capacity main room and the 150 capacity Candy Bar upstairs, which features a glass wall along one entire side offering a commanding view of the main club dancefloor.

The Robe

UK - Penn Elcom, manufacturer of flight case hardware, speaker cabinet hardware and 19-inch racking solutions, alongside sibling brands, Pro Audio Stash and CLD Distribution, has signed a partnership with industry charity Entertainment Workshops (EW).

Entertainment Workshops is set to produce a catalogue of product functionality videos accessible to customers via QR codes and website links. This partnership not only supports the charity with a guaranteed financial income over at least the next two years but more importantly provides real-life, hands-on experience for students to work on projects being used in our industry today.

Entertainment Workshops provides an alternative education programme for young people who benefit from a kinaesthetic learning style. The charity provides the students with opportunities to gain Arts Awards and BTEC's in areas such as stage, sound and l

South Africa - The National Arts Festival (NAF) is Africa's biggest annual celebration of the arts. It's hosted in Grahamstown, a small university city in the Eastern Cape, and takes place over 11 days every winter.

This year, from 3 to 13 July, 225 000 people attended some 2800 performances in 50 venues scattered across Grahamstown and its surrounds. Once again Electrosonic SA was a sponsor of this world class arts festival. This year, to celebrate the festival's 40th birthday, it was decided to do something special. Recently Electrosonic SA became the sole distributors of Green Hippo's Media Servers, and the festival presented the ideal opportunity to show what these servers can do.

The plan to use the Hippo to project images onto a large area was the brainchild of NAF Technical Director Nicci Spalding and Robbi Nassi (Electrosonic SA's project manager and programmer. Report

UK - The World Snooker Awards '14 took place recently at The Lancaster Hotel, London and saw the great and good of Snooker assembled to honour the outstanding performances of the 2013/14 season.

Hosted by TalkSport's Andy Goldstein, the event featured awards for nine separate categories and was dominated by Ronnie O'Sullivan and Mark Selby with Dennis Taylor and Cliff Thorburn inducted in to the Hall of Fame.

For the third year in a row MRL Productions supplied full production including lighting, staging, AV and camera feeds to screen. MRL also provided sound which meant that, also for the third year running, KV2 Audio loudspeakers were relied upon exclusively to transfer the presentation and performances to the audience.

The event had two stages - a live band stage and main awards stage.

For the band stage a KV2 Audio ES system was used whilst the main awards stage featur

USA - Completed in 1837, St. John the Evangelist is a historic Catholic church in Frederick, Maryland, with a Grecian ionic design and a cruciform floor plan. The church has carpeted floors but its spacious marble and plaster interior and hardwood pews create major challenges for voice intelligibility.

St. John's existing sound system had poor intelligibility and coverage and a recurring feedback issue., Eric Johnson of Audio Video Group offered St. John's a new system using Community's Entasys column line-source loudspeaker system. Johnson performed a live demonstration that showed his design could provide intelligible sound with even coverage while minimizing audio feedback.

St. John's new system has an Entasys ENT-FR full-range column and an ENT-LF low-frequency column on each side of the chancel tilted slightly downwards to avoid rear-wall echoes.

The left and right tran

Mexico - SAE in Mexico recently opened a new live audio engineering degree course, installing Allen & Heath's new Qu-24 compact digital mixer as the teaching console.

Supplied by Allen & Heath's Mexican distributor, Audyson, students will learn to mix using Allen & Heath digital mixers, starting with the Qu-24 and progressing onto larger consoles, such as the GLD-80. The course will also include practical sessions, placing students in real situations with live bands, where they will also mix using A&H consoles. One such session has already taken place with a Qu-24 at FOH, with additional IO provided by an AR2412 audio rack, and a ME personal monitoring system for the musicians.

"We are using the Qu-24 and GLD-80 with SAE students because we want the new generation of sound engineers to know about the excellent sound quality and ease of use, and way to mix of the Allen & H

UK - After winning a competitive tender to provide a technical infrastructure at the London School of Economics' new Saw Swee Hock Student Centre in central London, LSI Projects turned to the Harman Professional catalogue.

Responding to a specification drawn up by consultants, Arup - to supply and fit sound and communication, lighting and staging systems in the 850-capacity nightclub/live venue - they constructed their digital routing network around BSS Audio Soundweb London components, before turning to sister company Soundcraft's digital VI platform for the main FOH and monitor mixing consoles.

Named after an alumnus who made a sizeable donation towards the £24m development cost, the building itself was designed by Irish architects Sheila O'Donnell and John Tuomey (O'Donnell + Tuomey).

Set on seven storeys above ground and two high storeys below, it contains a nightc

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