Germany - Self-styled 'panic rocker' Udo Lindenberg is showing no sign of letting up. During his Keine Panik (No Panic) tour, the rocker celebrated his 70th birthday, but there was no sign of him quietening down; and that was a good thing for all his fans.
His stage incorporated Lara Croft Dancers, Go-Go girls, Jugglers, Acrobats, a UFO, a giant pink piano, a Russian empress, a houseboy, a children's choir, biopic clips , various movies and so on - plus a jam-packed set list with over 30 songs. The repertoire spans a wide range of classics such as Sonderzug nach Pankow, Mein Ding and Alles klar auf der Andrea Doria to more recent songs like Ich schw
USA - Raiding the Rock Vault and Raiding the Country Vault shows' production was developed by lighting designer Paul Dexter. Both productions present the biggest selling classic songs from an unrepeatable era (mainly 1965-1990) and include Elation Professional Platinum Series moving head fixtures and Cuepix Panel LED matrix blinders as visual support.
Raiding the Rock Vault opened at the Las Vegas Hilton in 2013 before moving to the Tropicana Theatre in December 2014, where it is currently in residence. The newest production, Raiding the Country Vault, premiered in May 2016 in the Mansion Theatre in Branson, Missouri. Production designer and show director Paul Dexter created the stage set and lighting for both shows, including all video content creation and direction. He also came up with the storyline concept and wrote the script.
UK - Showforce, the event crewing specialist, was called upon by Henley Festival Ltd to help deliver their five-day black tie 'boutique cultural experience' at Henley-on-Thames this July.
The quintessentially British festival, set on the banks of the Thames, returned for its 34th outing, with a showcase spanning classical music, rock, pop, jazz, opera and folk. Headline acts Elton John, Elvis Costello and Will Young all graced Henley's floating stage.
Show-stopping visual art and dance, comedy from leading performers and the finest cuisine ensure that the music is not the only thing that makes Henley unforgettable to an audience of 30,000 people, the festival experience concluded with a firework spectacular.
Showforce supplied 16 crew and plant operators to unload, install and set-up infrastructure and equipment for the event. The team were onsite for eight days suppor
UK - Working with some of the biggest names in UK live entertainment production, VER kicked off the festival season delivering a range of equipment packages to both Glastonbury and the Electric Daisy Carnival.
For the second year in succession, VER was contracted by the Glastonbury Festival Pyramid and Other Stage production team to work with video production coordinators Production Network, supplying the main camera image screens to both stages, along with installed screens onstage to be used with associated control equipment for a mixture of artists.
On the Pyramid Stage, VER had a clean sweep of headline acts, with screens supplied via Video Design for Muse on Friday, directly to the act for Adele's Saturday performance and via Glastonbury Production for Coldplay's Sunday night set. The same screen gained further use in a variety of configurations throughout Sunday by a
South Africa - Thankfully no one was injured in a massive fire, which burnt down Durban Christian Centre in Mayville, KwaZulu Natal on the evening of 8 June. Three days later, the sky was lit up by 12 Clay Paky Mythos, all pointed towards a star, as the congregation met together for a service held in their parking lot.
One of the largest churches in Durban, the 5,500 seat auditorium known as the Jesus Dome, was a house of prayer for all nations and a place where miracles happened.
Having regularly lit events in this venue, lighting designer Michael Broderick along with his friend in the industry, Brandon Bunyan of Black Coffee, came up with an idea to use the Mythos fixtures in an act of compassion for the church's loss.
"When we told DWR's Duncan Riley about our idea, he insisted that the globes in the Mythos be 100% new and that the lights be freshly serviced," said
Sweden - The summer is here and the festival season is in full swing. In Sweden, this means Summerburst has arrived. Now in its sixth year, the festival has, to date, taken place at two distinct cities, Gothenburg and Stockholm. With audiences of over 100,000 at each venue, Summerburst presents the best in electronic music for two days at each site.
This year Summerburst Baltic has been added; the Vingis Park, Vilnius in Lithuania will host the festival that boasts a multitude of artists from the EDM genre including headliner Steve Angello.
For the past three years, lighting design duties for Steve Angello have fallen to Jon Trincas. "After a valuable period of working as a technician on a wide variety of shows, from theatre and opera to concert touring, I began operating about four years ago. I got involved with Steve Angello's team and began creating live show designs. C
Belgium - Lighting rental company Splendit supplied lighting equipment including Robe Pointes, CycFX 8s and LEDBeam 100s to a 25th anniversary event for legendary Belgian club phenomenon Cherry Moon at the Lotto Arena in Antwerp.
Lighting designer Steven Couliez was asked by the organisers to produce a design which encompassed lighting, video and structural set elements for an evening of pumping techno, trance, house and retro sounds from a landmark quarter century of Cherry Moon, with video content produced by Nachtcollective.
Steven took the spherical shape of the Cherry Moon logo as his starting point. A circular 10m diameter video screen centre stage was flanked by three curved vertical trusses either side and more circular trusses above - so there were circles in multiple directions all around the stage.
The 46 x Pointes were dotted all over the trusses and used f
UK - Currently running at the St James Theatre Studio, The Stripper is a revival of the 1985 musical which features lyrics by Richard O'Brien - the author of international smash-hit The Rocky Horror Show. In what has already been an extremely busy summer for the company, White Light has been approached to provide the lighting for this highly-anticipated production.
The Stripper is set in 1961 California and follows hard-boiled detective Al Wheeler who is taken into the sleazy underworld of strip-joints and lonely hearts clubs as he tries to solve a mysterious death. When he ventures into Club Extravaganza, he soon realises that the truth isn't the only thing he's about to uncover...
The show, which is embarking on its first UK run in seven years, is produced by Scala Theatre. Producer Chris Wheeler comments, "The Stripper is such a crazy show that it w
Denmark - Danish singer Lukas Forchhammer, the frontman of the band Lukas Graham, is impressed with DPA's new d:facto Linear Vocal Microphone, which is helping the band deliver an exceptionally natural sound during its current European tour.
Lukas Graham's production manager and Front of House sound engineer Frank Gr°nb
Europe - French wholesaler LA BS, which has been supplying professionals and end-users for 25 years, has signed an exclusive distribution partnership with GLP for its lighting fixture solutions in France.
"It was important for us to find a strategic partner in France whom we can trust, to expand our presence in France", commented GLP's managing director Udo K
Asia - SGM has announced a new partnership with Sanecore, part of the IAG Group, as the new exclusive SGM distributor for mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao, effective as of 15 July 2016.
As part of the IAG Group Ltd., Sanecore is a leading manufacturer of loudspeakers and audio electronics based in Shenzhen, China. Henceforth, Sanecore will be the exclusive distributor of SGM products in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macao.
IAG Group has its headquarters and manufacturing facilities in Asia and with offices (including R&D) in the UK, IAG is has a truly global reach. Peter Johansen, CEO of SGM, and Michael Chang, President of IAG, have an extensive track record of working together that dates all the way back to 1991, where Sanecore became the distributor for Peter Johansen's previous lighting company.
Johansen said, "Based on my past experience with Michael Cha
UK - Penn Elcom completed the design and installation of a wiring infrastructure for a new recording studio in Hastings, housed in an old Methodist Church building in the heart of the town. The studio is owned by Paul Godfrey, songwriter / producer and well known as creator of the popular trip hop trio, Morcheeba.
The installation entailed delivering all the multicores, cables, stage boxes, patch bays, wall racks plus associated metalwork, and was overseen by Penn's Leon Whipp who heads the company's specialist wiring division.
Every centimetre of space in the characterful building has been utilised meaningfully in the conversion to serve as a busy and proactive recording environment offering a large control room, main space and mezzanine floor chamber.
Cat 5 connectors have been used throughout. A 48-way line system from the control room connects the recording spaces
USA - For rising young country music star Brett Eldredge, appearing on tour with Grammy and CMA-winning performer Keith Urban represents another milestone in a career that has taken off like a rocket. Like every support act, though, Eldredge's team is expected to get its lighting floor package on and off the stage quickly. This dictum could have created a special challenge, since Eldredge's big sound requires an equally impressive lightshow, but lighting designer Trevor Ahlstrand of Ahlstrand Productions and lighting director Wesley Palmer overcame this obstacle with help from Chauvet Professional's new Rogue R1 FX-B fixture.
The Ahlstrand Productions team is using 24 of the new Rogue blade-style movers supplied by Primer Global in the Eldredge floor package for Urban's RipCord Tour. The Rogue R1 FX-B fixtures are arranged in a line that runs across the upstage deck roughly 3'
South Africa - MGG were called upon to supply the full technical for the SAPOA annual convention, which celebrated its fiftieth anniversary at the Sandton Convention Centre's Pavilion Venue in Johannesburg. For this occasion, MGG asked lighting designer Francois van der Merwe from Wizardry Group to design both the conference and banquet styled show.
The South African Property Owners Association (SAPOA) is the representative body and official voice of the commercial and industrial property industry in South Africa. As they wanted something extraordinary for their golden celebration, MGG incorporated the largest VuePix configuration they had ever built comprising of some 200 x Q3 3.91mm panels. The show also included eight Robe BML Blades, a range of Robins, Clay Paky Sharpys and Mythos and control on a grandMA2 full size.
The event kicked off in the conference room where a
UK - As of July 2016, Edinburgh based Black Light has been awarded Constructionline and The Contractors Health and Safety Assessment Scheme (CHAS) accreditations.
Constructionline is a procurement and supply chain management service that, assesses, collects and monitors standard company information. Black Light gained the accreditation through a question set that is aligned to PAS 91, the standardised pre-qualification questionnaire developed by BSI to reduce duplication within the construction industry.
CHAS is the fastest growing health and safety assessment scheme in the UK. Its main aims are to improve health and safety standards across the UK and reduce duplicated safety applications for both suppliers and buyers.
These accreditations will benefit Black Light by saving time and resources, giving guidance of supply management and promoting that the company shows co
Denmark - The ancient city of Viborg in central Jutland is one of the oldest in Denmark dating back to the Eighth Century Viking settlements and has always had a tradition for meetings and commercial and social interactions. Each year in June the streets, squares and parks become energised with Snapsting, a 10-day annual festival, organised by the city to bring entertainment, arts, culture, sports, music and fun to its community!
The three main entertainment stages this year were equipped with Robe moving lights provided by rental company Lystek, headed by Kristoffer Neilsen, one of the country's well known theatre LDs.
Kristoffer delivers and co-ordinates full technical production for the event, and his lighting rental company Lystek supplies lighting to the entire festival apart from one area, an exercise which empties his warehouse!
USA - Universal Parks & Resorts has entered into a corporate partnership agreement with Christie, which will see Christie delivering the latest projection technologies to Universal Parks & Resorts as the official projection system provider. The agreement includes Universal Parks & Resorts' Theme Parks and CityWalk complexes throughout the United States.
As a Universal Parks & Resorts corporate partner, Christie will be the preferred partner for projectors ordered, purchased, and installed by Universal Parks & Resorts at all domestic controlled venues. Christie will also supply software and professional services in addition to projection technology to Universal Parks & Resorts, helping create customized projection solutions for future attractions.
"Universal Parks & Resorts continues to push the limits of technology and innovation, and Christie is honoured to have this long
UAE - Zero Gravity, a popular beach club, bar and restaurant situated on the perimeter of Skydive Dubai, unveiled its much-anticipated 2,000sq.m expansion in March, including a 39m glass-fronted infinity swimming pool, 75sq.m multi-use stage and one of the world's first permanent installations of L-Acoustics' X Series, along with L-Acoustics K2 and ARCS Wide loudspeaker systems, which is part of an overall audio-visual system that uses the highest quality equipment currently available.
The expansion - which comprises of 50 sun loungers, 30 x 3m diameter day beds, changing facilities, bar and stage - represents a new instalment in the evolution of Dubai's most-talked-about beach-side spot. "Everything has been custom-made to ensure it fitted our very specific brief," says general manager Peter Skudutis. From top-of-the-range Spanish marble, to the 60cm x 60cm rain showers in ou
UK - Rigging industry experts from across the UK joined forces at Birmingham's' Barclaycard Arena to trial the Trailblazer Live Event Rigging Apprenticeship assessment on 29 June.
The Live Event Rigging Apprenticeship, part of the government's Trailblazer scheme encouraging three million new apprentices by 2020, has been developed by the National Rigging Advisory Group (NRAG) to provide formal training to new recruits, supporting them beyond the National Rigging Certificate Level 2, and plug the gap in trainee numbers to fill increasing demand throughout the entertainment rigging industry.
Key rigging leaders from Blackout, UK Rigging, RTM Rigging, PSI Production Ireland and NEC Group attended the trial run of the newly-created Live Event Rigging Apprenticeship, to scrupulously test the assessment format and marking system before it is formally launched to the industry in
Australia - Fairlight.au, the Australian technology development company best known for its professional audio products that are used by major broadcasters and producers around the world, has announced that it is actively seeking a buyer for its Professional Audio technology.
"Over its long history, Fairlight has continually developed highly innovative professional audio technologies that are used by a large number of major content producers around the world" says Philip Belcher, CEO. "With a range of innovative new AES67 compliant audio distribution products approaching release, it has been decided that the potential for Fairlight's professional audio technologies is much larger than can be achieved under the current ownership."
Fairlight is seeking to enter into discussions with organisations that wish to leverage its professional audio technologies to augment their offer
Lost & Found - A 1969 Led Zeppelin session for the BBC that was thought to have been lost when archives were wiped has been recovered from a recording made by a fan. The set went out on the BBC World Service as part of Alexis Korner's Rhythm and Blues programme and was taped from an AM radio in Europe.
It includes the band's only known recording of the track Sunshine Woman. The session recording has been restored with help from guitarist Jimmy Page for inclusion on a new compilation. The Complete BBC Sessions, which will be released in September, is a remastered update of a 1997 collection of tracks recorded for the BBC between 1969 and 1971. It includes eight previously unreleased recordings, including the first broadcast of Stairway To Heaven, from the BBC Paris Cinema in London on 1 April 1971.
South Africa - The Parlotones Orchestrated Live saw the band deliver a mesmerising performance together with a chamber ensemble, arranged and conducted by composer and musician Brendan Jury, at the Teatro at Montecasino, Johannesburg.
For the first time in his career, lighting designer Kevin Stannett from Crosslight had an entire Phillips Vari-Lite rig at his disposal and as always, he programmed on a grandMA2 light. Gearhouse Splitbeam was the full technical supplier at the venue.
Recently awarded as the Naledi Lighting Designer of the Year, Kevin is experienced at creating dramatic lighting effects, fuelled even more so having worked exclusively for Natani
Spain - The summer season is in full swing and this is when live entertainment can be enjoyed in the open air on terraces, in parks and town squares all over the northern hemisphere. Some of the most popular and exclusive holiday destinations put their trust in the quality products from the Spanish manufacturer GUIL to ensure their events are a success. Stage platforms, aluminium barriers, trussing and lifting towers, all manufactured in Spain, are not only chosen for their stylish and innovative designs but also because they meet the strictest safety regulations.
For example, the prestigious Ushuaia Club in Ibiza not only use GUIL aluminium crowd barriers to restrict access to the main stage where the best DJs in the world perform (David Getta, Bob Sinclair, Dj Luciano, etc.), but also to separate the private and VIP areas from the rest of the club.