Turkey - One of Istanbul’s largest nightclubs, the latest in the group of Jolly Joker venues, is making a big impact on the city’s entertainment scene, thanks to a high-specification Nexo STM Series modular line array installed by Alkor and Yamaha Music Europe Turkey. The Jolly Joker Vadistanbul has been opened by Hakan Polat, İbrahim Sayın and Ahmet Çelenk, a new addition to a collection of clubs spread all across Turkey. The 2,000-capacity club has a large stage, and plays host to a busy rota of popular Turkish artists. Installation company Alkor collaborated closely with Yamaha Music Europe Turkey to present a Nexo proposal to Hakan Polat and the Jolly Joker’s audio engineer Eren Öztürk. After a live demo, they selected the Nexo STM Series modular line array system, with Nexo’s 45 N-12 line monitors on-stage, from a competitive tender, citing the system
UK - Long before the Christmas period up until January 2019 the well-known Royal Turnbridge Wells Ice rink in Kent is open for the public. During this time there are all kinds of activities like figure skating presentations, live music, choirs concerts. Kent-based Limelite Lighting has been involved with this event since its start in 2012. This year they have coloured the ice rink and the surroundings with a lot of Showtec including 43 units of the Showtec Cameleon Flood 15 Q4. With their IP65 rating very well equipped to be used outdoors, even under harsh conditions. 15 RGBW 4-in-1 LEDs make sure that the event remains colourful. Thirteen units of the Showtec Helix S5000 Q4 including the optional 40° beamshapers are in action to light up the surrounding grounds and trees. These units are also rated IP-65 and, as an additional advantage, are equipped with W-DMX by Wi
UK - Illumination specialist LED Creative supported Projection Artworks on a festive installation project at Luton Airport. Housed in the easyJet hanger and featuring a sequence of scintillating visual projections, mapped across an easyJet Airbus A320, the magical performance was choreographed to sync with a contemporary reworking of Tchaikovsky's Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy. Created by a team of 10 lighting designers and artists, the spectacle incorporated an array of stunning lighting effects, illuminated props and festive themed scenic elements that included over 1.5 miles of coloured lights used to add colour and sparkle throughout the venue. Working with Pete Boatfield at Projection Artworks, LED Creative provided a selection of their Sigma Pulse Wands paired with BYTE, the company’s state of the art controller units developed specifically to work
Ireland - Thousands of people witnessed Dublin’s New Year Festival with a light show that illuminated the landmark Custom House and River Liffey. Lighting designer Matthew Kilmurry, of Kilmurry Design, controlled the spectacular effects using two Avolites Tiger Touch II consoles. More than 40,000 people enjoyed the New Year’s celebrations in Dublin, with millions watching live TV coverage of the ‘Midnight Moment’. This was billed as a ‘dazzling lighting spectacle’ featuring a ‘thrilling choreography of lasers and aqua beams’. “My brief for the event was to light up the sky and surrounding areas of Custom House Quay in Dublin city centre. The lighting needed to be dynamic, original and totally in-sync with the six-minute music piece that played at midnight,” says Kilmurry. “I pre-programmed to timecode, using Capture and a Tiger Touch II at home
Ireland - Early last year the INEC Killarney venue, the largest music and multi-purpose venue in Ireland outside Dublin, worked with AC Entertainment Technologies to fit a complete new lighting rig which featured a full fixtures range, cabling infrastructure and lighting control console. Since Gavin James, the first artist to use the rig, many other big names have played at the INEC. Snow Patrol, Nathan Carter, Una Healy (the Saturdays), Jimmy Carr, Walking on Cars and Jake Carter have all subsequently performed at the INEC, with their production teams enjoying the benefits of a full existing rig at their disposal. Mark Egan, director of corporate and leisure events at INEC says: “The lighting rig has been incredibly well received. The feedback we’ve had from LDs has been fantastic.” The Prolights fixtures form the cornerstone of the rig, which uses a vari
Spain - The modern Centro Comercial Gran Via in Alicante is one of the foremost shopping malls in the city. Set on two floors it celebrated its busy Christmas season by installing a number of spectacular architectural colour-change effects from PR Lighting. These were supplied and installed by Sound Light Spain (SLS), the Chinese manufacturer’s long-term territory distributor. SLS were introduced to the project by one of their customers, Pdb Studio, and after conducting various comparative tests the latter voted in favour of PR Lighting. SLS co-owner Fernando Abad, who is in charge of the company’s lighting department, assisted Pdb Studio in the specification and selection of the devices. They opted for 18 of the twin head ARC LED 1054 IP65-rated outdoor fixtures (each containing 27 x 10W 4-in-1RGBW LEDs and advanced colour mixing). These were chosen for their powe
UAE - Protec was called upon by Envie Events to provide full AV support for Bao: The Final Frontier EDM festival at Meydan Racecourse, Dubai. Bao attracted large crowds to the theatrical display and line-up of world class DJs. Artistes included the top 2 DJs of the DJ Mag top 100 Martin Garrix, and Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike as well as heavyweights Afrojack, Don Diablo, Nervo, R3hab and more. Mel Deighton, Protec’s project manager, worked closely with other suppliers to make sure the show was delivered beyond expectation and on time. Faced with considerable challenges along the way, he credits his team on delivering under pressure. “Due to the complexity of the production we were on-site 11 days for set-up, two days for the show and we were fully loaded out two days later. It was a challenging build which required cooperation with the staging company. Ou
UK - Devon-based specialists for LED visual effects, drapes and starcloths S+H Technical supplied 550sq.m of its LED starcloth product to help realise designer Joshua Grace’s set for ITV’s Best Christmas Ever. The show, a Christmas special, was hosted by Alexander Armstrong with a live audience on D Stage at Elstree Studios in Hertfordshire, and was produced by Remarkable, part of the Endemol Shine Group. Armstrong invited celebrity guests to his winter lodge to discuss their favourite elements of the season, and a member of the audience had the chance to win a Best Christmas Ever hamper. A house band played popular Christmas tunes, with some of guests joining in for a sing-along. Josh wanted a twinkly festive feel for the show and to suit the environment - a cosy fireside chat scenario with a wintry forest scene visible through the windows of t
UK - As one of the UK’s premiere performance venues, the National Theatre (NT) presents a wide-ranging programme. In 2018 a new permanent structure for corporate and other events was added to the roof space known as The Deck. A flexible audio system based on the Yamaha MRX7-D matrix processor has been installed, thanks partly to the unit’s success in providing show relay throughout the NT’s three theatres and other spaces. Previously occupied by a pavilion-like tented structure, The Deck’s views across the River Thames to the City of London make it a popular rental space for corporate gatherings, product launches, parties and weddings. Last year, the NT redeveloped the space by installing a bespoke permanent structure with state of the art sound and lighting. The audio solution is based on the Yamaha MRX7-D, with control via an iPad running a custom-designed ProVisio
France - Arena Pays d'Aix is a modern, multi-purpose venue which can house audiences of up to 8500. Designed to host a wide range of events, a Yamaha and Nexo audio system delivers quality, flexible audio throughout the arena complex. Located close to the southern French city of Aix-en-Provence, the outside of Arena Pays d'Aix presents a futuristic vision, its clean, sweeping lines contrasting with the surrounding countryside of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. It has quickly become a popular destination for sport and entertainment from throughout the region, including nearby Marseille, France’s third largest city. Designed by architect Christophe Gulizzi, the vision of the future continues inside, where a modular format allows the 4000m2 interior space to offer 17 different configurations, depending on the type of event being hosted. The main space (Grande Salle,
UK - Late 2018 saw the return of electronic pioneer Gary Numan on his epic orchestral tour, featuring six UK shows – including one at the Royal Albert Hall (see LSi January) – accompanied by the 16-piece Skaparis Orchestra and an Allen & Heath dLive system handling monitor world. dLive’s ability to allow simultaneous connections of multiple control devices, from full console surfaces to PCs, iPads and IP controllers, proved indispensable in facilitating both monitor mixing duties and communications between the engineers and performers. “We chose the Allen & Heath dLive S7000 as our monitor console because it’s great at allowing multiple operators. It’s not just the core of the monitor system,
USA - BayPort Credit Union’s 25 Nights of Northern Lights is an annual holiday event held from 1 to 25 December in the City Centre at Oyster Point in Newport News, Virginia. Situated by the lakeside with its 400ft fountain, a 50ft tall pixel-mapped Christmas tree forms the focal point of the festival which includes seasonal events, vendors and street performers as well as a light show that is tied to the tree and includes elements surrounding the fountain. The sound system for the 2018 festival was designed and supplied by Washington Professional, a full service AV systems integration specialist. Designed by Austin Wydrzynski of Washington Professional, with installation by RWS Entertainment, the loudspeaker system was installed inside the Christmas tree to provide sound reinforcement for the synchronized light show. The system designed by Wydrzynski employed Communi
France - Every year around 4m visitors come to the Fête des Lumières in Lyon and every year this festival surpasses itself. It began in December, 1852 as a spontaneous, religious gesture: During the procession of Mary, the inhabitants of Lyons put candles on the window. In the meantime, Fête des Lumières has become France's largest art festival, attracting millions of visitors every year and offering 40 light installations spread all over the city. For four days, international light artists illuminate highly complex light projections on the historic buildings of Lyon. For four nights, the courtyard of the Hôtel de Ville becomes is made accessible to the public. People can cross the building from the Place de la Comedie to the Place des Terreaux. Walking becomes a contemplative experience of pure light, the laser sources are multiplied and compose a spectacular sce
UK - At the recent double premiere of the 2018 post-apocalyptic adventure films Mortal Engines and Aquaman in London’s Leicester Square, the red carpet was suitably soaked in a fittingly post-apocalyptic two-day torrential rainstorm. Fortunately, for movie fans who had turned up in droves to take selfies with stars like Hugo Weaving, Hera Hilmar and Robert Sheehan, the atmosphere on both nights was not dampened in the slightest, thanks in part to a large multimedia installation showing film snippets, custom created content and live action. IPS created the crowd-pleasing video screens with 106 PVP X6IP LED panels from Chauvet Professional. “The most complicated aspect of this particular project was that there were two different premieres on consecutive days,” explains Ian Brown, project coordinator at IPS. “Understandably, the designer and IPS
UK - Over the last three years, Anne-Marie's musical evolution has been nothing short of seismic: she has gone from playing to 300 people in a club, to 360,000 people over four days at Wembley Stadium alongside Ed Sheeran. Now, she is touring her debut album, Speak Your Mind, and both FOH and monitor engineers are working on DiGiCo SD12s, with the consoles supplied by Audiotech UK, which splits audio rental duties with Production North. Production values at an Anne-Marie show are clearly a far cry now to what they were just a couple of years ago. According to FOH engineer, Ben Dexter, it is down to hard work, raw talent, and determination. “I have been working with Anne-Marie since her first show back in 2015 in a 300-cap room; when you look at what she achieved this summer [with Ed Sheeran] at Wembley Stadium, you can see that production elements have been
UK - Johnny Marr, one of the UK's most prolific songwriters, producers, and collaborators has been on the road again, this time with his fourth solo studio album, Call the Comet. The former founding lead guitarist of The Smiths has forged a shining solo career since his debut album in 2013, bringing his latest UK journey to a stellar conclusion with a sold-out date at EartH (Evolutionary Arts Hackney), London, which boasts the first permanent installation of L-Acoustics' L-ISA Immersive Hyperreal Sound technology in a European live music venue. For Marr's FOH engineer, Russ Miller, this was his first date with L-ISA, and his post-show report was glowing: "I was blown away by it," he says. "The separation is unbelievable, without it feeling like it’s separate sources. At sound check our backline techs were amazed: we had people just walking around the venue listenin
Hong Kong - Clockenflap Music and Arts Festival, which takes place annually on Hong Kong’s Central Harbourfront Event Space, once again proved a major success. This year’s headliners included such names as David Byrne, Erykah Badu, Jarvis Cocker, Interpol, The Vaccines, Khalid and Wolf Alice, which delighted the crowds of more than 60,000. GLP’s X4 Bars were pressed into action by event management and production company, A-Team Plus (HK) Ltd, who had made their first investment in the German manufacturer’s LED fixtures. They had added eight impression X4 Bar 10 battens and 16 of the longer X4 Bar 20 - all of which were specified and deployed at Clockenflap. A-Team Plus has been the main stage supplier for a number of years. Although the stage structure this year was shipped in 15 containers from Megaforce in Germany all AV for the main stage was provided by A-T
UK - White Light is welcoming in 2019 by supplying a range of theatre shows in London’s West End as well as touring productions across the country. Over the course of 2018, WL supplied the lighting for a variety of hit shows including the critically-acclaimed Company, The Inheritance, Young Frankenstein, The Jungle, The Pinter Season, The King and I, True West and the Oscar Wilde season. The company also continued to supply long-running hits including Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Matilda, Aladdin, Tina The Musical, 42nd Street and Les Misérables. WL’s MD Bryan Raven comments: “We had a fantastic 2018 which was one of our busiest yet. As we progress into 2019, we have hit the ground running and are looking to repeat the success of last year. Our expert Customer Service teams continue to work with designers, both established and emergi
Lithuania - The Lithuanian agency Baltas Daznis put their trust in Goboservice to create a highly evocative scenario in collaboration with the Creative Dock agency. The municipal administration of Vilnius last year announced a competition reserved for innovative projects which aimed to embellish public zones of the city. 30 proposals were submitted, from which the Commission selected the top four. One of these is the Vilnius Illuminated Legend Park, based on an idea by Simonas Eismontas. At the Pasaku Park (the fairytale park), Divum projectors were used to revive 10 legendary figures in the national history of the Baltic country. The architectural projections were used to give new life to an urban-suburban area that risked degradation in a territorial marketing operation with a strong cultural value. This was a difficult test for the new architectural projectors
Columbia - Arbol Naranja (Orange Tree) is an event organiser and creative agency that more recently also became an equipment rental company called Circuito Naranja, initially to service their own shows and clients, then expanding into a proactive new division of the business. They are young, ambitious and passionate about their work which is primarily music orientated, and the new rental element has also become a bit of a disruptor on the lively Bogota event production scene. The rental side of the business is managed by Luis Burgos, also one of the owners and founders of Arbol Naranja, which kicked off in 2006. Their two main areas of business are complete event organization and equipment rental, and there are currently 70 full time staff working across two nearby sites in the Chapinero area of Bogota, servicing around 200 events a year of different sizes and complexi
Germany - The Brandenburg Gate has seen New Year’s Eve come and go over 225 times, but the historic structure has never shined quite like it did this 31 December. An estimated one million NYE revellers gathered along a two-kilometer route that culminated at the landmark for New Year's Eve in Berlin. There, in the shadow of the famous gate, international stars like DJ Bobo, Alice Merton, Bonnie Tyler and the Village People appeared on the Genesis Stage. Providing visual support for their performances was a dazzling lightshow that featured Chauvet Professional ÉPIX Strip IP fixtures deployed by TCL Event AG. Designed by Denny Arndt of 666 Veranstaltungstechnik and Helge Rabethge of TCL Event AG, the lightshow used 160 of the 1-meter ÉPIX LED strips. With over 50 different acts from a wide variety of genres taking to the stage, the designers’ main challenge was to underli
UK - Stage Electrics has announced it has won a £2m contract for the supply and installation of specialist production lighting and audio-visual infrastructure for Riverside Studios, Hammersmith. The broadcast, arts and entertainment venue closed in 2014 for demolition and redevelopment and is scheduled to fully reopen its doors again in 2019. The new 90,000 sq. ft. Riverside Studios will comprise three studios, small, medium and large, as well as public and community spaces including a two-screen cinema, rehearsal space and a number of restaurants and bars. The design of the medium studio is particularly flexible allowing for the easy alternation between theatre, music, events and television. During the consultancy phase of the project, Stage Electrics advised on the supporting infrastructure to allow it to function as a multipurpose space. The smaller studio is int
USA - Named after local businessman and philanthropist Jerry Scheidegger, the J. Scheidegger Centre for the Arts on the campus of St. Charles, Missouri’s Lindenwood University, is a $32m educational and performing arts complex. The 138,000sq.ft facility’s main theatre, the 1,200-seat Lindenwood Theatre, can be a challenging acoustical space, with its high interior and ceiling weight load restrictions. The school’s ambitious theatre programme also adds its own specialised requirements. An L-Acoustics Kara sound system recently installed there by St Louis-based Logic Systems addresses both the acoustic and artistic requirements with ease. According to Logic Systems president Chip Self, the Kara system was both the venue’s choice as well as his recommendation. “We have a long-time relationship with the school as their rental systems vendor, so we’ve been able
UK - Lighting and visuals rental specialist HSL supplied lighting equipment to 32 Qdos pantomime productions across the UK for their 2018-19 season, together with a full rigging – truss and motors package – plus Kinesys automation for Cinderella at Glasgow’s SEC. Lighting the colourful fantasy environments that characterise this genre of comedic melodrama is huge fun for lighting designers, and this year HSL worked with 17 LDs and liaised with 25 production LX’s who made it happen on the various sites which included Belfast, Cardiff, Edinburgh and London. HSL’s 2018 panto team was led by Jordan Hanson, assisted by Emma Turner, and included account handlers Sean McGlone and Mark Shakeshaft, all well-known for their multi-tasking and number-crunching abilities. Jordan comments: “Fluid communication, having a cool head for logistics and being orga
