USA - The Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences (CRAS) recently hosted an in-house event with recording engineer, mixer, and record produce Bob Clearmountain and Apogee founder and CEO Betty Bennett with CRAS’ AES student section at the school’s Gilbert, Ariz. campus. The Apogee CRAS Takeover included Apogee product demos and interactive mix sessions, alongside more intimate student discussions. Clearmountain and Roger Robindoré hosted Dolby Atmos demos in CRAS Studio D. Apogee Product Specialist George Williams showcased Apogee products and answering student questions. “It was gratifying to interact with the inspiring, dedicated and professional students I met during our recent visit to CRAS,” said Clearmountain. “I was impressed by the facilities, especially those offered as part of the broadcast audio curriculum. After my visit, I have high hopes
Germany - VDC Trading is providing Van Damme cables to the motorsports industry where they are used in real time professional driving solutions. These simulation tools accelerate product development and innovation across the motorsports and automotive industries by enabling designers and engineers to experience the full ‘experience’ and performance of the vehicle they are developing without having to build a prototype. Simulators are vital to the motorsport and automotive industries, as they not only reduce time-to-market for new vehicles but they also ensure they are totally safe when finally on the road. Recently, Van Damme’s German distributor, Audiosteps Commerce, supplied Van Damme Black Series 18x2.5mm Speaker POWER multicore cables to a business in Europe for several simulator projects. Andre Masterati Freitag at Audiosteps commented: “Audiosteps r
The Netherlands - In October, MHB of the Netherlands provided sport lighting for Indoor Friesland, one of Europe’s top equestrian competitions. MHB delivered, using their recently expanded inventory of Elation KL Panel LED softlights. Indoor Friesland returned after a 15-year absence as top national and international riders competed in dressage and horse jumping at the WTC Expo in Leeuwarden. MHB collaborated with the event for the first time as technical AV partner, providing sport and show lighting as well as LED screens and other technical essentials. MHB has plenty of experience designing and suppling AV solutions for sporting events, having worked with clients such as Triple Double sports marketing and EMG media group. The company added to their inventory of KL Panels in September with 100 additional units and immediately deployed the full-spectrum LED s
USA - Monster metal band Lorna Shore’s 18 December To The Hell Fire Christmas Show at the Wellmont Theatre, Montclair, NJ, featured songs from group’s albums, including the hit And I Return To Nothingness. Powering his way through the explosive set on his ChamSys MagicQ MQ70, lighting designer Nate Haber kept pace with his client’s music, serving up a variety of potent looks, all while preserving an instantly recognisable Christmas flavour complete with brightly lit 12ft high holiday evergreens on either side of the stage. Helping him accomplish this feat was a Squeek Lights supplied rig that featured Maverick Force S Spot, Rogue Outcast 1 BeamWash, and Nexus 4x1 fixtures from Chauvet Professional. “Lorna Shore wanted to set the mood of a Christmas show, but with death metal music,” said Haber. ‘Given that directive, I wanted to accentua
USA – The new Chaparral High School in the central Texas city of Killeen opened its doors in August 2022 with a modern performing arts wing designed to elevate student learning. It is equipped with an array of luminaires from Vari-Lite, including a Neo and Vision.Net control system, VL800, Acclaim LED and Coda LED fixtures, and Aurora LED Strips. The arts centre within the $147m school boasts a 1,200-seater auditorium, band, choir, and orchestra rooms, a black box theatre, set design workshops and teaching spaces, built by American Constructors and designed by James Fauver at PBK Architects. “Our mission was to provide an integrated, fully networked, professional standard stage lighting system that would be intuitive to learn, access and use for both students and staff,” says Erich Friend, principal consultant at theatre consultancy, Teqniqal Systems. “Our desi
USA - Jennifer Lucas has a first-hand appreciation of the power of Christmas traditions as the director, programmer, and lighting design of the Taylor Family Christmas tour. The annual series of concerts was started in 1994 by B.E. Taylor a founding member of the popular ‘80s progressive rock band Crack The Sky, as the B.E. Taylor Christmas Show. Taylor, who became a Christian music star in the 90s, brought a warm and engaging style to Christmas classics, ensuring that the show became a beloved holiday tradition for fans throughout Pennsylvania and the eastern Great Lakes. At the time Lucas joined the tour in 2005, it included 14 dates in four states. As the tour continued to grow in popularity, Taylor sadly was stricken with brain cancer. After he passed away in 2016, the Christmas show stopped touring. His family tried to revive the tour, but then COV
USA - Slightly off the beaten path, Bethlehem United Methodist Church in Bethlehem, Georgia, has thrived in the same location since 1848 due to its dedicated members. Each successive generation has looked to the future, acting as servants to determine how best to minister to the community. The old audio system consisted of two 12” two-way loudspeakers flown sideways in a vertical array with two small side fill loudspeakers to cover the front left and right seating areas. When on-axis with any one of the four loudspeakers, the intelligibility was acceptable. However, intelligibility dropped off significantly in the remainder of the sanctuary. Small incremental improvements could be made by removing even more low-mid energy from the existing system. However, the real solution proved to be a highly targeted audio solution featuring Renkus-Heinz loudspeakers. Church staf
Cambodia – To transform the Bar Menaka into a modern entertainment venue, Nano Tech Co installed a range of Harman Professional audio solutions. Located at Phnom Penh, Bar Menaka is a popular venue for upscale parties, fashion shows, dinners and corporate events. Elaborately decorated with lush jungle terraces, Khmer sculptures and a long Angkor-style hallway, the venue exudes an alternative ambience while offering Cambodian hospitality. To deliver captivating live music experiences for guests, Bar Menaka’s management wanted to repurpose the venue’s cafe into a premier bar and entertainment space featuring a world-class audio system. With live bands and DJs performing on a regular basis, it was imperative that the new system had tour-grade power and versatility. To meet these requests, NanoTech Co partnered with Harman Professional and installed a diverse range
USA - Self-described as “mission-minded”, Madison, Mississippi’s Broadmoor Baptist Church began meeting over 65 years ago following the rapid expansion of the city of Jackson after WWII. Over the decades, membership has grown to nearly 6,000 people, with over 1,500 attendees regularly attending services at the multi-structure campus located on 35 acres. Music has always been an integral part of the church’s worship experience, and that has expanded with the church itself. Today, there are between four and eight vocalists and as many as ten musicians onstage for weekly Sunday services. With that many musical participants, the stage at Broadmoor Baptist Church can be a busy place. That’s what led media and communications Pastor Michael Bowen and his staff to look into a more sophisticated and personalizable in-ear monitoring system. The choice, which he said wa
USA - To support his fourth and newest studio album, Twelve Carat Toothache, Post Malone hit the road last fall for a 38-date North American arena tour with special guest Roddy Ricch. With PRG recently re-joining the singer/rapper as his touring sound reinforcement provider, one thing that remained unchanged on the Twelve Carat Tour was the artist’s reliance on L-Acoustics K Series loudspeakers, which had also been deployed on his last major run, 2019/20’s Runaway Tour. Manning the FOH mix each night was Burton Ishmael, known for his previous work with Lil Baby, Nas, Big Sean, Miguel, H.E.R, and others. Supporting him at FOH was systems engineer Ben Bruns, who toured with both Jack Johnson and Harry Styles between the Twelve Carat and Runaway Tours. According to Bruns, the sound system approach for Malone’s latest tour was somewhat unconventional, which wa
Canada - On completing a string of European performances in July, pop star Faouzia began preparations for a fall North American tour that saw the Moroccan-Canadian singer playing dates across the U.S. and Canada. Jon Stanners of entertainment production company Red Rover Entertainment of Winnipeg designed lighting for the outing and specified an Elation rig of Fuze SFX moving heads, SixBar 500 linear bars, and SixPar 200 6-color PAR lights. Both Faouzia and Stanners have roots in Winnipeg’s French community and the designer says he has been familiar with the singer since she was a young artist. “The French community of Winnipeg always had high hopes for her and now she’s really realizing her potential,” he stated. “We’re from the same city and have been doing the same calibreof shows over many years so I’ve known her a long time.” Stanners even lit one of her
Belgium - Two Halloween-themed haunted houses set up by Production Pirates drew massive crowds using light and audio products from Showtec and DAP. For the two weeks around Halloween, Bellewaerde Park in Ieper, Belgium, turned into a Halloween immersion experience, with the two main attractions being the Funerarium and Mexican Massacre. Bellewaerde Park is both a fully-fledged animal park as well as a complete theme park with many impressive coasters and rides. For Halloween 2022, Bellewaerde offered their visitors something special. They asked Production Pirates from Herentals, Belgium, to create an immersive Halloween experience by designing two haunted houses and preparing the park for opening its doors this late in the season. Production Pirates turned to Showtec and DAP and found the light and sound equipment they needed. To dress up the haunted houses, they used
USA - Located in Salem, Oregon, Alpha Sound is rapidly establishing a reputation for excellence across the US for its work in designing and installing sound systems in houses of worship. Following a recent project at St Mary’s Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Portland, lead engineer Devin Sheets and the Alpha Sound team have added further to their credentials with another successful installation at the prestigious Mount Angel Abbey monastery of Benedictine monks, established 140 years ago in St. Benedict, Oregon. “The brief at Mount Angel Abbey was to amplify the spoken word throughout the abbey with the exact same sonic character and timbre as that of the unamplified choir, while also providing pristine audio capture for the live streaming of choral music,” reports Devin. “And, of course, the system had to be as unobtrusive as possible in such a historic bu
USA - As Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas steamed out of port 7 December for the Welcome To Jamrock Reggae Cruise, Nesta Garrick, Abbas Ritscher and the entire team at The Design Oasis were grateful that they would be able to do something, they’d never done before: leave all their fixtures unbagged overnight! “This was the first time we didn’t have to worry about putting bags over our fixtures at the end of a long day,” said Ritscher, who oversaw the installation of the lighting rig on the ship. “That’s a tremendous time saver.” Ritscher and his team were able to avoid the hassle of wrapping fixtures in plastic bags, because for the first time, since the cruise began in 2012, the entire rig was made up of IP65 rated units, most prominently the Color STRKE M, Maverick STORM2 BeamWash, and Rogue Outcast 1L Beam from Chauvet Professional. “Wel
UK - Sarah Faith Griffiths or, rather, Griff, has only been in the music business for a few years, but her candid and emotional lyrics, woven into uplifting melodies of songs like Black Hole, Good Stuff, and Head on Fire, won her the BRITs 2021 Rising Star Award. This year, the breakout star switched to Sennheiser’s Digital 6000 wireless microphone system, which has given her extra freedom on stage thanks to its eRF robustness. With over 300m total streams and more than four million monthly listeners, Griff has amassed a large and zealous fanbase. Her 2022 debut headliner tour across the US, Europe and UK saw her play to thousands of enthusiastic fans, and she supported some of the world’s best-selling artists, including Ed Sheeran and Florence + the Machine. Tim Boardman has acts like Solange, Tyler the Creator, AJ Tracey, Giggs, Ty Dolla $ign, Tori Kelly, Kodalin
Italy - Danilo La Rosa is an Italian lighting designer with a successful career spanning more than three decades. He has worked on live events and theatre productions all over the world. A long-time Hog platform fan, Hog 4 was the obvious choice for La Rosa when he was tasked with lighting runway shows at the recent Milan Fashion Week. For Milan Fashion Week, La Rosa was eager to put the latest Hog 4-18 hardware and 3.17 software to the test after being consistently impressed by Hog consoles in the past. "I’ve been using the Hog platform for many years, so I know the tools it’s equipped with,” he says. “The colour-mixing and the speed of use make it a top performer for fashion events where quick set-up and the technical realization really make the difference." The goal was to illuminate and colour the clothes, giving them character, while at the same time resp
Qatar - Sixty thousand fans gathered from around the world and millions of viewers tuned into the FIFA Opening Ceremony live from the Al Bayut Stadium in Qatar. Oscar-winning actor Morgan Freeman was the narrator of the opening ceremony and Jungkook of K-pop boy band BTS performed Dreamers, a new tournament song as well as more than 300 dance performers ignited the stadium and filled the air with excitement just before the first FIFA match. Creative Technology Middle East delivered the spectacular projection mapping covering the pitch for the impressive opening ceremony along with flown tracking LED screens and rolling stage LED screens for the biggest football opening ceremony of the year. The show was a technically complex production with lots of signals and different displays under the high-pressure environment that comes with global televised shows.
UK - Nearly a decade on from clinching Best British Newcomer at the 2014 Kerrang! Magazine awards, Southampton metalcore outfit Bury Tomorrow have just completed an extensive UK and European tour in support of their well-received Cannibal album. Throughout the tour the band’s front of house engineer Dave Billings and monitor engineer Chris Cole relied on an array of Audio-Technica microphones, wireless and Allen & Heath dLive and SQ digital mixing systems. At the heart of the band’s set-up is Audio-Technica’s latest 3000 Series digital wireless, used across guitars, vocals and for in-ear monitoring duties, while drums are delivered via Artist Elite AE3000 cardioid condensers (for overheads), compact AE2300 cardioid dynamics (for snare top and bottom), ATM250 hypercardioid dynamic (kick drum) and ATM230 hypercardioid dynamic mics for toms. “I
UK - Scottish singer songwriter Gerry Cinnamon concluded his summer tour with two sell-out concerts at his home stadium, Hampden Park, in Glasgow, breaking records as he did so. Cinnamon was the first Scottish artist, and the first independent act to sell out the 50,000-capacity stadium - twice! His long-term production and lighting designer, Pete Hutchison of Illumination Creative Design, knows all about Cinnamon’s determination to entertain every member of his audience and give each and every one of them an unforgettable experience, whichever part of the stadium they are seated in. ‘This Is The Beginning Of The Rest Of Your Life’ is a maxim which forms a big theme for Cinnamon and outlines his intention to bring the party to his fans. His set and lighting are designed to deliver big moments, which include lots of pyrotechnics, video and lighting effects, and ar
France – To celebrate the inauguration of the Christmas lights of the Village Outlet of Villefontaine, the whole troupe of the Folie Douce Val d'Isère was there. In this open-air emporium in this ski resort that showcases chic designer fashion, these artists presented live electronic music backed by a dazzling light show. Produced by Romain Plantier and the team at L&Db, the lighting design is anchored by a collection of Chauvet Professional fixtures. “The Folice Douce Val d’Isère troupe give us their general lighting scheme,” said Plantier. “We are then pretty free to choose the fixtures and colors we want.” What Romain Plantier and the team wanted this year was a collection of Chauvet Professional Maverick MK2 Wash and WELL Fit fixtures, taken from L&Db own inventory. Arranged six units across upstage horizontal truss and four units on ver
Finland - Helsinki’s Linnanmäki is the oldest and most popular amusement park in Finland. It is owned and operated by the non-profit making Children’s Day Foundation to raise funds for Finnish child welfare work. With Finland’s 24 hours of sunlight in the summer and 24 hours of darkness in the winter, Linnanmäki has, for the past 20 years, marked the final days of its open season with a Carnival of Light (Valokarnevaali), when visitors are entertained on site by samba groups and visual artists in illuminated costumes. Having designed the pyrotechnic and light show for last year’s event, Helsinki-based Visual Monkeys was invited back to light the entire amusement park in 2022. Lighting designer, Rölli Ridanpaa, who likes nothing better than to light the unconventional, was the ideal man to transform the amusement park into an illuminated wonderland guaranteed
Europe - Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Cats has embarked on a large-scale international tour throughout Europe, direct from its sell-out seasons at the London Palladium. Rather than touring traditional theatre venues, the tour takes in significantly larger arenas which typically pose challenges for sound designers wanting to replicate the sonic intricacies and detail expected from such a high-profile production. With audio production supplied by Autograph Sound, sound designer Greg Pink turned to KV2 Audio loudspeakers to fulfil the task in hand. “Having been designing musicals for over 30 years, I have used PAs from many different manufacturers, but it is without doubt that KV2 Audio’s range of loudspeakers are second to none,” states Pink. “Whether you are using them in a small theatre or a large arena they handle the job perfectly. We are currently
USA - A Christmas Carol recently arrived at Broadway’s Nederlander Theatre and sound designer Joshua D. Reid called upon Masque Sound to provide a custom audio equipment package for the holiday classic featuring Tony Award winner Jefferson Mays. In this production, the timeless tale of Ebenezer Scrooge comes to new life as Jefferson Mays plays over 50 roles, directed by Michael Arden. Masque Sound provided a custom audio set up for the film version of the play back in 2020, so for Reid it was just natural to bring Masque along to Broadway. “When we filmed at the United Palace, Masque Sound was wonderful to work with, so we wanted to make sure we approached them first when we moved to the stage,” says Reid. “As we started planning for the stage version of the production, we knew we were going to need a lot more in terms of equipment and we had full confid
UAE - Created for the largest event ever staged in the Arab world, Expo 2020 Dubai, and part of its legacy District2020 project, DP World Pavilion is a construction comprising five floors of content-led immersive brand experience, with a VIP floor for invited guests and government officials. Creative Technology Systems Integrations (CT SI) Middle East team was awarded the contract for DP World Pavilion, with its team working alongside The OpenLab creative agency, responsible for designing the Pavilion, to supply systems integration of the audio, video, lighting, and control systems for this impressive complex. Based around the concept of ‘Making Trade Flow’, DP World Pavilion’s content gives an insight into the world of global trade. Split over five floors, the lower four floors are dedicated to the public visitor experience, while the fifth floor is used for the
