Saudi Arabia - The Jeddah World Festival Closing Ceremony was the first of its kind and saw acts such as Janet Jackson, Liam Payne, Future, Tyga, 50 Cent, Chris Brown and Steve Aoki perform. The ceremony marked the end of the 41-day festival, which comprised of a series of events to include performances from national and international artists. The ceremony took place on 18 July in the vicinity of King Abdullah Sports Stadium, which gave festivalgoers a view of the stadium as a backdrop to the main stage. The event was not only the largest music festival to have been held in Saudi Arabia, but it also marked ‘a milestone in KSA’s 2030 vision to expand the entertainment sector in the country’. Creative Technology (CT) worked alongside client The Manual, technical director, John Adkins (World Class Events) and production designer, Mark Cunniffe to deliver al
South Africa - Rental company MGG - the largest Claypaky stockist in South Africa - has purchased six Scenius Unicos from DWR Distribution. “We initially received the Scenius Unicos as demo units and it was love at first light,” explains Denzil Smith from MGG. “In the end, they were never given back. The punch, brightness, versatility and fantastic gobo selection make it the first choice for events (budget dependent), and my personal favourite fixture.” The Scenius Unico is able to perform in spot, beam or wash mode, and offers an assortment of solid colours. MGG’s lighting HOD, Jacques Pretorius, has test-driven the new workhorses and used them for front light and back light. What stands out for him is the full framing shutter, effective for applications like highlighting banners on stage as well as the renown Claypkay optical design. “Claypaky is re
UK - Britannia Row Productions continued a busy summer of festivals and tours with a packed roster at Glastonbury 2019. The audio rental company supplied PA and control to the British festival’s Arcadia stage - this year named Pangea - and teamed up with US partner Clair Global to supply bespoke control and monitor packages for a host of major acts, including headliners The Cure. Arcadia, through its Spider and Metamorphosis spectaculars, has earned a reputation for wildly creative, multi-sensory experiences. This year, Pangea - a towering crane structure loaded with dazzling projections, a plethora of pyrotechnics and vivid lighting designs - created a ‘blank canvas in the sky’. The Arcadia team has worked with L-Acoustics for a number of years, and following a recommendation from the loudspeaker manufacturer, Britannia Row was appointed as the 2019 audio
UK - The Broadway hit Come From Away landed in London’s Phoenix Theatre this February. The heart-warming production focuses on the kindness and fortitude of the residents of Gander, Newfoundland; a small Canadian town that welcomed 38 planes full of passengers in the wake of the Federal Aviation Administration closing American airspace on 9/11. The production also marked the first d&b Soundscape show in London’s West End. An auspicious debut, the sound design provided by Gareth Owen, along with associate sound designer Russell Godwin and production sound engineer Andy Green won Best Sound Design at the 2019 Olivier Awards. Using d&b Soundscape, Owen was able to overcome one of the major challenges of a show that features a 12-strong ensemble cast with actors playing multiple characters, often in the same scene: As he explains: “There are so many
UK - A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET), a Patron of the British Racing Drivers' Club (BRDC), supplied the event lighting for the Club's annual British Grand Prix party at Silverstone Circuit to showcase its latest product portfolio. Staged within the grounds of the BRDC Farm as part of the Formula 1 Rolex British Grand Prix weekend, the occasion attracts high-profile members and motorsport personalities. AC-ET has been a Patron of the BRDC’s exclusive Young Driver Programme for over a decade and supplied the lighting design for the event ever since. AC-ET worked closely again with the BRDC to create the event lighting. The company supplied the complete indoor and outdoor lighting systems, which utilised approximately 200 fixtures. The project was designed and overseen by AC-ET production manager, Andy Walne Smith. Featuring heavily in the marquee lighting
Russia - While the founding of the Bolshoi Theatre dates back to 1776, its production team is looking to the future with the newest LED technology from High End Systems. The theatre – a cultural landmark and home to the Bolshoi Ballet, Opera and Orchestra – opened a second venue, the New Stage, in 2002 to host performances while the Historic Stage underwent refurbishment. By 2011, both neighbouring performance venues were offering a full schedule of events in the heart of Moscow. In 2018, it was time to make some changes over at the New Stage. Lighting designer Anatoly Samosadny was seeking an alternative to the older lamp-based fixtures. Preferring to work with a modern, LED-based automated luminaire in his productions, he turned to High End Systems’ Moscow-based distributor SiM, which recommended High End Systems’ SolaFrame Theatre fixture. Eight SolaFr
USA - Wisconsin’s Summerfest runs over 11 days in late June and early July each year. Over 700,000 people flock to Milwaukee’s Lake Michigan shoreline to watch more than 800 top artists and bands perform on a dozen stages, earning Summerfest its double-decade-running Guinness World Record title as The World’s Largest Music Festival. The technical challenges behind providing sound reinforcement for such a massive event are numerous, but locally based Clearwing Productions - Summerfest’s long-time primary production partner - keeps the festival roaring like a well-tuned Harley-Davidson engine. According to Clearwing Audio operations and logistics manager Jeff Schauer, a big part of that success has been the company’s now-five-year standardisation on DiGiCo FOH and monitor mixing consoles for all of Henry W. Maier Festival Park’s stages, including this
Thailand - One of Thailand’s largest financial institutions, the TMB (formerly the Thai Military Bank), has recently undergone an audio transformation of its multi-purpose auditorium, centred on an Allen & Heath dLive mixing system. The seventh floor of TMB’s Bangkok headquarters houses the 500-seat auditorium, used for functions and meetings, interspersed with live performances. Due to the size and shape of the venue, a highly flexible and easy to use audio system was required. TMB enlisted the services of Allen & Heath’s Thai distributor, Sonos Libra (in conjunction with Multiline Professional), to deliver a solution. The installation comprises a dLive C3500 surface, a DM0 MixRack fitted with a Dante card, four DX164-W wall-mounted expanders and an IP1 remote controller. Located in a discrete control room positioned at the back of the auditorium,
Sweden - Summerburst is the biggest EDM festival in Sweden. The inaugural event was held in Stockholm back in 2011, and by the following year had also opened its doors in Gothenburg. Since then it has remained a two-city festival, both with a capacity of around 25,000. Daniel Hellsten has worked closely with Summerburst since its inception, as production manager and designer. At the recent event at Gothenburg’s Ullevi Stadion he introduced GLP’s KNV Cubes for the first time as 25,000 came to see international DJs such as Tiësto, Alesso, Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike, Tigerlily, Salvatore Ganacci and many others. He positioned 24 of the KNV Cubes in the arc roof surrounding the DJ booth following a design conceived by himself and assistant designer, Tobias Borén. Explaining the rationale behind his design, Hellsten said, “They were placed in a central po
Norway - Stavernfestivalen is a summer music festival that takes place in Stavern. It began on the town’s southern shoreline in 2001 as a one night, four band event with an audience of less than 200 and has subsequently grown over the years into a major three-day gathering, featuring an international line-up and attracting more than 30,000 people. The 2019 line-up incorporated a wide range of music styles and featured leading international acts such as Swedish House Mafia, Travis Scott, Bastille and G-Eazy. Oslo-based rental company G Production was engaged by the organisers to supply audio for the festival’s Club Stage as well as the VIP Stage and elected to deploy their new Pioneer Pro Audio XY-3B system, recently acquired from lNorwegian distributor First Audio. John Moss of G Production added the system to his company’s inventory having been impressed
Cyprus - The Corinthian columned façade of Cyprus’ largest theatre, the Municipality Théâtre in Nicosia, reflects the island’s theatrical heritage, but like a good play, the 1,000-seat venue holds surprises. Stepping inside the classical building, visitors will encounter an advanced and very modern theatrical lighting system made up entirely of 150 Chauvet Professional LED fixtures. Nicosia-base V Hypersound & Light, installed the lighting and audio systems in the building, which re-opened on 18 June after being closed for more than a decade. “This was a very big re-modelling project, the biggest one ever relating to theatre in our market,” said the company’s Kypros Shekkeri. “Regarding the theatrical lighting, the theatre management wanted to have an all-LED system in the building. “We won the project by offering a complete solution of compact an
Italy - The harmonising elements of light and water came magically together at Toce Falls by Lake Maggiore in the Alps of northern Italy (Cascata del Toce) during an evocative light and music show designed by Pierre Gèlil. For a special event held 28-29 June, the designer turned to colour-changing Elation Paladin lighting effects to visually paint one of the most spectacular waterfalls in the region. Gèlil, who also works as director of Teatro Maggiore in Verbania, was looking for a suitable product to illuminate the breathtaking but complex location. Seeking a watertight fixture that could put up with mist from the Falls as well as weather extremes, Elation’s Italian partner, Audio Effetti, proposed the Paladin, a versatile multi-functional LED wash light with high luminosity, chromatic performance and IP65 housing. Sealed against water or dust ingress, the Pala
The Netherlands - Dutch popstar, Marco Borsato, recently returned to Rotterdam’s De Kuip stadium for the first time in 15 years to host a five-date concert series featuring an ambitious lighting and video programme. The 50,000-capacity stadium was fitted with a massive 85 x 15m rear wall screen as the backdrop to Borsato’s band and featured an innovative display of lighting and augmented-reality (AR) video images. Commissioned by Musica è and Mojo Concerts, Faber Audiovisuals supplied the LED screens, play-out, camera, and video facilities, with Visual Solutions and Malfmedia developing the AR and 3D video design, and disguise programming. Faber selected more than 1,000 square metres of ROE CB5 LED screens, four kilometres of ROE LED strips, and 21 cameras, with the strips managed by just seven Brompton Technology Tessera M2 LED processors. “4000 strips is argu
France - The Romanian Embassy was installed in the Palais de Béhague in Paris in 1939. Within its walls is a theatre, built in 1898, called the Byzantine Room, because of its largely Byzantine style decoration. This room can accommodate a variety of different events such as conferences, shows, parades, musical performances or theatre. When Luca Luculescu the current ambassador, decided to give a second life to this abandoned theatre, he discussed options with Sébastien Collin, co-founder of DID Technology. The goal was to revive the theatre whilst modernising the facilities and developing a versatile solution that could adapt to any type of event that was organised. For the stage element, eight Prolights Eclipse Fresnel units were selected in variable white along with eight Eclipse HD RGBA / Lime / Royal Blue. The floor lighting concept incorporated eight Proli
UK - A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) has provided Scottish Opera with a new surtitling system, utilising AlphaPIX2 by Prolights LED video panels. Founded in 1962, Scottish Opera is Scotland’s national opera company and largest performing arts organisation. With a diverse annual season of productions embracing opera’s unique blend of music, singing and theatre, it is committed to making the art form available to the widest possible audience. As well as performing its productions in mainstage and other venues across the country, Scottish Opera’s home is the Theatre Royal Glasgow, which last year celebrated its 150th year. Recently the Theatre Royal’s surtitling system was in need of an upgrade after 11 years of service. Alex Reedijk, general director of Scottish Opera approached AC-ET to discuss alternatives. Chris Beardwell, technical sales execut
USA - The team at WorldStage prides themselves in being “technology specialists at heart” and they have the track record to prove it, being among the earliest adapters of a long series of breakthroughs like moving LED fixtures. This summer, the innovative company took another step toward the future, when it added 50 Chauvet Professional Maverick MK3 Profile fixtures to its inventory. “This is a new technology fixture,” said Terry Jackson, vice president, director of lighting at WorldStage. “We have been searching for a large LED fixture to upgrade some of the older 3K range units we own, and this is it. This will definitely replace several fixtures in our inventory, so we can continue to grow and deliver a better experience to our customers. “We have already used these fixtures on the DRL/Formula E Kick-Off Party, and we have them ready for additional high
UK - As the contract for the Hyde Park festival site comes up for renewal, all involved in the production of Barclaycard presents British Summer Time can reflect on seven glorious years at a location that had previously been considered unworkable and unviable. That promoters AEG Live have proven otherwise is due in no small part to the role of their technical contractors, including Capital Sound - whose deployment of the Martin Audio MLA multicellular loudspeaker array technology had proven under test conditions its ability to meet required propagation thresholds, both inside the bowl and beyond the perimeter. Monitored by acoustics consultants Vanguardia, as it has been every year, MLA - optimised using Martin Audio’s proprietary advanced DISPLAY software - was equal to a wide range of performance over the two weekends - extending from Barbra Streisand, Celine Dion
USA - The Who are currently between legs of their 2019 Moving On! Tour, which finds them joined by a local orchestra in each city to present different takes on classics and deep cuts from their extensive catalogue. The Who are carrying a sizeable Adamson E-Series system provided by Cleveland, OH’s Eighth Day Sound. Chris ‘Chopper’ Morrison, who shares FOH duties with The Who’s long-time engineer, Robert Collins, says that while this is the band’s first full outing to carry an Adamson system, the choice was informed by previous experiences with the E-Series on one-off and festival dates. “We’ve done a few festivals in Europe the last few years and took note that, if it was an Adamson E-Series rig, it always sounded great. We never had to fiddle with the EQ or anything too much and Robert was always really happy,” the engineer reports. “I knew it would
Belgium – The highly anticipated Eric Prydz EPIC 6.0 Holosphere debuted at Belgium’s Tomorrowland Festival last weekend, with Eric performing inside a giant video-mapped, 3D transparent LED sphere. The production was the latest in Prydz’s EPIC (Eric Prydz In Concert) series of visual spectaculars, realised by dream team, long term collaborators Liam Tomaszewski (Punkette), Ross Chapple (RCLD), Mark Calvert and Dave Green (RES) and Bryn Williams (Light Initiative) with the eight-metre-high Holosphere forming the centrepiece of the new design. “EPIC 6.0 has been two years in the making, starting with conceptual sketches, through to putting together exactly the right team with the skills, know-how and passion to get the project off the ground, and now successfully delivering the show at Tomorrowland,” says Calvert, who has been working with Eric Prydz on the EPI
UK - Lighting and video rental specialist Colour Sound Experiment supplied stage and architectural lighting and LED screen to the 2019 Hampton Court Palace Festival, staged in the Tudor Courtyard of Hampton Court Palace in Richmond, Surrey. A star-studded line-up for the 2019 season included Kylie Minogue, Nile Rodgers & Chic, Tears for Fears, The Jacksons, Jools Holland and many more. The event was enjoyed by thousands who flocked to this unique venue to enjoy summer evenings picketing in the gardens and grounds before taking their seats for the evening concerts which ran over a three-week period in June. Ensuring that everything ran like clockwork onstage was Jonny Gaskell, production manager and production lighting designer, who has worked for the festival for the last seven years. Jonny provides a production design for the stage and lights selected archi
USA - Like a scene from Star Wars or Blade Runner set in the middle of Brooklyn, Jupiter Disco is a refuge for intergalactic bounty hunters, replicants, and thirsty, trend-setting New Yorkers. Celebrated mixologists Maks Pazuniak and Al Sotack opened Jupiter Disco with inspiration drawn from their mutual love of dystopian science fiction. Danny Taylor, from House Under Magic, designed the sound system for Jupiter Disco, relying on his long history with Danley Sound Labs’ technologies to give the bar impactful, detailed sound with a “grills-off” aesthetic that fits the theme. “This is Maks and Al’s passion project in a scene filled with taste-makers who are very enthusiastic, but also very critical,” explained Taylor. “Sure, they had to put money into it to pull it off, but the real key to Jupiter Disco’s success is their genuine passion. T
Switzerland - Each August for the past 73 years, the Romanesque Piazza Grande is transformed into the world’s largest open air movie theatre. Flanked by detailed buildings, the piazza provides an enchanting setting for screenings at the Locarno International Film Festival, an event that draws the likes of Harrison Ford, Ethan Hawke and other Hollywood A-listers to this ancient town on the Italian-Swiss border. Earlier in the summer, this venerable site, which traces its origins back to Roman times, undergoes another transformation, as it is turned into an urban nightclub for the Connection Festival. For two days in June, the sounds or rap, pop, and electronic music resonate off the pastel walls of its buildings, accompanied by intensely bright light from over 40 Chauvet Professional Maverick fixtures, supplied and set up by Fumasoli Audio & Lights Rental. Enrico
Poland - The mercury hit record highs in Warsaw, while theatre-goers visiting the Stanisław Witkiewicz Studio Theatre were treated to a performance of Cameron Mackintosh’s Les Misérables staged by the Śródmiejski Teatr Muzyczny. The company - made up from school pupils aspiring to be acting / performance professionals - produces an annual musical which was lit by LD Michal Piskorski who has also lit the previous two such productions, 2017’s Footloose and the Monty Python’s Spamalot. He worked closely with programmer Krzysztof Gantner from the show’s technical sponsor, Prolight, on the spectacle which was directed by Antoniusz Dietzius who also designed the set. Six Robe T1 Profile moving lights were utilised, provided by Warsaw-based lighting and technical sales specialist Prolight. Also, part of this ‘specials’ package were five R
Malaysia - Malaysiato’s new Fo Guang Shan Hsing Ma Buddhist Temple recently opened in its southernmost city of Johor Bahru. At its core is a soaring Main Shrine Hall, capable of accommodating more than 1,000 people. The Fo Guang Shan Chinese International Buddhist monastic order is well-known for its use of world-class technology in its temples across the world, including New Zealand, Canada and the UK, and the new Johor Bahru branch is no exception. Its size, shape and materials presented acoustic challenges, leading the technology team to a permanently installed d&b audiotechnik loudspeaker and amplification solution. Kuala Lumpur-based Chan Lee Sound and Light was first on the scene to identify a system that would fit the bill. Having served as Fo Guang Shan’s rental contractor for a number of years, Chan Lee Sound has used d&b systems on several of the
