UK - While the remaining members of Queen, Brian May and Roger Taylor, were pleasantly surprised to find that 21 years after their last tour Clair Brothers Audio is still the biggest PA rental company in the world, some things had changed. The band's itinerary has them scheduled to play the arenas of Europe, followed by some stadium dates this summer and a tour of the US in the autumn, "but we started rehearsals in Roger's home studio, so space was a bit tight," said monitor man Steve May. He explains: "The band suggested I use a Yamaha PM1D, but at that time the pre-amps in the desk hadn't been upgraded, and besides it's nearly as big as an XL4. The logical choice was the new PM5D."

With a stated preference for the old Midas analogue warhorse, how's he finding the Yamaha? "Overall it's sounding great, the band think so too; it's a busy show with lots of

Slovakia - Slovakian Superstar is the country's first series of the Pop Idol roll-out, and has captured the nation's popular imagination, with up to 1.8 million TV viewers (out of a population of approx. 5.5 million), a highly enthusiastic public, and 3,678 original applicants, whittled down to the 11 most talented finalists.

Superstar is broadcast live each Friday night from the National Tennis Centre arena in Slovakian capital, Bratislava, staged in front of 1,500 highly vocal fans. STV has put 2.6 million Euros into producing the series, making it the country's largest TV project to date, and very much a matter of National pride. The live show tickets are allocated as give-aways for various competitions and about half via the show's main sponsors, including Nestlé.

Naturally, production values are right at the top of the agenda, with STV seeking the best technical and crea

UK - London's St. Paul's Cathedral is in the midst of a substantial audio upgrade which has seen a complete overhaul of its room and signal processing by long-term contractors, RG Jones Sound Engineering Ltd. System designer and project manager Jon Berry favoured BSS Soundweb architecture following discussions with Arup Acoustics' consultant Sam Wise. Arup had been asked to provide an independent assessment of the original system and identified that while RG Jones' bespoke speakers were still serviceable, the front end - including custom mixer, graphics and delay lines - needed a substantial overhaul to satisfy the broadening function of the Cathedral, and the audio requirements of congregation sizes up to 2,600 people.

As one of the cathedral's preferred suppliers, RG Jones was contracted to undertake the work by St. Paul's Dean and Chapter, acting on the advice of Martin Stanc

UK - Surrey-based loudspeaker manufacturer EM Acoustics has named Chris Hinds as sales and marketing director. Known throughout the industry for his work with Turbosound and Beyerdynamic, Hinds' role is primarily looking after international relationships, as well as strengthening the already-developing brand within the UK. Hinds says: "The offer of working with an exciting, emerging brand was too good an opportunity to pass up. Drawing from my own experiences of loudspeaker design, EM Acoustics have some very talented designers, and it is this that initially drew my attention towards them."

(Lee Baldock)

UK - London's Sounds Expo will witness a number of UK product debuts and promotions on the Shure Distribution stand 525. Firstly Shure's E4c sounds isolating earphones will make their UK debut, having already made headlines, as they were one of this year's International CES Innovations 2005 Award honourees. They are the ideal accessory for music lovers who are serious about sound quality and detail, the E4c's are also the lightest in Shure's family of E Series earphones and mirror the iconic design of the iPod.

Furthermore Phonic's Helix Boards will also be unveiled and consist of two models; the Helix Board 12 is a 12 input compact mixer with 4 mic/line input channels, two paired stereo input channels and two stereo AUX returns. While the Helix Board 17 is a 17 input compact mixer with five mic/line input channels, three paired stereo input channels and three stereo AUX returns

UK - Leeds is the second city centre site of the new bar and restaurant concept Babycream. The forces responsible for the world famous Cream and some of Liverpool's chicest nightspots are behind this venture. Cream has a strong tradition in clubbing, festivals (including the hugely popular Creamfields), and records.The latest Babycream is a two floor venue occupying a prime site in the heart of Leeds on the Headrow. Intimate booth seating downstairs combine with a bar and dance floor area providing a 600 capacity, whilst the upstairs restaurant seats another 80. Joint operators, The Lyceum Group (founder of Liverpool's renowned Blue Bar & Grill, Baby Blue and The Pan American Club), are keen to ensure that Babycream Leeds delivers on style and contemporary design, with an emphasis on quality eating, premium drinks and cutting edge music.

Music is a massively important part of th

UK - The Spinal Research Top to Tail Dinner took guests into the world of James Bond and attracted the support of some leading celebrities in raising £80,000 at the Savoy this April.

Lorraine Kelly and Jim Rosenthal hosted 300 guests through a light hearted evening with a serious fund-raising purpose. A fast moving fashion show entertained guests with models including ex bond girls Maryam D'Abo and Caroline Bliss, joined by D'Arcy Bussel, Jilly Johnson and sporting icons David James, Richard Dunwoody, David Ginola and (hotly tipped as the next James Bond) actor Colin Salmon.

Sound engineer Richard Ryan skilfully mixed James Bond tracks to create a dynamic feature of the evening, he commented: "The fashion show was quite complicated due to the number of different tracks behind the catwalk parade. I introduced the stings behind each of the couples whilst keeping the backgr

UK - Hawthorn was appointed as technical production contractors for the 2005 RSVP party at Olympia, supplying lighting, sound, AV, rigging and drapes.

With a low ceiling height and no provision for rigging Hawthorn decided to make a bold feature of the truss and created a ground support structure with lots of long spokes covering both the stage and the rest of the room. As UK dealers, Hawthorn used Prolyte's X30V truss due to its lightweight but superior strength, allowing large spans of truss with the minimum number of truss legs.

With only a 3m clearance, Hawthorn specified Mac 250's and Mac 300's - due to their small size, uplit with Thomas PIXELline battens. Working in conjunction with Mask Event Design and Production, Hawthorn sponsored the Event Talks area. Hawthorn draped the room in its white Expo Cloth, a fabric it imports for its light reflective abilities. These dra

UK - Adlib Audio has completed a stylish sound installation, blending art, science, acoustics and aesthetics at Panacea in John Dalton Street, Manchester.

Panacea is the brainchild of one of the City's smartest young local party people and entrepreneurs, Joe Akka. Superlative acoustics was seen as absolutely crucial to creating Panacea's essential atmosphere. Akka contacted Adlib Audio's Andy Dockerty via recommendations from Kennedy Street Enterprises, and asked him to design an appropriate system - keeping the speakers as invisible as possible.

Dockerty - renowned for his attention to detail and quality and Dave Fletcher, who produced all the cabinet work, designed, specified and built a tailor-made system for Panacea. This involved embedding four speakers into each of Panacea's structural pillars with a minimal extrusion to ensure the preservation and integrity of the inter

Czech Republic - Every year, the Akademie populární hudby (Czech Academy of Popular Music) stages the Andel Awards - the Czech equivalent of the Grammys - which are presented at a glittering ceremony. The event is a major highlight of the musical year in the Czech Republic, staged at Ostrava's CEZ Arena and broadcast live on Czech TV and Czech radio. In 2005, with 14 bands appearing live on stage, the event's promoter called on the extensive experience of Rental Pro for a PA system which featured, for the first time in the Czech Republic, the use of digital mixing consoles.

Apart from the broadcast audience of many millions, the crowd in the Arena numbered around 8,000. For Rental Pro, the choice of the PA system was clear: Nexo Geo T (10 T4805s and three T2815 per side), with Nexo Geo S cabinets (nine S805 and an S830 per side) for the sides of the arena. Powered by Camco Vor

Australia - Established in 1881, The Three Weeds Hotel in Rozelle (or The Rose, Shamrock and Thistle to give it its official name) has undergone an exciting transformation. The hotel was purchased by Todd Salter of Investment and Development Corporation in 2002. He closed the large rear entertainment section while contemplating the re-design. Besides the extensive building re-development, the AV component was also of paramount importance. Salter therefore turned to Sydney-based Avsound Productions to deliver a top quality result. "Once we knew exactly what Todd required we recommended a high quality JBL speaker system incorporating Crown amplification and BSS Soundweb for all DSP," said Justin Lakerink, Avsound's project manager.

Rod McKinnon and Jeff Shoesmith from Jands worked closely with Justin to map functionality throughout the various audio zones of the venue. D

Singapore - In 1996, a group of five Christians gathered for its first bible study meeting. Under the mentorship of another established church in Singapore, this small group and its leaders soon increased in numbers and grew to become Heart of God Church (HOGC), a church registered with the Registry of Societies in Singapore in 1999. Very much a part of the charismatic church movement in Singapore, HOGC recently made a bold decision to move to the city, right into the very heart of the Singapore shopping belt. On 12 December 2004, Heart of God Church held its opening service and opened the doors to its training and facilities centre in the city, focusing on reaching the next generation in an urban environment.

Being in the heart of the city, the HOGC converted a whole floor of a prime commercial building into a beautiful new training and facilities centre for the church, allowin

UK - Marquee Audio has sold thirteen Midas Venice and Verona consoles in the first two months of the year, including a Venice 160 delivered to Jason Wood, rising musical star of one of London's increasingly popular entertainment venues, the Comedy Café.

According to Marquee's Spencer Brooks: "The reliable performance and audio quality of the Midas consoles keeps them in demand with our customers. Recently the volume of sales has been especially high for the compact consoles, first the Venice, and more recently the Verona."

Marquee has supplied Venice desks to Cloud One, Lost It, Blue Audio and AVE. Customers for the Verona model have included Entec, W.E. Audio, Thames Audio and Chaps PA.

(Sarah Rushton-Read)

Italy - Gioia Molinari has been appointed head of marketing and communications for Italian audio manufacturer RCF SpA. Molinari graduated in marketing and languages at UWIC (University Wales Institute Cardiff) has previously worked in the banking sector. Initially she worked for two years in London for Deutsche Bank, before moving to Milan. She then returned to London where she was responsible for all the bank's Equities Marketing activities in Europe.

After six years in the banking sector Molinari decided to go back to Italy to pursue a different career in a more creative environment. She joined the RCF team on 1 March where she will be responsible for looking after all the public relations activities, as well as updating the website. Molinari commented on her appointment: "I'm looking forward to working in the audio industry and the new challenges that it offers. One of m

UK - Following numerous enquiries and subsequent orders from sound hire and touring companies, Smart Sound Direct has launched a special PA package aimed at larger outdoor events such as carnivals, festivals and concerts.

The 'Carnival PA Package' comprises two pairs of Precision Devices-loaded Concert Performance CP115 tops and a pair of CP28SPD subs - offering a total power handling of 7.2kW RMS.

Fitted with a compression driver and super tweeter, the CP115s are rated at 3.2kW RMS, and the CP8SPDs at 4kW RMS. The latter offer added flexibility courtesy of a special input connector plate, allowing for 4 or 8 ohm operation.

Constructed from plywood with a hardwearing carpet finish, the tops and subs benefit from heavy-gauge, zinc-plated grilles for added speaker protection, plus Speakon connectors and bar-type handles for easy handling. Heavy-duty castors and 'skid' mounting

UK - In a blaze of publicity, live music venue Koko in Camden was recently given a whopping technical refit. However, the last pieces in the jigsaw have now been put in place; new Midas consoles for front-of-house and foldback, including the first Siena to be installed in a live music venue.

"It's the comfort factor," says Santi Arribas, the technical manager at Koko. "Live promoters and engineers see the Midas desks and they know they are getting quality, it's very reassuring for them."

Midas dealer Glen Smith from GSA has supplied Koko with a 40-channel Heritage 1000 for front-of-house, and a 32-channel Siena for stage monitoring. Santi Arribas has had full responsibility for choosing and commissioning the new equipment, and says that both he and his clients are much happier now that the Midas boards are in place."Despite all the excitement about the

Hungary - In Budapest, the Palace of Arts opened to international acclaim, featuring four Studer Vista digital consoles in both studio recording and front-of-house mixing applications.

The Palace of Arts is an arts complex that promises to change the landscape of Hungary's cultural life, and its technical specifications are world-class. Opening just in time to celebrate the 2005 Budapest Spring Festival, the Palace of Arts covers a ground area of 10,000sq.m in southern Pest, adjacent to the National Theatre. The centrepiece of the Palace is the National Concert Hall, the largest of its kind in Hungary, seating 1700 with standing room for an additional 200. Distinguished by outstanding acoustics and equipped to welcome international orchestras and virtuosi, its programming will also represent the wider scene of Hungarian culture, particularly its rich folk tradition.

The

UK - The networking architecture of Australian Monitor's DigiPage matrix switching system is proving a winning formula for AV company, Selecter, in its installations for health club group Holmes Place.

Set up two years ago, Trevor Montgomery's company has been upgrading, fitting out and maintaining the Holmes Place audio visual systems for over 12 months. He remembers finding a lot of custom-built equipment within the estate - "expensive to build and maintain, with a lot of relays which were highly space consuming and proving to be unreliable."

After experimenting with another system, his desire for something "more PA-oriented" led him to the 8 x 8 DigiPage zoning system; and it has remained his preferred matrix device ever since. "We first used it at Barbican, which was a difficult site, and required something reliable and robust," he said. "

UK / Worldwide - News from Funktion One, the British manufacturer of professional loudspeaker systems, which has informed PLASA Media of the addition of a number of new companies to its international distributor network: 100% Puro Design, based in Naples, is the distributor for Italy - contact Gino Passarella ; Macrosound Construction, based in Moscow is the distributor for Russia - contact Andrey Kremenchugsky, and Seesound in Barcelona is the distributor for mainland Spain - contact Nacho Alberdi. At the same time, Funktion One has also announced that it will be represented in Vietnam through Fantasie Show Light, based in Hanoi - contact Dinh Viet Hung.

Funktion One also rep

Germany - Italian pro audio manufacturer Outline suffered a substantial theft of equipment during the break-down of its booth at the recent ProLight & Sound show in Frankfurt, on Sunday 14 April. A full list of the equipment stolen, together with the serial numbers where available, has been provided to the Frankfurt police. A copy of the list can be downloaded from Outline's website by clickinghere.

Outline's Giorgio Biffi says: "Obviously we'd like to warn the possible buyers of the risk incurring in buying this items . . . Fortunately very few items can be used, as they've been stolen without some essential parts, such as the Butterfly units, which are devoid of side bars and back side incremental bars, which are absolutely necessary for their normal use."

(Lee Baldock)

UK / Sri Lanka - When the devastating effects of the tsunami struck the countries around the Indian Ocean over the Christmas period, the services offered by the entertainment production industry weren't those that were immediately required as part of the disaster recovery effort. Three months on, however, as the countries work to return to normality, the UK lighting industry has been able to offer assistance to colleagues working in Sri Lanka.

Production manager Alison Ritchie heard about the damage caused to the lighting, sound and staging equipment stock of her friend Thushan Dias of Mahinda Dias Engineers. MDS has supplied lighting sound and staging services in Sri Lanka for more than 50 years, and Ritchie knew Dias having worked with him when Shared Experience toured to Colombo in the 90s. After the tsunami, she contacted him to check that he was OK, and heard that though he

Italy - On 26 February 2005 at the Salone delle Idee in Turin's Arsenale della Pace, a packed house attended the première of the concert Dal Basso della Terra by Ernesto Olivero and Mauro Tabasso, which was dedicated to the late Pope John Paul II. The concert, conducted by Salvatore Accardo - one of the world's greatest living violinists - was transmitted by Italian national state broadcaster RAI's channel 3 on 7 March 2005.

The audio rig for the event was from Outline, installed and fine-tuned by Bologna's Nuovo Service. It consisted of three arrays made up of Butterfly Hi-pack CDH 483 (6+5+6), two Victor Live subwoofers, four H.A.R.D. 212 monitors and four Micra enclosures, used for 'front-fill' purposes. The entire system was powered by Outline Series T power amps.

Nuovo Service's owner Willy Gubellini commented: "With artists of this calibre, it's the precisio

Spain - Based on the success of its powered systems, D.A.S. Audio has expanded its offering with two powered stage monitors. The bi-amped SM-12A 12" two-way and SM-15A 15" two-way systems use the latest in power amplifier technology, offering a Class D 500W amp for the LF section and a 100 W Class A/B amp for the highs, say the company.

The SM-12A utilizes a high efficiency 12" low frequency speaker with a 3" voice coil. The large ferrite magnet structure and pole piece cooling provide high power handling and low power compression. The high frequency section makes use of a neodymium magnet compression driver with 1.5" exit and 3" titanium diaphragm. The compression driver is coupled to a narrow dispersion horn.

The SM-15A's LF section uses a high efficiency 15" speaker with a 3" voice coil. The HF section, as in the case of the SM-12A, u

Germany / UK - High-quality wireless microphone systems do not have to be expensive, say Sennheiser, following the launch of the three freePort systems that Sennheiser electronic GmbH & Co KG launched at ProLight+Sound in Frankfurt recently - 'Vocal', 'Instrument' and 'Presentation' versions. All three systems allow four switchable frequencies to be operated simultaneously, ensuring high transmission reliability and flexibility. "freePort offers outstanding quality at a tremendously low price," says Michael Polten, industry team manager for the Music Industry at Sennheiser. "The systems can be operated without licensing and without a fee in many European countries."

All three have a diversity receiver installed in a sturdy metal housing, ensuring optimum reception. A dynamics processor provides the freePort systems with a wonderfully clear and natural sound.

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