UK - Distributor POLARaudio, consistent with its recent internal restructuring, has promoted former business development manager Stuart Leader to the position of head of installation. The company recently re-aligned its operation into two distinct sectors - MI and Installation. Stuart Leader has been at POLARaudio for two and a half years and in heading up the Installation team brings to the table a wealth of experience gained from his time with Crestron and Sanyo, where he specialised in the corporate and higher education sectors.

Leader will be responsible for a team which is involved in large scale system solutions that comprise everything from system design and programming to commissioning. End-user engagement sits at the heart of the team's holistic approach to this area, whe

UK - An Allen & Heath iLive digital mixing system recently managed FOH on a tour marking the 40th anniversary of the release of Rick Wakeman's landmark concept album, Journey To The Centre Of The Earth.

Based on the novel by Jules Verne, which also had its 150th anniversary in 2014, the album is one of the rock era's landmark achievements selling 15m copies.

The 14-date tour comprised performances across the UK, including two dates at the Royal Albert Hall. Each show was a live presentation of the album, performed by Rick Wakeman and The New World Symphony Orchestra, accompanied by The English Chamber Choir and the English Rock Ensemble.

Long time FOH engineer, Ian Barfoot, specified an iLive modular system comprising twin iDR10 MixRacks and his preferred iLive-112 surface linked by a fibre optical link, along with a Lenovo tablet running iLive Editor control software

UK - David Atkinson Lighting Design (DALD) recently completed the lighting design for the new flagship Sky Store at Westfield, White City, London.

With the lighting playing such an important part in the overall concept for the store, DALD was bought into the project at a very early stage.

The Sky design team's brief to DALD was for the lighting to create a dynamic energy enhancing lighting scheme within an area of Westfield that has high ambient levels of natural and artificial light. The store consisted of the following areas of lighting:

The main structure consists of eight large fins, which appear like aerofoils on end, which support glass panels, and have a graduated printed dot manifestation applied to the glass. Set within the fins high output RGBA LED strips within a heat sink edge, illuminate the glass dot manifestation. The LED strips are controlled over a series of

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LD Systems ICOA PRO series – high-performance coaxial PA speakers for professional demands

The popular ICOA PA systems have been further developed to include two active full-range coaxial speakers – ICOA PRO 12 A and ICOA PRO 15 A – as well as the active 21″ bass-reflex PA subwoofer ICOA PRO SUB 21 A. With its professional features and high output power, the ICOA PRO series is aimed at ambitious bands, musicians and DJs as well as hire companies and commercial customers looking for a compact, robust and powerful PA sound system. The ICOA PRO series is rounded off with modern connection and control options via Bluetooth 5.1 and the specially developed ICOA PRO app, for use on smartphones and tablets.

ld-systems.com/icoapro

South Korea - This year's Ultra Music Festival (UMF) Korea took place in Seoul, South Korea with more than 100,000 EDM fans and music lovers in attendance. The event, which took place at the Olympic Stadium Sports Complex, featured heart-thumping beats produced by the world's top DJs reinforced by Adamson Energia loudspeakers.

The ground floor of the Olympic arena was converted into the nation's largest outdoor club for the two day event. Electronic music was delivered by a number of big-name DJs including Steve Angelo, Above & Beyond, Steve Aoki and Paul Van Dyk. Empire of the Sun, Infected Mushroom, Far East Movement and M.I.A. were a few of the bands that performed live.

Blue Noise and AMG Korea (Alpha Sound), two prominent South Korean sound companies, provided Adamson sound systems deployed at the Live and Main stages. Sun Kim, technical support manager for Sound Solution

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ETC Halcyon Silent

High End Systems Halcyon Silent builds on ETC’s legacy of fanless automated fixtures by incorporating features from the highly sought-after Halcyon family. Halcyon Silent perfectly balances silent operation with brilliant output of 18,400 lumens and high-impact features. 

For more information visit us at www.etcconnect.com

Germany - As in recent years, sound engineer Carsten Kümmel handled classical production duties at the 2014 Thurn & Taxis Classic Festival (Schlossfestspiele) in Regensburg. Among the performances he mixed were Guiseppe Verdi's Rigoletto, Operas in Bavarian and the gala performance of star soprano Angela Gheorghiu and the Symphonic Orchestra from Hof/Germany - all on a Lawo mc²56 console.

The most testing production for Kümmel was Rigoletto, where more than 60 microphones were in use. As previously, he took a two-level approach to the console setup - one level was used for inputs and outputs that did not change during the festival (including feeds to the stage manager, the interval bell and communication with the stage) with a second level dedicated to the various performances. These included, for example, the levels of singers' mics, the band and orchestra.

Sweden - As one of the largest arenas in the Nordic region, Sweden's Ullevi Stadium recently completed a renovation that increased its capacity from 54,000 to 75,000 people featuring 43,000 seats with another 32,000 in standing room. Located in the Swedish city of Gothenburg, the outdoor arena was inaugurated in 1958 when the country hosted one of the world's most prestigious soccer competitions.

However, as the stadium has aged it has undergone a series of renovations, the first in 1985 when the stadium's iconic concrete pillars on either side of the main entrance were reinforced. Further renovations in 2004 brought Swedish lighting design firm Kreative Teknik AB on board to light the pillars and recently the company retrofitted their original design with six Martin Professional Exterior 400 light fixtures.

Each pillar features three Exterior 400 fixtures mounted over 200ft a

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Create new traditions – Cameo P6 - High Output Full-Spectrum Ellipsoidal

Cameo's P6 is a future-proof LED profiler with a powerful 600 W RGBACL engine and 16,000 lumens. It’s an energy-efficient replacement for 2.5 kW halogen profile lights in theatres and venues. With excellent light quality and natural colour rendering, it fits perfectly in theatres, musicals, TV studios, congresses, and live events.

With an LED life of 50,000 hours and low power use, the P6 cuts energy costs and supports the EU’s ‘Green Deal’ goals for climate neutrality by 2050. It also meets updated eco-design rules for lighting.

www.cameolight.com/p6profile

Belgium - The Benelux countries are rapidly making a name for themselves as a hotbed of musicals produced on a giant scale. As Soldaat van Oranje continues to wow Dutch audiences in a former aircraft hangar, a new production, 14-18, is now doing the same in a similarly vast Belgian venue - De Nekkerhal in Mechelen.

The production brings the grim reality of Flanders fields to life with a high level of intensity and immediacy for the audience, a spectacle helped greatly by Sennheiser's flagship Digital 9000 wireless microphone system.

Set in Western Flanders during the Great War, 14-18 traces the fortunes of three young soldiers caught up in one of the most ruthless and bloody struggles in European history.

This latest production from global entertainment company Studio 100, Frank Van Laecke, Dirk Brossé and Allard Blom takes place in a venue measur

USA - With nine studio albums, 26 singles on the Billboard charts, and five number one hits, Gary Allan is one of country music's hottest stars on tour today. On the 2014 Set You Free tour, Allan and his design team are maintaining that same tradition with lighting designer Brandon Quisberg using Showline SL NITRO 510 luminaires from Philips Entertainment, provided by Elite Multimedia, to achieve a wide variety of powerful and dynamic looks.

"This is my first tour with Gary Allan and we wanted a big show with a big feel," says Quisberg. "We needed a rock show that was very in-your-face and we wanted to do a lot of strobing. The audience needs to feel the music and that's where the Showline SL NITRO 510 luminaires really help us out. With the SL NITRO 510 you are not handcuffed to what most other strobes in the market are limited to and you have a wid

USA - "This feels like a perfect night in Louisville where anything can happen." Beck may have been speaking on the last night of the Forecastle Festival, where he closed out the three day musical bonanza, but the sentiment could have applied to the entire weekend, where 75,000 gathered to enjoy music, arts and Kentucky bourbon.

Bandit Lites worked with AC Entertainment and the festival's production manager, Richard Wold of Lambda Productions, to provide the lighting rig for two stages and the DJ tent.

Dubbed by Rolling Stone Magazine as one of the "Coolest Festivals," the Forecastle Festival is in its twelfth year and takes place in downtown Louisville's scenic 85-acre Waterfront Park on the Ohio river. This year's line-up included festival favourites Outkast, Jack White, Beck, Spoon, The Replacements, Ray LaMontagne, Nickel Creek and Jason Isbell i

USA - Twenty-two Robe Robin Pointes enhance the set for country music star Chris Young's US tour in support of award-winning country singer / songwriter Dierks Bentley.

Bandit Lites are supplying the lighting equipment to production designer Chris Lisle, and the Pointes were specified as they could cut through and stand out from the video-orientated set.

Lisle has used Robe's Robin LED fixtures on random shows and one offs before, but this is the first time he has specified them for a tour.

"I had been hearing great things about the Pointe," commended Lisle, "And then had a chance to see them in action at LDI last year. For Chris's show this year we wanted a good beam light with more gobo and beam effect options than other 'beam' fixtures."

Chris Young's musical style mixes "new traditionalism with polished Music City production" and his caree

UK - Eve supplied more than 7,500 Trakway panels to the two V Festivals last weekend, together with a pedestrian footbridge, barriers, anti-climb fence panels and other kit.

At Hylands Park, Chelmsford, Eve put 750 hybrid box panels together for the biggest pad it's built, under the Virgin Media Stage platform, and used a new clamp attachment to drop Trakway into place for the MTV Stage, slashing the installation time.

Festival manager, Simon Forshaw, comments, "Eve gets the job done with a remarkable amount of pace and it's very accommodating in terms of last minute changes to configurations. which is essential on a festival site."

Numbers were marginally down at Hylands Park, but headliner Justin Timberlake's set won acclaim at both sites, as did The Killers and a support cast including Ed Sheeran, Paulo Nutini, Lily Allen and Example.

(Jim Evans)

USA - Sound designer Tim O'Heir has chosen a Meyer Sound system built around M'elodie line array loudspeakers to reinforce the Tony Award-winning Broadway revival of the musical comedy Hedwig and the Angry Inch. The production entertains audiences with a high energy that Time Out New York says "makes Broadway rock harder than it ever has before".

"The M'elodie centre array is working out perfectly for the vocals," says O'Heir. "It's a rock concert sound, but we also needed great intelligibility along with vocal punch, because the lyrics carry the story line. On both counts, the M'elodies deliver every time."

The main Meyer Sound system is anchored by dual front-hangs of eight-each M2D line array loudspeakers flanking a center hang of 11 M'elodie loudspeakers, while a cardioid array of three flown 600-HP subwoofers provides low end. T

Denmark - Sune Snellman Jakobsen is a live mix engineer stationed in Copenhagen whose credits include world tours with The Raveonettes, Mew, Mercury Rev from NY, Kashmir from Denmark, and, most recently, Trentem°ller.

An avid Metric Halo user, Jakobsen owns a ULN-8 interface and a LIO-8 interface and regularly uses their SpectraFoo sound analysis software to set up shows and to help identify and solve problems while mixing. His interfaces carry Metric Halo's optional +DSP, which allows him to run their powerful plug-ins on critical live channels (including the whole mix!).

"As a FOH engineer, I think it's important to embrace the sonic ideals of the artist," Jakobsen says. "I don't see any point in applying my own favorite flavor if it doesn't appeal to the artist. Along those lines, it's critical to build a relationship of trust so the artist feels I have a

USA - The 137th Audio Engineering Society Convention (9-12 October, 2014, at the Los Angeles Convention Centre in downtown Los Angeles) will feature a High Resolution Audio (HRA) programme Friday, 10 October.

The direct result of a collaborative effort between the Audio Engineering Society (AES) and DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group, the HRA programme will include a number of panels and sessions that address the current and future direction of HRA from various perspectives, including content creation, digital distribution, licensing of hi-res music files, archiving, subscription models, marketing/promotion of hi-res music, compatibility of playback devices and more.

These panels and sessions will feature some of the brightest minds in the business as they discuss some of the most current and controversial issues concerning the rapid adoption of high-resolution audio across

UK - Bubble & Squeak PR and marketing agency for the broadcast and media technology sector, has appointed Andrew Winter as client development consultant. He will join on 1 September from SGL where he was marketing director and will be working on new business development and providing marketing services to Bubble & Squeak's client roster.

Prior to joining SGL, Winter held marketing director roles at Orad and IBIS. He started his broadcasting life in radio production and presentation at Capital Radio. Part of the launch team at Southern Sound, he then joined BFBS (British Forces Broadcasting Service) serving in Gibraltar, Belize and Hong Kong. He returned to the UK to launch BSB then BBC World, BBC Prime and the Arabic BBC, gaining invaluable experience in managing creative, editorial and technical teams.

Winter will head up the agency's new #noheadcountrequired service for comp

Australia - DPA Microphones' d:facto Vocal Microphone provided significant vocal improvements to the live broadcast of Australia's The Voice, ensuring an even more enjoyable experience for TV viewers. In similar fashion to other TV singing/talent shows, The Voice Australia relied on wireless microphone technology to ensure that contestants could move freely about the stage. DPA's award-winning d:facto fitted the bill for the show's finale.

The decision to try the DPA d:facto Vocal Mics on the show was on suggestion from Australian rental company JPJ Audio. "JPJ's Brad Adamson told me he had DPA d:factos and we were keen to try them on a couple of TV shows we were working on," explains John Simpson, senior audio director of The Voice Australia. "DPA has a great reputation for high-quality mics and this interested me because I hadn't been happy

Canada - Show Distribution, a company specializing in the sale and rental of staging equipment and electric hoists, has appointed Bernard Thériault, formerly from Arcofab, as senior consultant for the company. Thériault will bring his vast experience in the fabrication and distribution of aluminium trusses to expand an already full line of staging equipment offered by Show Distribution, says the company.

A former lighting designer, Thériault established Arcofab in 1993, a company known for its quality and service in the manufacturing of trusses and aluminium structures, which closed down last year after 20 years in the business.

The arrival of Thériault reflects Show Distribution's will to introduce high quality trussing products adapted to the North American market. "Bernard is very passionate about his work and will steer Show Distribution to

UK - Event production and design company, Light Motif, has appointed Kelly Yeomans as business development manager.

Yeomans arrives at Light Motif from Fisher Productions where she gained valuable experience in the event industry. Yeomans now brings this experience and purpose to Light Motif's rapidly expanding team, driving forward the company's business with venues, agencies, clients and other event suppliers.

On joining Light Motif, Yeomans says, "Working for such a young company was what really appealed to me. I want to make a difference and have brought with me the experience and industry knowledge to do this. I have every confidence that we will build upon Light Motif's current successes for the future."

(Jim Evans)

Sweden - Wireless lighting control manufacturer, LumenRadio, is expanding to keep up with its strong growth. The company is appointing a new CEO, Alexander Hellström and ramping up in-house development.

"Today LumenRadio is profitable and experiencing strong growth as our wireless products are becoming the preferred choice of lighting professionals. To keep up with demand and manage the continued success we are appointing Alexander Hellström as our new CEO to lead us through this next phase of growth", explains Per Hulthén, co-founder and former CEO of LumenRadio.

Hulthén transitions to a new role in the Board of Directors of LumenRadio where he will continue to lead the development of wireless control for building automation.

Alexander Hellström comes with a career spanning from senior management at Capgemini, CEO at Experis IT and CEO of Primas I

USA - Discovery Park of America has opened in Union City, Tennessee, offering visitors a world-class entertainment and educational experience with more than 70,000sq.ft of exhibits on nature, science, technology, history and art. Electrosonic provided audio-visual equipment for most of the ten exhibit galleries in the three-level space of the new Discovery Centre.

The primary benefactor of Discovery Park of America is the Robert E. and Jenny D. Kirkland Foundation, which has donated approximately $80m to the creation of the park and endowed a programme for its continuing operational support and expansion. As long-time supporters of education in the area, the Kirklands have given Discovery Park the mission of enhancing the educational experiences of children and adults, and inspiring them to see beyond their current level of knowledge.

The Discovery Centre's diverse array of ga

Germany - In Berlin, they call it the Fanmeile - a 1.5km stretch of avenue which serves as the main theatre for Germany's national celebrations. Where else would more than 1m people gather to celebrate the return of the World Cup, after an astonishing summer of football in Brazil!

Rental company auvisign GmbH was called upon to provide the PA for the huge crowds, from the main stage in front of the Brandenburg Gate to the 10 big TV screens spaced down the length of the fan mile and beyond to other stages. This massive task was supervised by sound designer Johannes Raack, who has worked many times here at Europe's biggest public viewing space.

A Nexo Geo D10 line array system was used on the main stage, together with Geo Sub and CD18 subbass cabinets, and a large number of Nexo PS Series. Elsewhere on the fanmeile, nearly 270 Nexo cabinets were deployed; Geo S12, Geo S8, Nexo A

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