South Africa - ApexPro, distributor of professional audio-visual equipment for the sub-Saharan African region, has recently cemented a partnership with UK-based HH Electronics, manufacturer of professional audio from within the Headstock Group, UK.
“We are extremely excited about our partnership with HH Electronics,” says ApexPro director, Justin Acres. “The entertainment, tourism, and live events sectors in Southern Africa are poised for a much-needed comeback following the restrictions on business imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic. As new venues open, and those that survived the lockdowns look to attract new patrons, the demand for high-quality, low-cost, expandable professional audio systems is on the rise. We can’t think of a better manufacturer to fill this gap tha

UK - TV, broadcast and event lighting rental specialists, Version 2, supplied the moving lights, control, cabling and power distribution infrastructure for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Party at the Palace, catering for the needs of all four stages and the audience areas, including the Royal Box, which had been built in front of Buckingham Palace.
One of the main highlights of the four days of Jubilee celebrations, the Party at the Palace, took place on the evening and night-time of Saturday 4 June 2022. The two-and-a-half-hour event attracted a global audience of 13.4m viewers, with an array of technology, and programme of classic performances that began with Queen and ended with Diana Ross.
Produced by BBC Studio Events, and with a multi-stage design by Stufish, the set featured four stages: the Pop Stage and Orchestra Stage which flanked the Palace gates; the Pala

USA - Elation Professional’s atmospheric effects brand, Magmatic has welcomed atmospheric FX Specialist Joey Olaerts to the Elation and Magmatic team.
Olaerts will work with Elation’s R&D and sales teams to ensure that current Magmatic products meet customers’ needs, as well as conduct product research, testing, and viability studies to develop and market new atmospheric effects solutions.
Olaerts will also be overseeing Elation sister-company ADJ’s atmospheric product line.
Olaerts is a Halloween enthusiast and fog machine aficionado who founded Fog It Up!, a fog, haze, and snow fluid company, while in college. The company expanded over nearly a decade to include lighting and sound before being acquired by Antari Lighting and Effects. Olaerts comes to Magmatic from Antari where he worked as a sales representative while setting up their fluid produc
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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

Theatre Funding - York Theatre Royal and Northern Stage are among 10 venues to be awarded funding from the Theatres Trust’s small grants programme. Through a partnership with The Linbury Trust, the Theatres Trust is awarding £49,476 to support 10 UK not-for-profit theatres with funding that will allow them to make repairs and improvements, enhance accessibility, and improve sustainability measures and facilities.
Jon Morgan, director of Theatres Trust said: "The wide array of projects funded this round show the many challenges that theatres continue to face. We are pleased to be able to help these theatres with projects that protect future use, remove barriers to participation and attendance, and make them more welcoming spaces."
The funding will allow the York Theatre Royal to buy equipment to capture immersive recordings of live performances and will deliver them
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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

USA - Theatre Projects has announced the addition of two new full-time staff members to their team. Chris Smith joins the firm as the marketing and content manager and Ashley Keen joins their strategic planning team as a senior consultant. Both bring significant expertise in their respective fields, have backgrounds in the performing arts.
Chris joins the company’s New York office to lead marketing and PR efforts. Over the past decade and a half, Chris has worked with a wide array of non-profit organizations in Chicago, Texas, and Oregon. His experience includes content creation, digital communication, writing, brand and marketing strategy, and data analysis. Prior to Theatre Projects, Chris worked with Oregon State University, The Black Sheep Agency, 4th Wall Theatre in Houston, Echelon Design, Chicago Art Department, and the Chicago High School for the Arts.
Ashley

UAE - Unusual Rigging & Engineering won an award for exceptional delivery and contribution to EXPO 2020 Dubai. At a ceremony at Grosvenor House, Dubai Marina, last month, the company was recognised for its contribution to health and safety at the event which took place between 1 October 2021 and 31 March 2022.
Denis Bramhall, managing director at Unusual Rigging & Engineering commented: “We are extremely proud to have won this award. There were over 3,500 subcontractors working on EXPO 2020, so for us to be one of the final 3 in the health and safety category was completely unexpected and to then come first is a huge honour. We really were up against some big companies – some of which employ ten or eleven thousand people, whereas in contrast we are an extremely small team. But good things come in small packages, and our team here at URE, really did pull out all t
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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

France - Naostage has announced the appointment of experienced pro-AV professional Alexis Reymond as its new sales manager.
Reymond has worked as a freelance audio engineer, electro-acoustic consultant, sound designer and music producer for more than 20 years, most recently in a sales engineering capacity with fellow Nantes-based company Arbane Groupe (APG/Active Audio). His other experience includes spells with event specialists Videlio and Magnum, where he worked as a sound engineer for 17 years, and Disneyland Paris, where he served as a freelance AV technician.
In his new role, Reymond – who is tasked with developing Naostage’s commercial strategy and overseeing its development, both domestically and internationally – will initially focus on building relationships with major industry players in the EMEA region and showcasing the benefits of the Naostage pro

USA - Renkus-Heinz has appointed Sebastian Rivas as software development and research engineer. Rivas will work closely with chief technology oficer Ralph Heinz and engineering manager Chad DeFranco.
“I had the opportunity to speak with Harro Heinz about the role and found great value in learning about the history of the company and the innovative processes that have put them as the leader in beam steering loudspeaker technology,” said Rivas. “Renkus-Heinz is a leader in the audio solutions industry and I am fortunate to enter the company at a time to contribute to the sound revolution.”
Prior to joining Renkus-Heinz, Rivas worked as a professor at St. Thomas University, 2D Software Developer at Sensey Electronics in Mexico, and at Danley Sound Labs developing the Direct Sound System modelling software.
“Sebastian’s talent and ambition in the audio

UK - RentalPoint Software has released a fully web browser-based version of their Small Business Edition rental management software package designed for event technology rental and production companies.
This new release, says RentalPoint, is a re-imagining and updating of their Windows based product first released in 1998. It incorporates many of the features expected in software these days including online signatures for equipment deliveries and proposal/contract acceptance, dashboard, electronic pick list for prepping gear as well as scaling down to fit on smart phone screen sizes or scaling up to fit on desktops.
Additionally, the software offers many of the powerful features that the company has developed over the last 30 years such as equipment, crew planning & scheduling tools and optional multi location.
You can find the software at https://rentalpoint

UK - Mash P is getting a hands-on, practical introduction to the world of production thanks to the Audient sponsorship at ICMP. Enrolled on the six-month Music Production & Sound Engineering course, he is building on his talent as a musician. He performed at Glastonbury Festival this year, celebrating the release of his latest music.
“I want to say thank you to ICMP for the environment, the equipment, studios and the space for people like me to learn,” he says. “Also, thank you for the equipment given to me from my Audient sponsorship.” Audient provided him with the EVO Start Recording Bundle, which includes EVO 4 audio interface, the EVO SR1 Condenser Mic and EVO SR2000 Monitoring Headphones.
Mash, whose given name is Nathaniel Sesay, was captured by civil war rebels when he was nine in his native Sierra Leone. After the brutal civil war was over, he spen

Malaysia - Robert Juliat has announced that the Zepp series of venues in Asia has invested in more RJ fixtures with the addition of six RJ Oz 600W LED followspots delivered to the new Zepp Kuala Lumpur.
The Oz fixtures were specified by Yukiteru Hayashi of Sogo Butai, and supplied by Total Solution Marketing Pte, RJ’s partner for Malaysia.
Zepp Kuala Lumpur is a multi-purpose venue with a seating capacity of 2,414 which hosts concerts, comedy shows, musicals, drama and seminars.
The RJ Oz followspots were selected as the best fixture to meet the varied demands of the venue’s requirements and the types of show Zepp KL puts on. “The flexible features of RJ fixtures will be highly appreciated by our followspot operators,” says Arnan Rahman, Senior Manager for Zepp KL. “I cannot wait to see what wonderful stages they will accomplish in different scenes wit

Austria - Droneberger Showtechnik of Klagenfurt am Wörthersee, is the latest company in Austria to invest in Ayrton fixtures, adding more than 40 Ayrton Karif LT and Ayrton Perseo Beam to its lighting inventory.
“With the relocation of the company to our new business premises in Gerberweg 44 in Klagenfurt, we are excited to have expanded our portfolio of Ayrton moving lights for the first time,” says Freidl Droneberger. “The first order is already successfully in use.”
The Ayrton fixtures were initially purchased for the television show, Starnacht and have since been taken into Droneberger’s dry hire stock and project area.
“We were searching for a current fixture which, in addition to a large light output, was able to realise clean, crisp gobo projections. Both these properties are extremely important for our TV projects,” explains Dronebe

UK - At this year’s Glastonbury, ChamSys consoles were widely deployed across the festival’s various stages.
The MagicQ MQ 500M Stadium, which was introduced during the pandemic in 2020, was the house desk at seven stages, including the Park Stage, (supplied by SWG Events), where Ed Warren used it to run Four Tet’s headline show, and the Acoustic Stage (supplied by Fineline Lighting), where Patrick Sollitt relied on its seamless cloning and morphing to make last minute changes for headliners Paul Heaton and Jacqui Abbott. SWG Events and Fineline Lighting also provided ChamSys consoles for many other Glastonbury stages.
The MagicQ MQ500M was used to support more than just music acts. At the Circus Big Top stage, James Loudon relied on the console to run 14-hours of pre-programmed shows for 30 different acts every day of the festival with to-the-minute precision.

UK - In May 2022, Burning Man Artist, David Best, in conjunction with Artichoke UK created Sanctuary – a public artwork and COVID memorial for the nation, to pay tribute to those lost during the pandemic.
It was also a moment to mark rebirth, recovery, and regeneration. Built by Best and his crew, together with the local community, in the Miners’ Welfare Park in Bedworth, North Warwickshire, individuals from the local community took part in the project, employed to assist with the build and volunteering as Sanctuary guardians and guides once it was open to the public.
Unusual Rigging was contracted to provide production management and rigging services, to survey the site, provide condition reports, plan the build layout and production compound as well as manage the structural build and post event clean up.
Kate Harvey, director of projects at Artichoke UK com

USA - Following their pre-Covid Moving On! tour, The Who are back on the road with The Who Hits Back! 2022 tour. Lighting designer Tom Kenny selected a compliment of active Ayrton Khamsin fixtures, provided by Solotech Las Vegas, for the rig. ACT Entertainment is the exclusive distributor of Ayrton lighting in North America.
The month-long North American spring leg of tour kicked off in April in Hollywood, Florida and wrapped in May in Bethel, New York. After a summer break, the tour resumes in early October with another month of dates starting in Toronto and concluding in Las Vegas.
“I’ve been fortunate to have used Ayrton fixtures before, whenever I came across them,” says Kenny. “Solotech offered me Khamsins for this tour, and I remembered how much I love them – they’re so much brighter and have all sorts of resources not found in other fixtures I’ve u

UK - TSL supplied a rigging and lighting package for the recent Grenfell Memorial event held on the 14 June, to mark the fifth-year anniversary.
The truss structure covered the 8m by 5m stage and consisted of silver Prolyte H30v truss together with custom angle brackets to give the roof a sloped 10° angle. TSL also provided a wireless anemometer from Broadweigh and an onsite wind monitoring laptop to give continuous recording and monitoring.
In terms of lighting, TSL supplied six Astra panels from Litepanels to provide a consistent and fully colour adjustable front and side light across the stage. These lightweight fixtures offer smooth dimming and are flicker free at any frame rate, which is perfect for both broadcast and studio work.
A selection of Chroma Q ColorForce 12 and 48 utilised as a ground row offered an even coverage of the backdrop. These LED batten

UK - When Capital Sound, part of the Solotech UK Group, conceived the original design for Stereophonics’ homecoming concert at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff for what would have been their We’ll Keep A Welcome Christmas show, the idea of 23 Martin Audio PA hangs (covering both an A stage and 40m thrust to a B stage) was entirely achievable.
“The kit was already prepped and ready to go out, when the show was suddenly cancelled,” states Solotech senior technical advisor, Robin Conway.
But when the gig was rescheduled for June, there was none of the luxury of pre-production time that had accompanied the original show. Not only did the B stage now need to function as a totally independent stage, with its own PA, (rather than simply as a delay stage), but Friday’s planned production/build-up day suddenly disappeared when the following night’s concert

USA - Indie groove band Goose’s Dripfield US summer tour united the passion and talents of two lighting professionals – Andrew Goedde and Tony Caporale – who with the assistance of some Robe Tetra2 moving LED battens among other lights, have created an eye-catching look as the band delights fans across America.
Indianapolis-based Andrew has worked as Goose’s LD for four years and also owns a busy lighting rental business. When he and Tony – well known for his lighting work with Billie Eilish among others – met randomly at a Goose show, they hit it off as friends and realised that a design collaboration would be the way to go for this project.
“Two minds can be better than one,” they say, and in this case, the creative results are evident onstage with Tony having worked on programming, bringing his vast fund of experience to the party, and Andrew contin

Spain - Lynx Pro Audio has installed an anechoic chamber within their Research and Development Department in Valencia, the headquarters of the company.
The new anechoic room has the latest technologies, being one of the most modern in Europe. The special design of the room offers an accurate measurement of the sound in a complete sphere (360 degrees), with an accuracy of one degree. The chamber has a Four Audio robot to provide better sound measurement and a new space designed for accurate measurements in a free-field acoustic environment.
Having detailed information on the acoustic response of a box allows Lynx Pro Audio to model each of their enclosures within the Rainbow 3D acoustic prediction software, offering a simulation that is as real as possible. “In this way, we provide a powerful design tool with which installers can carry out all kinds of sound reinforce

USA - With a total audience capacity of more than 7,000, the imposing Filene Centre is the flagship venue at Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts, located just outside Washington, D.C. The non-profit Wolf Trap Foundation, recently replaced the aging main audio system with a complete Meyer Sound reinforcement solution.
The Filene Centre performance calendar is noteworthy in both its breadth and depth, ranging from classical and Broadway to rock jazz and country. Luminaries such as Sting, Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne, Little Big Town and Elvis Costello highlight popular genres for the current season. An impressive classical programme features the Wolf Trap Opera and an ongoing partnership with the National Symphony Orchestra.
“The Filene Centre is one of an elite group of venues able to serve all genres of music without compromise, and we wanted to cement ou

UK - The Association of British Theatre Technicians’ Annual Awards took place on the evening of Wednesday 22 June, after the first day of the 2022 ABTT Theatre Show at Alexandra Palace, London.
Engineering Product of the Year: XM Automation’s XMove
Sound Product of the Year: Clearcom’s Arcadia Central Station
Lighting Product of the Year: Robe’s T11
Widget of the Year: CallQ’s Showcaller Training Software
Stand of the Year: Prompt Side
Technician of the Year: Daniel Ewing
Award for Emerging Excellence: Kat Ellis
Virtual Ideas Platform, Idea of the Year 2021: Matthew Dean
Additionally, commendations were made for d&b’s 5d amplifier, ETC’s Eos Apex, Whirly Reeler and trackingThis’ plug-in.
The next ABTT Awards will take place on the evening of 7 June 2023 at the 43rd ABTT Theatre Show at Alexandra Palac

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