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14 March 2016

In Milton Keynes, the Denbigh School has opened a new building for its Performing Arts faculty, and this 350-capacity multipurpose space will deploy the modular Nexo Geo M6 for the growing number of student activities in music, dance and drama.

Music technology leader Dave Wilkie, who oversaw the audio and lighting project together with Nexo dealer and installer Fabtronic, is himself a FOH engineer. "The Geo M6 system was ideal for what we wanted to do; because of its modular design, it's flexible enough to use for the whole space or part of it, allowing us to move the coverage by adjusting the angles of the lowest boxes.&quo

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14 March 2016

With a need to up-grade the audio system in the magnificent Great Hall, industry specialists National Stage Technology were consulted to propose a system which would provide improved audio quality for the wide variety of special events hosted, while blending discretely with the intricate hand painted walls and ceiling panels and stained glass windows showing an outline of English history from the time of the Norman Conquest to the reign of Queen Victoria. In this beautifully expansive, but highly reverberant

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14 March 2016

The singer's latest tour, entitled Erwin Schrott & Friends, explores all areas of Latin music, with dates all over the world.

"I use GLD on every show. The system has very good sound quality, and together with the fast and easy work flow, is my mixer of choice. Another advantage for me is the fact that the mixer is lightweight and easy to carry. Mostly, I have to do the whole FOH setup by myself, and GLD is easy to handle for one person," comments Martin Laumann. "All of GL

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14 March 2016

While highly regarded for the orchestral acoustics, the hall's warm and reverberant characteristics pose a suite of challenges for its amplified events, which have evolved and diversified under the leadership of Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas. Now with Leopard, SFS can offer the same world-class experience it brings to traditional orchestral events to its range of amplified programmes, such as film series, pop concerts, Broadway favourites, and leading-edge contemporary music.

"Regardless of content, sound reinforcement should feel natural and undistorted and defined and clear so that you can focus on what is on stage," says SFS operations director Andrew Dubowski. "Leopard is an exponential improvement in ho

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14 March 2016

Kilmurry's design for the Hozier tour is based around a warm tungsten atmospheric feel, using old school Edison bulbs dotted around the stage which gives a wonderful glow to the performers.

"I've been using Avolites consoles since I started out in lighting in 2001," says Kilmurry. "I trained in Ireland and the first console I used was a Pearl 2000. I chose the Sapphire Touch for the Hozier tour in the UK and US this year as I find the cloning/exchange fixture works very well and I can get around it much quicker than other consoles. Everything I need seems to be a few less button pushes away."

The Sapphire Touch is designed for ambitious shows, with more submasters, more flash and executor buttons, and the pow

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14 March 2016

Peppering the corrugated iron façade are a large number of Clay Paky Sharpy Washes, positioned inside transparent protective domes. These fixtures are barely visible until they strike up to bring texture, colour and dimension to the set and to bathe the audience in sharp, randomly angled, acid coloured light.

"AC/DC's identity is distinct, they're a straight forward rock and roll band," states Woodroffe. "We wanted to reflect that in

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14 March 2016

Steve Hankin, chief executive officer of VER said, "We are very excited to team with Aurora, an industry-leading lighting rental house that offers the UK a boutique, premier service. Over the next year, we will invest significantly to expand the equipment offering and other resources to support the tremendous demand for their service. The combination of Aurora's knowledge and quality service with VER's broader product line will offer Aurora's clients a truly one-of-a-kind resource. "

Nick Edwards, managing director of Aurora said, "VER is a glo

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14 March 2016

Sennheiser already employs over 300 people at its manufacturing plant in Tullamore, where it produces headphones, headphone capsules, audiology products, studio monitors and products for the integrated systems sector.

"Ireland is an important market for us and we want to make sure that our customers there continue to be well supported," says Daniel Sennheiser, Sennheiser's CEO. "Drawing business for this territory directly into our global operation means that we are able to offer the same level of service that we offer everywhere else in the world. At the

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14 March 2016

QV Sound worked alongside the project management team during the construction phase to establish optimum speaker positions and cable runs, as well as providing audio equipment from which the entire sound system installation can be controlled.

The high demand of speech intelligibility requires a high transparency of audio signal. The entire sound system equipment is connected by Van Damme cabling and Neutrik connectors to ensure the spoken words are heard naturally and clearly.

The main worship area features 4 ASTS-1

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14 March 2016

Renowned Soulsound sound engineer Jose Ortega (also Quincy Jones Productions, Imogen Heap) was at the helm of the M-5000 for the majority of the performances. Describing his experience using the M-5000 for the first time, Ortega commented, "The M-5000 was quick to understand and has really good features that made my life easy."

Roland Product Manager Nico Suarez was also on hand for setup and to support the engineers for three days of back to back performances. Following the success

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14 March 2016

The festival, which drew over 25,000 people to Connecticut's sprawling Seaside Park (it covers over two miles of shoreline on the Long Island Sound), is a far cry from the small get-together that Ken Hays and a group of friends held 20 years ago to honour Jerry Garcia, following the death of the Grateful Dead's legendary frontman. Hays, who still runs Gathering of the Vibes, recentl

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14 March 2016

"They had their first day at Neets on 1 September and they all bring great expertise to our team. The goal for us is to have even more focus on how we can grow our business together and continue to develop and improve Neets Control Systems with new solutions and features," says Neets.

(Jim Evans)

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14 March 2016

"This is our second year in a row to be nominated for a Parnelli Award and we couldn't be more excited," said David Venus, PixelFLEX Director of Marketing. "Last year, our FLEXCurve LED Video Screen won the Parnelli Award, and this year we are hoping for the same outcome for the FLEXCurtain HD."

The FLEXCurtain HD is a lightweight and flexible LED video screen designed for high resolution video playback and video effects for indoor and outdoor applications. Its hi-res LED video can be driven by any DVI output, and the multi-directional, flexible design of th

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14 March 2016

"We chose them to fill a gap we felt existed in our inventory of consoles, for desks suited to the smaller and medium sized corporate work," commented Stuart Andrews, lighting operations manager.

"Given that we have established the MA2 platform as the standard for the Gearhouse Johannesburg branch to supersede the MA1 platform on which we operated for many years, it made sense to us to continue in this vein. The units are small and extremely powerful consoles yet very compact."

(Jim Evans)

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14 March 2016

With nearly 600 candidates having completed the course to date, the feedback is continually proving positive: visit bit.ly/scites to read more and find out about dates and venues. Some courses are being organised by BECTU so members may be eligible for a discount. Currently the major broadcasters plan to enforce Creative Skillset Certificate in Temporary Power systems on their productions by April 2016, so time is slowly running out to beat the de

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14 March 2016

Veggie Grill's management works hard to have every aspect of its customer experience reflect a sense of high quality and high standards, and that extends from the food to the background music. That's why virtually all of Veggie Grill's more than two-dozen locations - there were 28 as of the end of 2014 - now have sound systems from Bose Professional.

Depending upon an individual location's overall size and interior dimensions, a Veggie Grill restaurant will have anywhere from four to 16 Bose FreeSpace DS-16F, DS-40F or DS-100 surface-mount sp

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14 March 2016

Situated at the top of the route into the festival arena, and visible from all the main campsites, Midas three-phase inflated Newsubstance's mirror tile-covered PVC bladder to 10.33m, 35cm bigger than the previous disco ball record holder, and kept it at size via a bespoke pressure management system.

Andy Dann, operations director at Midas, comments, "The Guinness World Record was a fantastic achievement for Bestival and it was a pleasure to keep the ball in shape and to bring Green D+ to the event for the first time."

Introduced to the market this year, Green D+ is cleaner on the generator than red diesel and produces 35 per cent less NOx and 85

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14 March 2016

Organised by the ALD, STLD, The Fifth Estate Ltd and Clay Paky and now in its 8th year, the KOI Awards is a celebration of the creative talents of international lighting and digital content designers working in the UK across TV, Theatre and Concert Touring and Events.

The sub-categories for Television are: Drama; Light Entertainment; Small Studio; Events; and Video Graphic Display.

The TV shortlist judging panel comprised: Stuart Gain (Chairman) - Rob Horne (Small Studio) - John O'Brien (Drama) - Stuart Gain (Light Entertainment) - John King (Events) and Mike LeFevre (Graphics).

The shortlist is as follows:

DRAMA - Gavin Finney for Wolf Hall; John

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14 March 2016

"It was a great experience and it's a trending video in the country market," says Jeff Lavallee, lead designer at 44 Designs, who has been designing Thompson Square's stage look for the past four years, almost as long as the duo has been around. "The song and video capture the brazen passion and energy of Thompson Square's live shows. Together with Keifer and Shawna Thompson, we then decided to use the look on their 2015 tour."

An important visual element of the

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14 March 2016

Entitled Learn to Video Map Like a PRO! attendees of all levels of experience learnt how easy it is to achieve complex projections quickly, trigger shows from a lighting desk and build a quick cue sequence using ArKaos MediaMaster PRO.

"The purpose of today's presentations was to show people how easy it is to use ArKaos MediaMaster on their events," says WL's technical solutions director, Andy Hook. "MediaMaster PRO is the fastest system out there and even a first time user can be mapping and running shows in a very short time. The same software and servers can be used for television studios, theatres, production companies or schools - it is so versatile an