Time Traveller - Beyoncé won a record-breaking 32nd Grammy Award, while Harry Styles won album of the year, at this year's ceremony in Los Angeles. Beyoncé made history as she won best dance/electronic album for her dance opus, Renaissance. In doing so, she overtook Hungarian-British conductor George Solti, whose record of 31 Grammys had stood for more than 20 years. Overall, Beyoncé won four prizes at the ceremony - but missed some of the early presentations after getting stuck in gridlocked downtown Los Angeles. "I'm surprised traffic could stop you," joked host Trevor Noah. "I thought you travelled through space and time."
Border Crossing - Eurovision's stage will use a design that demonstrates "how music can transcend borders and bring people together", th

Germany/Poland - Event technology service provider DLP Motive supplied full technical design and production – staging, automation and kinetic elements, lighting, sound, video, and LED screens – to ESL Gaming for the 10th anniversary of the Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) e-gaming tournament, including two three-day events staged at the 10,000 capacity Spodek Arena in Katowice, Poland, and the 18,500 capacity Lanxess-Arena in Cologne, Germany.
Striking lighting designs by Andreas (Andy) Mohl for these two events included over 250 x Robe moving lights, part of 15 trucks worth of production kit that helped ensure the delivery of a colourful, adrenalized, all-action three days of superlative e-gaming enjoyed by both live and streamed audiences.
The Robe luminaires included 48 x Esprites, 70 x Spiiders, 60 x LEDBeam 150s, 54 x Pointes and 22 x MegaPointes, and the event i

Sweden - Automation and a Kinesys system were right at the heart of Palle Palme’s spectacular lighting and video design for Swedish pop supergroup GES’s popular 2022 tour, which culminated in a month-long residency at Stockholm’s Cirkus venue.
The band – featuring three of Sweden’s biggest singing stars – romped through a playlist of greatest collective and individual hits, and to keep the energy and pace pumping throughout the set, Palle’s design included two circular lighting trusses – 10m and 3m diameters – that moved, plus a 5m diameter semi-circular LED screen which flew in and out at strategic moments.
“Automation was an essential element of this show’s aesthetic,” commented Palle, who wanted the additional dynamics of movement to make the stage design really rock. “It was an ideally suited performance environment for the extra visual t

USA - Once again, the company responsible for creating the light show at Seattle's New Year's Eve event at the Space Needle, Illuminate Production Services (IPS), turned to Elation Professional's line of IP-rated products to bring their vision to life.
New to this year’s design were Elation Proteus Rayzor Blade linear effects, which joined other Proteus range luminaires and other Elation IP-rated lights on the dazzling show.
The New Year's Eve celebration featured a choreographed 11-minute show with synchronized drone footage (Sky Elements), fireworks (Pyro Spectaculars), and Elation lighting. The show was set to a playlist highlighting significant music and pop culture events of the year and included a tribute to Ukraine. Broadcast locally on KING 5 and streamed online, the night also included two 10-minute light shows prior to the New Year’s countdown used to bu

UK - Avolites has announced the replacement of the Titan Mobile, which has now ceased production.
Avolites launched its smallest control surface the Titan Mobile in 2010, together with a companion wing. Over its 12 years of production, it has become trusted and depended upon world-wide by many thousands of users. Over the years the Titan Mobile has been equally at home powering live productions on all sizes of stage to major installations. Anywhere were a small footprint, reliable hardware and a powerful lighting software platform has been needed.
Created in collaboration with leading lighting designers, the new T3 is the lightest, smallest, most portable console Avolites has ever produced. It shares the new design language first seen in the Diamond 9, and together with the companion Wing they form an unbeatable portable control surface. The new T3 is the leading produ

Switzerland - As the European festival scene kicked back into action following the upheaval and restrictions of the pandemic, Ayrton teamed up with some established Swiss rental companies to support festivals across the country and showcase some of Ayrton’s latest fixtures. Stagelight AG Showtechnik supplied kit to the largest hip-hop festival in Europe at Frauenfeld, the Gurten Open Air festival in Bern and Schaffhausen’s Stars in Town across July and August.
Stagelight AG Showtechnik used the same equipment package from Ayrton for each festival: 16 x Zonda 9 FX; 16 x Cobra and four Domino LT with every fixture adding its own features to the stages.
“Each of these fixtures brings a new dimension to meet open-air design challenges,” opens Stagelight’s Stefan Rüttimann. “We have a long and mutually trustworthy relationship with Ayrton, and having Marc (Lor

Japan - Since opening in 1985, Antiknock has become a hall of fame for punk and hardcore bands, and many of today’s major artists originally set down their roots there. Now the venue, situated in the burgeoning Shinjuku district of Tokyo, has become the first in Japan to install Martin Audio’s new Torus constant curvature array.
Speaking of the installation, Mr. Sekikawa, CEO of Hardaway Corporation, which manages the venue, said the renewal of the sound system was a gift to the many artists and patrons who volunteered to sell T-shirts and make donations to keep the venue alive during the COVID pandemic. “This was my first thought when trying to thank them all for their cooperation during those difficult times,” he said.
The system previously installed had been huge and featured old long-throw cabinets. Their disproportionate size not only made the stage looked

UK - Theatres Trust, the charity that campaigns to protect the UK’s theatres, has published its annual Theatres at Risk Register, which highlights theatres across the UK under threat of closure, redevelopment or severe decay, but which all have the potential to be revived for their local communities.
Theatres Trust has removed three theatres from the list, which are no longer considered at risk due to advocacy, planning and viability advice from Theatres Trust, along with the vital support of their respective local authorities, theatre operators and community groups.
Century Theatre, a travelling theatre that toured the country in the post-war years, is now looking more secure in its permanent home in Coalville Leicestershire. It had been threatened by the redevelopment of its site and had been added to the Theatres at Risk Register in 2014, but it is n

UK - Now in its 15th year, PLASA Focus Leeds is set to return to the Royal Armouries for another year from 9-10 May. Free to attend, the popular regional event connects thousands of professionals with many of the biggest names in live entertainment technology.
With a sold-out show floor, PLASA Focus Leeds is set to be a powerful platform for networking and discovery. 150+ brands representing pro audio, AV, lighting, rigging and staging will span two halls, offering visitors to opportunity to see new products up close while speaking face to face with potential new suppliers.
Headline sponsor Ambersphere will showcase the latest from Astera, Ayrton, MA Lighting, Robert Juliat, and Zactrack. Lighting professionals can also look forward to meeting Artistic Licence, Avolites, Chauvet Professional, ETC, GLP UK, Robe, and Vari-Lite.
Top quality pro audio is also on offe

USA/Europe - Lighting designers have been quick to adopt Elation’s KL Panel XL for soft light illumination in broadcast and film environments of all types. Now the full-colour-spectrum soft light is available in an IP65 version - the KL Panel XL IP - that makes it an even more versatile broadcast-quality luminaire.
The fixture’s IP65 design means the KL Panel XL IP can be used in a wider range of applications and locations. Suitable for use in both indoor and outdoor settings, it is an ideal soft light solution for on-location applications. Its weatherproof design allows it to function properly in harsh environments and adverse conditions, eliminating the need for frequent cleaning and maintenance and saving both time and cost.
The KL Panel XL IP offers ‘exceptional output with precise control over colour temperature and full-spectrum colour rendering for an ev

USA - For Patrick Dierson, it was a case of really bad timing. The day before he was scheduled to travel to The Kia Forum for the iHeartRadio ALTer Ego concert, he had to cancel his flight after testing positive for COVID.
“It was a real bummer, as this is one of my favourite projects,” said Dierson, the production designer for the big alternative music concert. “It was particularly disheartening given what a non-event my sickness turned out to be. So, I had to work on this one remotely. In the end, though it proved to be way more of a personal disappointment than an actual production challenge.
“Things went smoothly because of the team we have onsite, beginning with our project manager and gaffer, Zack Guthimiller, and our LD, Justin Cheatham, as well as the crews from 4Wall Entertainment, C2W Rigging, and Diversified Production Services.”
There was an

Denmark - When it opened in September of last year, the new campus of Sonic College - a unit of the University of South Denmark in Kolding - immediately vaulted to the top ranks of European educational institutions for all disciplines related to sound design for music, film, video, and gaming. The new facility boasts 10 studios for sound creation, recording, and mixing, but what sets Sonic College apart is what the school calls their “sound-embracing atrium”.
More than 180 Meyer Sound self-powered loudspeakers are installed throughout the five-story space, with about half facing into the open atrium and the remainder placed in the ceilings of connected corridors. Each loudspeaker is connected to a discrete output of a Galileo Galaxy Network Platform, which allows dynamic panning of multiple sound sources throughout the entire space using Meyer Sound’s Spacemap Go spat

Spain - Returning to its normal January/February timeslot in the AV calendar, ISE 2023 had 58,107 attendees from 155 countries, alongside record-breaking occupation in the city’s hotels, bars and entertainment venues, and with exhibitors reporting ‘unparalleled footfall’ on booths across the show floor.
Mike Blackman, managing director of Integrated Systems Events, commented: “It’s been an extraordinary week and it’s hugely gratifying for us to look back and realise we’ve delivered an exceptional show for our industry and the wonderful city of Barcelona.
“We’ve had unprecedented visitor levels to the show, so much inspiring content and features on display, and ground-breaking visits from the King of Spain on Tuesday and the President of Catalonia on Thursday to add both a royal and a political seal of approval to the show. This week at ISE 2023 confir

Sweden - Pop supergroup GES (an acronym derived from the surnames of three of the country’s biggest singing stars – Anders Glenmark, Orup (Thomas Eriksson) and Niklas Strömstedt – continued a rollercoaster tour that started in 2021, wrapping up 2022 with a 33-date sold-out residency at Stockholm’s Cirkus venue.
The lighting and visual stage design was created by Palle Palmé, based around the architecture of this circular-shaped venue which was also where the tour had originally kicked off all those months ago after the first Covid restrictions were lifted.
The design featured two truss circles – large and small – and a curved LED screen on an automation system, with an all-Robe lighting rig in the air.
Backed by a versatile band, the whirlwind-paced show romped through a string of hits from the collective and individual careers of GES to which the

Europe - Prolight Concepts Group has introduced the Elumen8 Evora 740ZP LED Zoom Wash produces a high output from a very compact and durable chassis, making it a versatile yet affordable solution for both rental and installation applications.
The first-class optical system presents a high intensity adjustable zoom; the narrow 4 degree beam angle creates sharp mid-air effects, whilst the wider angles produce uniform colour mixing, bathing concerts and events in rich colours.
Full pixel control over the seven 40W Osram Ostar quad-colour LEDs gives lighting designers a further level of creativity, whilst colour calibration ensures colours match from batch to batch.

Europe - Bosch has announced the Integrus Omneo transmitter, a new addition to the Integrus Wireless Language Distribution System. The Integrus Wireless Language Distribution System, which is widely found in parliaments and used for international congresses, is designed for multilingual meetings to enable attendees to understand speeches in their native language. The audio signals of simultaneous interpretations are transmitted to pocket receivers and headphones via radiators utilizing proven, tamper-free infrared technology.
Thanks to the built-in Omneo IP architecture, the Integrus Omneo transmitter can seamlessly interconnect with the fully IP-based Dicentis conference devices from Bosch. This allows all existing Dicentis users – building owners, rental companies and system integrators specifying the Dicentis conference system – to integrate Integrus systems in an eas

France - Anolis ArcPar 150 Outdoor architectural luminaires have been installed for an urban lighting renovation scheme – halving the power consumption – in and around the vibrant Gerland Park district of Lyon.
Gerland is a dynamic residential area that has also become a hub for emerging tech companies and commerce and a hotspot for sports and entertainment events with several world-class venues located in its 7th arrondissement catchment area.
Lighting designer Laurent Fachard, founder of Les Éclairagistes Associés (LEA), has worked extensively in and around this area, and recently two of his key landscape lighting projects were updated with new LED technology that had subsequently come to the market.
The new Anolis lighting authentically replicates his original illuminated art, simultaneously making these landmark urban lighting designs more energy effic

Italy - Neapolitan rapper and record producer Luchè, former member of the hip hop group Co'Sang, landed in arenas across Italy with his latest platinum-selling album DVLA - Dove Volano Le Aquile. The sell-out tour has crossed Italy from Naples to Milan via Rome and Rimini and will reach London in March 2023 for a special one-off date. During the tour the singer was joined by other stars of the Italian music scene such as Shiva, Elisa, Marracash, Sfera Ebbasta, Paky and Guè.
Lighting designer Giorgio ‘Josh’ Geromin chose 42 Ayrton Domino Profile S fixtures as the main light source and key lighting for the tour. The concept started from the idea of an eagle's flight, echoing the name of the album Dove Volano Le Aguile (Where Eagles Soar) and symbolising a human being’s attempt to rise up and land on Mars. From this was born the idea of approaching the stage as i

Spain - Powersoft has launched its third-generation fixed-install amplifier platform, UNICA.
The UNICA range comprises three four-channel (UNICA 9K4, 12K4 and 16K4, with 9,000W, 12,000W and 16,000W respectively) and three eight-channel models (UNICA 2K8, 4K8 and 8K8, with 2,000W, 4,000W and 8,000W).
Featuring high power density, sound quality and backed by five new patents and four existing ones, UNICA represents the third and latest generation of Powersoft amplifier platforms, designed to meet the requirements of any size of installation with a single product family, explains Powersoft’s R&D director and co-founder, Claudio Lastrucci.
“UNICA is engineered to accommodate upcoming functions and feature expansions to fulfil the most demanding audio design requirements for years to come – all within a single platform,” says Lastrucci. “By listening to

Italy - Chauvet Professional has appointed Zalight the exclusive distributor of its products in Italy.
"The timing of Chauvet and Zalight joining forces to develop the Italian market is spot on, as both companies share a similar vision and culture,” said Stéphane Gressier, international sales director of Chauvet. “We are thrilled to start this new adventure with Graziano Zanini and Luca Di Donato's team at Zalight. Antonio Parise, our business development manager EMEA, and Goran Doncic, our senior European business development manager EMEA, and the rest of the Chauvet team are looking forward to accomplishing great things with Zalight.”
Graziano Zanini, CEO of Zalight, is equally enthused about the new agreement, staging, “Chauvet Professional needs no introduction. It is a highly respected global brand with offices with universally recognized leadership, and

USA - ESTA has announced that Richard Nix is the new technical standards manager for the Technical Standards Programme (TSP). His predecessor, Karl Ruling, will stay on in a supporting role.
Nix’s involvement in the development of standards spans decades. In early 1994 he was already actively involved in the USITT Rigging Standards project when discussions began about the TSP and its mission. He immediately came on board as a volunteer and has been, as he puts it, “a rather hyperactive standards evangelist ever since,” having led multiple tasks groups over the years before joining ESTA as assistant technical standards manager in May 2019.
Former technical standards manager Ruling will now be senior technical standards manager. “I am stepping back so that Richard can step forward, and I am sure he will excel. Richard has been involved in the TSP for as long as

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