By Design Day - Although 23 April has passed, it's not too late to support By Design Day 2011, which raises money for Light Relief in the UK and Behind the Scenes in the US and Canada. Some of the industry's top designers pledged that day's royalties to the two charities while others are choosing to make a straightforward donation. By Design Day is being championed this year by an illustrious group of international designers from a number of design disciplines including Neil Austin, Ken Billington, Paule Constable, Jonathan Deans, Rick Fisher, Howard Harrison, Scott Lehrer, Tony Meola, Scott Pask, Ken Posner, Jennifer Tipton, and Hugh Vanstone.

Royalties have been pledged from shows on stages all over the world including Hamlet and Moonlight (Jon Clark); Warhorse, Clybourne Park, and Les Mis 25th Anniversary Tour (Constable); La Cage Aux Fo

UAE - Eighteen leading local technical and production contractors will supply equipment, crew, services and technical expertise free for a concert taking place in Dubai on 27 April 2011, at the Aviation Club in Garhoud, which will be in support of Peace One Day.

UB40's Ali Campbell and a full ten piece band will be topping the bill on 27 April, and this will be followed by two further evenings of action-packed shows including a host of local artists.

The main concert sponsors are Al Laith Event Services, Creative Technology, Delta Sound, EFM Event Logistics and Neumann & Mueller.

Staging, roofing, FOH, barriers and production village cabins will be provided by Al Laith Event Services; lighting and rigging by Neumann & Mueller; sound by Delta; LED screens, projection and cameras by CT, with logistical support from freighting experts, EFM Event Logistics.

A further 13 local

UK - Thin Lizzy are using a DiGiCo's 500th SD8 console on monitors for their current tour. Brian Downey, Scott Gorham and Darren Wharton are joined onstage by Marco Mendoza, former Almighty frontman Ricky Warwick and Def Leppard's Vivian Campbell. All are very much from the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school of rock so, for the band's recent UK and European tour, monitor engineer Phil Shenton used the tried-and-tested formula that has served hard rock well for decades.

"My remit was that the band wants to keep it old school," says Shenton. "No in-ears, it's six loud wedge mixes, side-fills and an analogue rock 'n' roll sound.

"My good friend Matt Coton of BCS Audio had been lucky enough to win the 500th SD8 at PLASA 2010," Phil continues. "I've always been a fan of DiGiCo consoles, so I gave Matt a call and hired the SD8 for the UK

Canada - Montreal's Les Grands Ballets Canadien recently purchased an Allen & Heath iLive digital mixing system following a trial run on a three week production of Leonce et Lena. The Company selected a system comprising an iDR-32 MixRack and iLive-R72 Control Surface due to its compactness, flexibility and versatility, which would be suitable for both touring and installed in their home venue, the Theatre Maisonneuve at the Place des Arts.

Audio sources included a mixture of pre-recorded tracks, sound effects and a live orchestra. Three Macbooks, two installed at FOH and one in the orchestra pit, were set up to run different software packages, including Cricket V2, Qlab V2 and ILive Editor. The pit Macbook contained organ tracks to be played by one of the musicians, while all additional music and sound effects had redundant back-ups and the musicians tracks were controlled from

India - Earlier this year, AbhangaNaad: The Voice of Devotion took place on the University Grounds of Shivaji University in Kolhapur. Featuring approximately 2,500 Warkari (devotees of Lord Vithoba) singing in unison and accompanied by 1,350 Dhols (traditional Indian 'dhangar'drums), the event celebrated divine love in the presence of His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, also known as guruji.

This massive concert attracted more than 120,000 devotees plus another 3m television viewers throughout India. Sound reinforcement for an event of this magnitude required loudspeaker systems that could project over a large area with excellent speech intelligibility and music reproduction characteristics. D.A.S. Audio's Aero Series line array system was chosen for the task.

Organised in a bid to attract youth to Indian folk traditions, AbhangaNaad featured devotional songs and meditation as

Greece - The Costa Navarino complex stretches for two kilometres along the coast of the Messinia region of Greece and comprises two five star deluxe resort hotels, golf courses, restaurants, conference facilities, spas and dedicated activity centres for teenagers and children.

Yamaha's Greek importer Philippos Nakas SA won the tender to supply and install a high quality audio system throughout the site, playing background music in all the public areas such as bars, restaurants, children's play centres, hotel lobbies and reception areas.

System designer Vasilis Drimouras chose a Cobranet-based network, due to its cost-effectiveness and also because any latency is consistent throughout the network. Divided into 85 zones, the system features 32 Yamaha DME4io-C satellite DME units and 110 XH-200 distribution amplifiers to power its loudspeakers.

The system is used to simultaneou

UK - Digital mixing console manufacturer DiGiCo has been awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise in the International Trade category. This is the first time DiGiCo has won the award in this category, having previously received an award in 2005 in the Innovation category. The current award has been granted for almost doubling its overseas earnings and exporting the vast majority of its products since its incorporation in 2002.

"As a UK company, manufacturing in the UK, it's especially gratifying and significant to be recognised by Buckingham Palace and the board of the Queen's Award Office in this way," says DiGiCo managing director, James Gordon. "It's testament to the strength of the DiGiCo team and to all our international partners, who have worked extremely hard to help us achieve this. We couldn't have done it without them."

DiGiCo's first digital cons

UAE - Meyer Sound has announced the incorporation of Meyer Sound Middle East, located in Dubai Media City in United Arab Emirates. Serving the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent, and North Africa, the new office will put customers in closer reach to Meyer Sound's offerings that include technical support, design services, and education, in addition to its high-performance loudspeakers, active acoustic technology, and system integration tools, says the company.

"The development of the AV industry in the Middle East has made it essential for us to form a strategic presence in Dubai, which will serve as an important regional hub for our business operations in the territory," says Helen Meyer, executive vice president of Meyer Sound. "This new office will give local audio professionals better access to the complete portfolio of our products and services, and allow us

Qatar - The partnership between Qatar and AVtech tech has been getting stronger as Doha is emerging as a major venue for international sport events. Qatar hosted the 2011 AFC Asian Cup finals from January 7 to 29 this year. It was the 15th time the tournament has been held and the second time it has been hosted by Qatar.

Since the 15th Asian Games, Doha 2006, AVtech has been providing all broadcast, AV solutions for sports venues and games. So when it came to the AFC Asian cup, AVtech was the obvious choice.

AVtech is a leading supplier of high-end audio, video, broadcast and lighting equipment from the some of the most reputable manufacturers in the world. The company is well known for designing leading-edge live performance systems and projects with superb performance-ready systems in the field of sound, lighting, video and multimedia applications.

For ACF, AVtech, along w

USA - Community Professional Loudspeakers has announced their sponsorship of a series of HOW-TO Church Sound workshops presented by Fits and Starts Productions.

This successful workshop series has toured cities and churches across America for seven years, and kicks off another season in 2011, offering six new tour segments of six cities each, plus several private training sessions. The programme features full eight- hour hands-on Live Sound for Worship workshops with equipment fully integrated, as well as a Recording and Podcasting Seminar.

Designed for the church audio volunteer, live sound personnel, media and praise band members, each workshop is produced by industry veteran Hector La Torre and presented by sound reinforcement engineer Mike Sokol. The programme offers attendees a rare opportunity to learn about church sound systems in a professional manner.

The HOW-TO Chu

USA - Originally opened in 1941 as the Plaza Movie Theatre, the Texas Music Theatre has gone through a variety of incarnations, including a live theatre, cinema, restaurant and live music venue. Shutting its doors in 2008, this already-decaying building went further downhill, becoming another clichéd historic building locals spoke about with regret, wondering when some enterprising team would swoop in and uncover the space's potential.

In March of this year that dream was realized when the Texas Music Theatre opened its doors, offering a solid rotation of live country, country-rock, indie rock, blues and tejano-salsa-latin. The venue's $2.4m renovation includes new flooring, new décor, and a powerful new audio system built around Renkus-Heinz line arrays.

Gray Gregson, head of production comments, "It's a big, flat, square brick box with high ceilings. We ha

USA - The next PLASA Control Protocols Plugfest will take place 22-24 July at the DFW Marriott Solana in Westlake, Texas. The event brings colleagues and competitors together to further the industry by testing the limits of control protocols and working out the bugs they encounter. Everyone is welcome to attend.

Plugfest began in January 2009 as part of the ESTA (now PLASA) Technical Standards Programme by members of various Control Protocols Task Groups represent a variety of manufacturers. Twice a year, when they are all in the same place at the same time, they bring controllers, lights, analyzers, and various other tools and devices, and connect them all through a network to look for and resolve problems. People attend from all around the world in an effort to improve their products.

Plugfest was originally created to support the Remote Device Management protocol (ANSI E1.2

USA - From serving as a standard convention hall to hosting concerts and events as extreme as midget car races, the Expo Centre at the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum in Fort Wayne, Indiana, relied on ESCO Communications to install a sound system to easily accommodate sound requirements for the immense variety of events at the venue. Designed by Kansas-City based Acoustical Design Group (ADG), the system at the 108,000sq.ft Expo Centre features a wealth of JBL VP Series loudspeakers.

Working to design an impactful sound system, ADG had to ensure the entire hall, as well as each individual section, would perform flawlessly. An assortment of 116 JBL VP7215 powered loudspeakers are suspended from the ceiling and fed via a Soundweb London system consisting of BLU-160 and BLU-120 processors.

"We wanted a system that could offer traditional conventions and tradeshows perfect

USA - The Big Country Baptist Assembly (BCBA) in Lueders, Texas, is installing a Technomad Berlin 6040 weatherproof loudspeaker on the roof of its new worship centre to broadcast news and prayer sessions across a designated area of its 100-acre campus. The Berlin will also play background music, creating a soothing atmosphere for the approximately 17,000 campers who attend every year.

According to Ray Clark, owner of the Texas-based installation company Tru-Sound Studio, the Berlin 6040 is the most ideal fit for the BCBA campus. Clark noted that one Berlin 6040 loudspeaker is all that is needed to cover a specific recreational area of the campus where most of the outdoor activities take place.

"The Technomad Berlin 6040 is fully weatherproof, which is necessary to withstand the extreme climate conditions in Texas," said Clark. "It also delivers pristine directio

UK - The LD Systems LRX215 is a passive bass reflex multifunctional loudspeaker equipped with 2 x 15" speaker chassis, and a 1" compression driver.

It has been designed for demanding, high power live applications, and can be used as a standalone unit or in combination with a subwoofer. Boasting a whopping power of 600 W, the LRX215 produces a high sound pressure level of 128 dB max with a deep bass foundation and precise & punchy mids, says the company.

It features an integrated tweeter protection circuit, heavy duty steel handles, black carpet covering and an overall rugged construction. The integrated castors allow for easy transportation of this speaker. It is the perfect PA solution for bands, mobile discos or fixed installations in mid-sized clubs and public facilities.

Andrew Richardson, managing director of Adam Hall UK says, "The new LRX215 is a great

USA - After 79 years of ministry, Central Baptist Church celebrated much more than the New Year this January as it launched a portable extension of its permanent church location. Bringing the ministry one step closer to its vision of 'one church meeting in multiple locations', the portable church has been equipped with an Aviom Pro64 digital snake, creating an audio solution that is both cost-effective and easily expandable.

Located in Jonesboro, AR, Central Baptist Church's permanent location seats about 2,500 members and hosts many services each week. Over the past year, the church has been working to expand into a multi-campus church, including the launch of the portable Journey Campus, that administers contemporary services to Arkansas State University (ASU) students and the community's growing population. EliteMULTIMEDIA was tasked with designing a setup for Journey Campus

UK - Cheltenham and Peterborough-based Event and Management Services Ltd has been appointed to oversee technical operations and production delivery for the Scarborough Open Air Theatre season 2011.

The newly redeveloped theatre, which can accommodate up to 8,000 in its largest format, was opened by The Queen in May 2010 and held its first season between June and August 2010 with capacity audiences to see shows such as a Gala Evening with Jose Carreras, Dame Kiri te Kanawa and '80s rewind.

For 2011, the arena seating has been extended from 6,500 to 8,000 using temporary decking to bridge the lake that sits in front of the stage and the season opens on 5th June with Sir Elton John in concert.

Pete Allison, MD of Event & Management Services said: "This is a great piece of work for us, we're well used to consulting on and managing the production and site issues around large

UAE - Renkus-Heinz is hosting the Middle East launch of the IC2 (IC Squared) at PALME in Dubai this week. The system is billed as the world's first high powered, medium format digitally steerable loudspeaker system.

Renkus-Heinz is also showing the expanding IC Live family of digitally steerable array loudspeakers, and the new CF/CFX101-LA Modular Point Source Array, a potent solution for today's small and mid-sized venues, including auditoria, night clubs, theatres and houses of worship.

IC² combines the control and flexibility of Iconyx digitally steerable technology with the power and focus of a point source loudspeaker, creating the world's first 'hybrid array' with the full benefits of both technologies, says the company.

(Jim Evans)

Germany - For the 16th year running, the Irish denizens of Munich along with friends of the Emerald Isle celebrated St Patrick's Day (17 March) with a parade through the heart of the Bavarian capital. The turn-out was substantial, with the 20,000 plus revellers watching the show, on top of the 1,200 people actually taking part, making this probably the largest St Patrick's Day parade on the European mainland.

For after the parade, the organisers had prepared a stage in Munich's Odeonsplatz as well as a varied programme of cultural entertainment the highlight of which was a performance by the three-time Eurovision Song Contest winner Johnny Logan.

The sound production for the event was the responsibility of M7 Veranstaltungstechnik, a company based in Rott am Inn. "We were recommended to the organisers by several sources as being reliable partners with first-class equipmen

China / Vietnam - In Guangzhou, D.A.S. Aero Series 2 and Compact loudspeakers reinforce the city's Performance Theatre. Here, a new sound system consisting of 16 D.A.S. Audio Aero 12A powered, two-way, mid-high line array modules-flown eight elements per side-were placed into service in late 2010.

Compact 218 Sub subwoofers - ground stacked in a left-right configuration - provide low frequency support while Compact 2 (a powered, 3-way, mid-high loudspeaker system) enclosures are deployed for use as front-fills. Six SML-15A powered, 2-way stage monitors/full-range units are used as surround-fills to give the audience a sense of being in a 3-D sound sphere.

This combination of equipment was selected based on the theatre's desire to have a 'punchy' system capable of conveying sound effects and other audio elements in a realistic manner to the audience. Equally important was a hig

UK - Flare Audio has announced the launch of their new professional speaker system Triwave i10. Its design has been focused on a true reference quality loudspeaker with exceptional sonic performance and flexibility, says the company.

The Triwave i10's interchangeable aluminium HF plate allows the system to be a truly multi format solution. The HF plates provide controlled dispersion to suit Line Source, Line Array and Point Source applications.

Incorporating interchangeable HF plates allows the i10 to integrate coherently. Eliminating any compromise of audio processing and phase alignment software, this produces a pure and accurate audio reproduction that every sound engineer strives to create.

Whether using Triwave i10 as a DJ monitor or for a flown arena system, its flexibility and quality will provide a compact solution for the most demanding of applications and artist ri

UAE - Dubai's DUCTAC theatre was the destination for many of the key regional AV integrators and audio consultants on Easter Sunday, to attend the Middle East Pro Audio Seminar, organised by Tannoy Middle East with support from Lab.gruppen, Lake and Biamp Systems. The successful event attracted over 40 attendees and was v well received.

The event was aimed at audio professionals throughout the region with an active involvement in the installed sound market, designed to give them an opportunity to discover the latest product innovations from the TC Group's pro-audio brands; namely Tannoy, Lab.gruppen and Lake, as well as some insight into the market-leading DSP install solutions from Biamp Systems.

The well-equipped community arts theatre proved to be an appropriate venue for demonstrating Tannoy's VQ Series point-source PA system and the company's QFlex digitally steerable col

UK - Blackstar Amplification has been honoured in the 2011 Queen's Awards For Enterprise in the International Trade category. Blackstar has only been in existence for four years - an unusually short period of time in which to earn the award.

Paul Hayhoe, Blackstar UK's sales and marketing director, comments, "In 2007, four friends - all passionate musicians - launched Blackstar Amplification. Having worked together for years at the highest levels of the amp designing industry, their dream was to create new and innovative guitar amplifiers and pedals that would be the ultimate tools for self-expression."

Hayhoe continues, "Since then, we have gone from a shed at the bottom of the garden to a 4500sq.ft facility and a team of 25 amazingly talented and dedicated people. Blackstar products are now distributed in more than 40 countries around the world, but one thing

Italy - RCF has invested in a new facility, called the RCF Audio Academy - a complex of several demo facilities, classrooms and conference areas. At the Audio Academy there is also a 'Room of Sound' - a large area where various different audio applications can be set up, from a standard commercial system to complex DSP-controlled solutions. The Audio Academy is an ideal place for system integrators, FOH sound engineers, installers, rental and "tomorrow's engineers" to participate in courses and have the opportunity to learn about new technologies or get updated with the latest developments and trends. The RCF Audio Academy is based in Reggio Emilia, Italy very close to RCF's international headquarters.

"Our goal with the RCF Audio Academy is to share our knowledge and skills with the industry," says Fausto Incerti, general manager of RCF.

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