UK - Golf's Ryder Cup paid its first visit to Wales this year, the tournament taking place in early October at the Celtic Manor Resort, near Newport. Beforehand, Cardiff's Millennium Stadium hosted Welcome To Wales, a glittering VIP dinner and live concert which showcased the country's musical talent to the sporting visitors. Three DiGiCo D5 consoles ensured that the Welsh voices came through loud and clear.

The sound reinforcement demands of the event were complex, the Millennium Stadium being divided into two for the dinner and concert elements. Audio company Capital Sound was required to treat both the dinner and concert as separate entities which were effectively competing against one another. Walk-in music was provided to mask the sounds of the dinner from the public filing into the concert seats but, at the same time, a performance by male choir Only Men Aloud in th

UK - Kent-based PA company, SRD Group, was appointed to provide a sound reinforcement system for a large scale 16,000 capacity outdoor classical music event at Leeds Castle, selecting a range of units from its stock of Allen & Heath iLive digital hardware and using the latest 'DualRack' capability.

The varied programme included opera, musical theatre, military band, traditional choral, and a headline performance by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by John Rigby and accompanied by soloists Wynne Evans (tenor), Elizabeth Watts (soprano) and Richard Morrison (baritone). The evening was also narrated by actor Robert Powell, featured the marching band of the Brigade of Gurkhas, and included a fireworks and cannons finale.

"With crowd coverage extending 365m deep x 100m wide, and due to the predominantly orchestral material, audio requirements reached 180 inputs. To c

USA - New York City's landmark Brill Building, KMA Music continues to book a range of VIP artists to record chart-topping hits, with the help of AKG microphones. From vocals to instrumentation, AKG has been a go-to microphone in KMA's Studios A and B for numerous performers since opening its doors in 2007.

Utilising AKG's C 12 VR Tube microphone and a set of C 414's, Studio Manager Dave 'Roz' Rosner offers his clients, including Jordan Sparks, Jay Sean, Jay-Z, Neil Diamond, Paul Simon, Lil Wayne, Beyonce and many others, a selection of the most widely requested microphones in the industry at a moment's notice

"Each artist has their own personal taste, but a large portion of our clientele are very loyal and will request the C 12 for their sessions," he said. "The C 12 is a great microphone and really gives a 'whomp' to any artists' vocals." The C 12 is also

USA - Located in Fayetteville, Georgia, about 20 miles south of Atlanta, Suburban Legend Audio has made a name for itself by specialising in audio for live theatre production. "We were formed about six years ago, initially doing all recording work," states owner Jonathan Wade. "But I've always been involved in live theatre, and that has become a very successful niche for us as well."

Recently, demand for Suburban Legend's production expertise expanded to the point where the company had clearly outgrown its Allen & Heath GL3300 analogue console. "In shopping around for a larger board, I knew that going digital would provide a lot of advantages, both in terms of operational flexibility and being more portable and self-contained," states Wade. "The expanded audio capabilities, sound quality, and lower cost made the iLive-T Series an obvious choice

Canada - The recent Canadian Country Music Association awards show featured an Electro-Voice sound reinforcement system, designed and provided by the Winnipeg office Sound Art.

"We've been an EV house for a long time," says Sound Art technical projects manager Iain Graham. "Their gear is very reliable, and EV is consistently evolving their processing, so their speaker systems keep sounding better and better." Graham designed the system in Electro-Voice's Line Array Prediction Software (LAPS) and directed on-site setup.

FOH mixing was handled by Toronto-based freelancer Peter Stoynich, while the mix on the EV Xw12 stage monitors was handled by Gerald Sawchuk, also of Sound Art Winnipeg, with Chase Tower and Dave Coe from Sound Art Calgary on RF and patch, respectively. Mike Noga, an independent technician from Edmonton was the fifth member of the Sound Art c

UK - Yamaha's M7CL and LS9 digital mixing consoles continue to make inroads in the education market. The latest establishment to invest in Yamaha is Aberystwyth University, which recently took delivery of two new systems.

Supplied by SSE Audio Group, the new equipment comprises an M7CL-48ES and LS9-32 digital mixing consoles, MY16-ES64 Ethersound interface cards for the latter, three SB168-ES stage boxes and two Nexo PA systems.

"When I moved here just over a year ago, it was obvious that the equipment needed updating," says the university's technical manager David Mitchell. "Having never worked in education before, it surprised me that the technical theatre students were still using rather dated methods to run live shows."

He continues, "I knew that this was going to be a one-off opportunity to get the university to buy a system that would bring the

UK - Entec Sound & Light supplied sound and lighting equipment and crew for Steve Miller's recent UK and European tour, showcasing his latest Bingo album.

Entec won the contract after being recommended to production manager Brett Enzensperger by Milwaukee based Clearwing Productions, the company that supplies technical production for all Steve Miller's US based live work, and with whom Entec also has a close association.

They wanted an operation that could deliver a competitive all-in production package for sound and lighting. Says Enzensperger, "I asked Clearwing's Gregg Brunclik who I should use for production in Europe, and Entec was the clear choice. Gregg knows the standards I expect from a rental company, so I knew that Entec would fit the bill - and also that account manager Noreen O'Riordan would put up with me."

Steve Miller's show was designed by N

USA - Royer Labs has reached a new distribution agreement with the German company S.E.A. Vertrieb & Consulting covering Germany, Switzerland, and Austria.

Headquartered in Emsbüren, Germany, S.E.A. Vertrieb & Consulting carries a wide range of products for today's audio professional, including microphones, signal processors, mixing consoles, digital audio networking equipment, and sound reinforcement systems.

"We are very pleased to be representing Royer Labs," says managing director Uwe Kirchfeld. "Royer is one of the world's premium microphone companies and is a perfect fit with our existing line card. The microphone is one of the most important components in terms of ensuring a quality recording or true to the source sound acquisition for live sound reinforcement purposes and Royer Labs is a first-tier choice among today's discriminating audio pros.

"

USA StagePro (Ottawa, Kansas) provided the live sound reinforcement system for the LDI Awards Ceremony, held at the recent LDI trade show in Las Vegas. The Awards recognised excellence in a variety of categories related to the live design, events and staging industry, including lighting, audio and video. The audio system featured a comprehensive range of products from Harman Professional, highlighted by JBL's subcompact Vertec line arrays.

For the event, StagePro supplied the audio reinforcement system as part of its Apex Mobile Stage. The main PA system included left/right hangs of four Vertec VT4886 subcompact line array loudspeakers and two VT4883 subcompact arrayable subwoofers per side, supplemented by an additional four VT4886 loudspeakers placed along the centre edge of the stage for front-fill.

"The response to the awards ceremony was very positive and the audio s

Germany - The Journey Home World Tour 2010 celebrates A.R. Rahman's prolific career, including songs from Slumdog Millionaire as well as landmark Indian films Lagaan, Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na, Dil Se, Rang De Basanti and Roja.

Monitor engineer Doug Kimball (Rob Thomas, Christina Aguilera, Goo Goo Dolls) insisted that the tour switch over to a complete Sennheiser package to accommodate the 12 wireless vocals, four wireless instrument packs, 38 wireless personal monitors, plus a plethora of conventional and unconventional instruments.

"In my opinion, there are a lot of mic manufacturers that make products that will do a passable job for a straight-up rock show involving musicians without nuanced technique," says Kimball. "But Rahman's show is much more than a straight-up rock show, and both he and the people he performs

USA - Ross Ashton of UK-based The Projection Studio was commissioned by the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust to be the main artist for the 2010 Pittsburgh Festival of Lights, for which he produced four projection works.

It's Ashton's first major work in the US and follows his installations at last year's event for curators Marguerite Jarrett-Marks and Christopher Oberdorf and another that he produced for New Year's Eve 2009/2010. The challenge was on to produce something that was completely different from anything in the past and that would engage the public as well as bring critical acclaim to the festival.

The Festival of Light was concentrated in The Cultural Quarter of the city, and the art works had to utilise existing architecture and spaces, which for projection purposes, were primarily confined to a series of flat walled buildings.

Says Ashton, "It was a great p

India - With a 60,000-plus seating capacity, Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi is the biggest venue used for the October, 2010 XIX Commonwealth Games. The stadium hosted athletics events and, most importantly, served as the venue for the Games' opening and closing ceremonies. The stadium is equipped with an audio system from Electro-Voice

The EV loudspeaker spec at Nehru Stadium comprises 132 customized XLC127DVX (line-array), 120 Sx300PI, 300 EVID 6.2, and 60 ZX5-60PI surface-mounted systems, all driven by a combination of 135 P3000RL and TG amplifiers to deliver an average of 107 dB and a peak of 115 dB. The entire system is remote-controlled and supervised from a single laptop in the stadium control room, all via EV's IRIS-Net software platform. The system's Auto Gain Control increases or decreases the sound levels consistent with changes in the level of ambient crowd noi

Ireland - The Convention Centre Dublin (CCD), which opened in September, features a technical specification including four DiGiCo SD series mixing consoles.

Costing €380m, The CCD is Ireland's first purpose-built convention centre. It features 22 multi-functional spaces and can host up to 8,000 people at a time.

The three biggest single spaces are the 2000-seat Auditorium, a theatre which encompasses the top three floors of the building; The Forum, a 2721sq.m exhibition hall which can house over 3000 delegates for a conference or up to 2000 for a banquet and The Liffey, a 1650sq.m space which can hold 1800 conference delegates or 1200 banqueting guests. The latter can be divided into two separate rooms by the lowering of a soundproof wall from the ceiling.

The technical specification was agreed between developers The Convention Centre Dublin and consultant Theatre Projects,

Australia - The Gold Coast's latest destination is The Envy Hotel, a uniquely different venue in the heart of Broadbeach. Formerly Brannigans, The Envy Hotel houses the Envy Bistro, the Envy Lounge Bar, and the Envy Nightclub.

Situated on the ground floor is the Envy Bar with its modern design including glass stairs to one side and dry bars. The Envy Bar opens out directly on to the very busy Broadbeach mall via large bi-fold doors that allow the wonderful Gold Coast weather to flow through the venue.

"Opening your venue to the elements is a wonderful idea but how do you pacify the sound police in such a built up area? The answer is the revolutionary Jbn Sound Ceiling," says the company.

"I've been dealing with Jbn Sound Ceilings for years as it is such a good product," commented Peter Shaw, managing director of Peter Shaw Electronics who specified and in

USA - With over 20 years of touring experience with such diverse acts as Rage Against The Machine, Maroon 5, Cypress Hill, Collective Soul, and Weird Al Yankovic, FOH engineer Joel Lonky has seen and solved a wide range of performance issues, but few are so chaotic as his current gig mixing with Rob Zombie.

"The show is chaotic and unpredictable," he states. "I don't have the luxury of knowing what will happen next, so I needed a console that would allow me to stay on top of any situation that might arise. The PRO6 turned out to be the ideal solution."

Lonky changed to a PRO6 between tour legs, and not without some trepidation. "The decision to make a change mid-tour was not taken lightly," he recalls. "Our first show after the break was at Gibson Amphitheatre in LA with Alice Cooper - no place to have a 'learning curve day'. Fortunately, the

USA - Almost three years in the making, Alan Parsons' 10-hour video series on sound recording is now available in a 3-DVD boxed set format.

Narrated by actor and musician Billy Bob Thornton, the DVDs are divided into 24 sections, starting with A Brief History Of Recording.

Technical sections come with custom diagrams and musical examples and include in-depth looks at EQ, compression, reverb, and delays. Recording equipment is spotlighted in Microphones, Consoles & Controllers, Monitoring, and Computers & Digital Audio, while a set of specific recording guides looks at Vocals, Guitars, Bass, Keyboards, and Drums. A series of practical recording sections look at Recording Acoustic Guitar with Vocal, Recording a Choir, A Band Tracking Session, Internet Recording, and, most crucially, Dealing With Disasters.

Alan Parsons' career -

Europe - Since the beginning of May, American heavy metallers Manowar, Guinness World Record holders for being the loudest band in the world, have been performing their Death to Infidels World Tour 2010 around the globe. The team from management company Magic Circle Music, with Jeff Hair from Aggressive Sound at front-of-house, have been with the band throughout. Monitor engineer Achim Lanzendorf and his DiGiCo SD9, provided by production company B&R Medientechnik, joined them for part of the European leg.

B&R Medientechnik has a long-standing association with Manowar, having first worked with them on the VivaLive-TV coverage of Ringfest in Cologne in 2002. Since then, the association has developed, not only between the band and the rental company, but also with Magic Circle Music and God of Thunder Production.

Numerous recordings, festivals, tours and ambitious

Japan - Clockaudio is preparing to increase its presence and profile in the AV and conferencing market in Japan, with the appointment of a new distributor Onkyo Tokki to represent the brand.

Tokyo-based Onkyo Tokki is a busy and well-known pro-audio equipment importer, bringing in several blue-chip brands from around the world, including EAW, Mackie, QSC and Powersoft, as well as Cadac and LA Audio mixing consoles. Earlier this year, the company was awarded the agency for Bi-amp, which was a persuasive credential for Clockaudio, as the products are often paired together in installation specifications.

Kyozo Ichitani from Onkyo Tokki expects the Clockaudio portfolio to perform well with Japan's TV broadcast companies and in the conferencing sector, appealing to both Japanese and overseas consultants. "Clockaudio has a very good reputation with the Japanese installation com

USA - beyerdynamic is to debut the world's first wireless ribbon microphone at this week's AES Convention in San Francisco. The RM 510 interchangeable ribbon capsule for beyerdynamic's Opus 900 and Opus 600 wireless systems is billed as "a giant leap forward in ribbon technology and brings a new dimension to live vocal performances".

The RM 510's capsule design features an ultra-light, 3mm thick aluminium ribbon that "delivers spectacular frequency response and exceptional transient behaviour". A unique sound channelling technology provides the capsule with its cardioid polar pattern making the RM 510 the very first ribbon capsule perfect for use on stage with wireless microphone systems, says the company. In keeping with beyerdynamic's manufacturing philosophy, every RM 510 wireless microphone capsule is handmade in Germany.

By employing a sound labyrinth

UK - Shropshire events production experts have helped to stage one of the UK's most unique festivals. The team from stagecraftuk, in Telford, installed the main music stage at this year's Freeze Festival which was held at Battersea Power Station.

The festival attracts snowboard, ski and music fans from all over the UK, and welcomes the world's very best skiers and snowboarders who compete on a specially erected 32m high, 100m long real snow ramp.

As well as the snow competitions, musical acts perform in a marquee on the site over the three days and this year's line-up included Mark Ronson, and Krafty Kuts & MC Dynamite.

A team of 10 from stagecraftuk was brought in to handle the all-important staging, and as well as installing over 330sq m of main stage, they also installed five drum risers for the artists' drum kits.

Gerald Salt, for the Telford company, said: "The w

Lebanon The downtown Capitole Roof Top Bar makes for one of the most vibrant nocturnal rendezvous in Beirut.

"Place is everything," said Capitole's co-owner Samer Rizk, "and Capitole's position is spectacular, but creating a successful open air venue in the heart of the city presents its own special challenges. Yes of course we have to consider our neighbours when we put a powerful sound system into the Capitole, and until this year this was a problem for us: and we must also consider our clients."

The Capitole operates as a bar and restaurant until midnight when it metamorphoses into a nightclub. These multiple considerations saw Rizk consult local sound specialist Seebeck Audio, whose director Youssef Aoun attended personally. "I made the preliminary design in 2009; a mix of the new d&b audiotechnik E8 loudspeakers, with E0s used to provide audio lif

Japan - Turbosound has announced the formation of a new pro audio company dedicated to the promotion and distribution of its professional loudspeaker systems in Japan.

Turbosound Japan, a new partnership between Turbosound Ltd and All Access Inc, will be launched at the Inter BEE show which takes place in Tokyo from 17-19 November. To accompany the launch, a wide selection of Turbosound products will be exhibited - including the Flex Array tour sound systems; the new TFM-560 and RACKDP-50 professional bi-amped floor monitor package; the IMPACT architectural loudspeakers; and Turbosound's complete range of dedicated sound contracting products - with experts from Japan and the UK on hand to advise and demonstrate.

President of All Access Cozy Hattori commented, "I am greatly looking forward to working with Turbosound. The brand has a long and rich history in Japan, and I am

California Calling - This week's 129th AES Convention in San Francisco will feature a strong element of live sound-based seminars, workshops and presentations. Included in the convention programme is Lunchtime Keynotes which will offer attendees a series of three lunchtime keynote presentations.

Convention co-chair Valerie Tyler reports that, "Lunchtime Keynotes provide an opportunity for attendees to take a break from the hectic Exhibition Hall and concentration-intensive workshops, master classes, platinum and educational programmes and relax as acknowledged industry leaders provide the benefit of their years of experience in a quiet and informal environment. Last year's Lunchtime Keynotes benefited from extremely positive word of mouth, and we're confident that this year's programme will draw appreciative audiences."

Kicking off proceedings wil

UK - When Welsh National Opera was commissioned by the Welsh Assembly Government to host an event at Wales Millennium Centre as part of the Ryder Cup celebrations, they wanted to give their guests something special to remember the evening by.

They decided to make a live recording of the performance of the Chorus and Orchestra of Welsh National Opera, which would be reproduced during the evening, burned onto pre-printed CDs, placed into pre-printed wallets and handed to each of the 350 guests as they left after dinner. This ambition was achieved in a special partnership with a team of technicians from Sennheiser UK.

The guests included the respective American and European Ryder Cup teams, their wives and partners, management, Ryder Cup sponsor representatives as well as significant VIPs from Europe and America. Sennheiser's team of Dave Wooster (live sound specialist), Andy Lil

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