UK - A.C. Lighting's Special Projects division has provided the complete supply and installation of lighting technical facilities for the Northern Stage theatre in Newcastle as part of a two year, £9m refurbishment programme.

Formerly known as the Newcastle Playhouse, Northern Stage is the largest producing theatre company in the North East of England and regarded as one of the top-ten UK producing theatres. The venue has been completely redesigned, doubling in size to accommodate three very different performance spaces.

Northern Stage's activities include performing their own major new productions on all three stages, co-producing new work with theatre makers from around the world and all around the UK, and inviting the most exciting theatre companies of all sizes and shapes to bring their work to the North East.

Stage 1 is the theatre's spectacular and versatile main

USA - Elation Professional has launched a new control solution for LEDs and DMX systems used in permanent architectural and entertainment installations. Designed to mount unobtrusively on the wall, the trim, compact AR-32 Architectural DMX Recorder/Playback System can produce professional-quality light shows downloaded from any standard DMX 512 controller, says Elation.

Using the AR-32, operators can now run all of their DMX-compatible lights from one easy-to-operate unit. The system comes factory-programmed for LED fixtures operating in 3-channel or RGB mode, and it can also control automated moving lights and DMX-compatible dimmers and power packs.

Capable of recording and playback in real time, the AR-32 has the ability to record show fade and hold times directly from the DMX controller. Users can programme complex fades and specify multiple cue points in exacting detail us

UK - A huge success story in Spain, street-wear retailer Desigual is now raising its ambitions to a more global level. And to entice shoppers in to sample its ranges of garments, Lighthouse 10mm LED screens are providing an eye-catching entrance in Desigual's most high profile stores, starting with the recently opened store in Las Ramblas in the very heart of Barcelona, Spain.

The company currently has 38 Spanish outlets, in locations from Barcelona to Zaragoza, while new outlets have recently opened in Italy and Singapore with one in London to follow in the spring.

The Desigual store in Las Ramblas, Barcelona is in a prime position, cutting through the heart of the city centre. Such is the popularity of the area and the amount of shopping on offer that something very special is required to make any new retail premises stand out from all the others. Desigual therefore chose tw

The Netherlands - A design team led by the Dutch architects Mecanoo has won the international competition to design the National Kaohsiung Performing Arts Centre in Kaohsiung, Taiwan.

A key team member of the design team, Louis Janssen, from Dutch theatre consulting office, theateradvies bv, was responsible for the design of the up-to-date theatre installations and logistics. The jury was particularly pleased with the interpretation of the programme and design of stage equipment.

The plans includes a concert hall with 2.300 seats, equipped with a flexible stage and all necessary hoisting facilities. A 2,000-seat opera house has a stage floor made up of five double deck elevators that can be moved from -11m to + 2.5m. The surface of these elevators, making up the stage floor, can be tilted and all are equipped with traps.

A 1,000-seat playhouse, a black- box theatre with 200

China - Opposite the famous workers stadium in Beijing, two new locations The Bank Club & Lounge and Jasmine Restaurant & Lounge have been equipped with extensive K.M.E. installations.

The Jasmine, designed in Art-Deco style features a QS 1082, driven by K.M.E. SPA 450 S amplifiers. The digital controller was programmed to customer requirements with different presets while mixing is via a Midas Venice 160.

The Bank boasts a 120sq.m dance floor. On both the right and the left side of the DJ pulpit six PANO QL 906s on TB 500 are flown. QLB 118 subwoofers are set in blocks. The DJ uses K.M.E. CLP 320 as monitors. As front-fill QS 1082 have been installed into the pulpit radiating on the dance floor. Below the gallery on the left and right side QS 1082 are installed as side-fill.

Also, the bar area and lounge are equipped with QS 1082s as delay controlled by a DAP 26. The electr

USA - The Alfred Lerner Hall at Columbia University has a newly installed sound reinforcement system based around Turbosound Aspect loudspeakers.

"I started the relationship with Columbia University's Lerner Hall by providing rental gear," said Lou Mannarino of L&M Sound in Staten Island, New York. "They would rent our equipment for events and activities in Lerner Hall - for everything from culture shows to meetings, concerts and other activities."

The Hall's previous system included a centre cluster that was not covering the room properly, making for unintelligible speech. Plus, the two mix positions were awkwardly placed. "One was behind glass and the other was difficult to manipulate," said Mannarino. "The system itself was underpowered with ceiling speakers used as under balcony fills."

Mannarino's system is based on the Turbosound

UK - Clifton Suspension Bridge spans some 214m across the River Avon linking Clifton in Bristol to Leigh Woods in Somerset, England. Designed by Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, this Grade I listed structure is a landmark of the city of Bristol and has attracted visitors from all over the world for almost 150 years.

The Clifton Suspension Bridge Trust wanted to update the existing lighting of the bridge with a new solution that would display the immense achievement of the structure. Illumination has long been part of the bridge's appeal, but previously it had focused more on a lit bulb component, rather than lighting the bridge structure itself.

With the bridge a key landmark of Bristol and the surrounding region, the Trust wanted the main elements of the bridge (the deck, the chains and the towers) to be treated with concealed light sources wherever possible. In ad

USA - High up on the sixth floor of the Time Warner Center in New York glows the stunning logo of Jazz at Lincoln Center. The white, teal and red sign is visible from halfway back to Fifth Avenue.

Says Jazz at Lincoln Center lighting director Zakaria Al-Alami, "The upstage wall of the Allen Room is all glass, looking down at the circle and straight down 59th Street - the perfect visibility for our brand. Displaying a sign of any sort in the window was a tad challenging for a number of reasons. Thenext best thing: use the back wall of the Allen Room. But we still needed something bright, legible, and economical and something that would fit right in with the architecture and aesthetics of the room. Building a light box was out of the question."

The solution was to use an ETC Source Four spotlight fitted with ETC's Enhanced Definition Lens Tube (EDLT) and

UK - Academy Music Group (AMG) has announced its plans for a major redevelopment of The Zodiac, Oxford from mid-May 2007. The company is investing £2m into the refurbishment to create a new multi-site venue that will re-launch in September 2007.

The four-month redevelopment programme will see the total building capacity increase to 1,150 (from the former 750) following the purchase of the adjacent retail outlet.

AMG will create three separate performance spaces for live music and club nights, with state-of-the-art facilities both front of house and backstage and full in-house production.AMG plans to rename the main venue (downstairs) Carling Academy Oxford which will have a maximum capacity of 900, though it will be flexible for alternative configurations.

The secondary venue will be the upstairs area of the building and named The Zodiac with a capacity for up to 436 p

USA - Designer John Lyons has specified Crown XTi Series for his new Martini Park chain of concept cocktail lounges offering live bands and DJs six nights a week. The first Martini Park, co-partnered by Lyons and Chris Barish, opened recently in Plano, Texas, close to the Dallas/Fort Worth metropolitan area, with other locations scheduled to come online in Chicago and Houston during the summer.

The Avalon Sound division of the Las Vegas-based entrepreneurs' design/build firm, John Lyons Systems, is responsible for the custom PA and lighting systems being used at the new Martini Park venues. Lyons also owns Avalon clubs in Boston and New York, as well as Avalon and Spider Club in Los Angeles, and was co-developer of the Avalon Series professional loudspeakers. "My extensive experience in the entertainment industry enables me to provide visionary design concepts combined with

UK - Ko Ko's in Leamington Spa, which boasts a large music bar, restaurant, nightclub and a roof terrace bar, has invested heavily in both décor and entertainment, appointing PSL to handle the entertainment lighting and sound design and installation throughout.

Peter Smith of PSL reports, "The management not only started with high ideals, but as opportunities were realised, these expanded the specification and flexibility required as the project developed. This made for an interesting installation and we had to be fast to react as requirements increased with tight deadlines. This in turn placed high demands on my suppliers so I was pleased I had chosen Community for the core loudspeaker systems; their range could meet any requirement and their distributor, CUK Audio, were well up to meeting our needs."

The main bar on the ground floor changed from its original

France - The operators of Paris concert club Le Nouveau Casino recently determined that they would need to improve their outdated sound system. The existing system had served them well over the years, but it was much too harsh and lacked distinction and coherence. A shootout between five leading audio companies was arranged. Audiolite based in Landernau, best know for doing sound production for the massive yearly Les Vieilles Charrues music festival, went to the shootout bringing in Adamson's SpekTrix True Line Source Technology.

Audiolite won the shootout and the final contract. The system for the venue was designed by DV2's Julien Poirot using Adamson's Shooter software. The main arrays are comprised of one SpekTrix 5-degree enclosure and three SpekTrix Wave 15-degree enclosures per side, providing coverage for the length of the club, which sits at about 18m (59ft), wit

UK - Registration to attend the 29th ABTT Theatre Show (13-14 June, Royal Horticultural Halls, London) is now available via www.abtt.org.uk/theatreshow.

Already sold out, this years show will play host over 100 exhibiting companies filling all three halls to capacity. With several new exhibitors, including ChamSys Consoles, Sunbaba Fabrics and Northern Stage Services, the event presents a comprehensive range of products and services for professionals and non technical users involved with equipping, refurbishing or up-grading their drama studio, theatre, auditorium or multi-purpose performance space.

One of the show's aims is to illustrate all aspects of performance technology and offer practical advice from leading suppliers about the enormous value that can be added by investing in technology.

Also illustrating the Show's commitment to education, drama schools from around t

South Korea - Avix Tech, a Seoul-based distribution and sound reinforcement company recently installed systems in two different South Korean projects - the newly refurbished Hannuri Art Hall in Suwon City's Jangan Ju community centre, and the Chuncheon Art Hall located in the recently renovated Chuncheon Culture and Arts Centre in the province of Gangwon. Despite dramatic differences in shape, profile, and capacity of the two halls, Avix Tech determined that the needs of their diverse calendars of musical theatre, live music, and dance programs would be met ideally by loudspeaker systems from Meyer Sound.

Eric Han, manager of Avix Tech's system design and technical support department, cites the self-powered nature of the Meyer Sound systems as key in making them the best solution. "The speakers and onboard amplifiers are perfectly matched, eliminating any loss of quality fr

UK - Baldwin Boxall Communications will be launching its latest Emergency Voice Communication system - VIGIL OmniCare at International Fire Expo. This latest development allows users to have disabled refuge remotes, fire telephones remotes and disabled toilet alarms all on the same system. A considerable saving can now be made as only one system is required. Prior to this product three separate systems would have been necessary, says the company.

The system works in the same way as Baldwin Boxall's market leading 'CARE' products. Remote units are wired in a loop configuration and it is possible to have a number of disabled refuge remotes, fire telephones or toilet alarms all on the same loop. Also in the range, Baldwin Boxall has developed a combined disabled refuge and fire telephone remote. Like all of Baldwin Boxall's 'CARE' products the system is compliant with BS5839 part 9

USA - Democracy Now!, an award-winning national, daily independent news programme that airs on over 500 radio and TV stations in North America, has recently taken delivery of an InnovaSON Sy48 digital mixing console and a remote Stage Box to handle a live news broadcast five days per week. Pioneering the largest public media collaboration in the US, Democracy Now! is broadcast on Pacifica, community and National Public Radio stations; on public access cable television stations and satellite television; as a podcast and on the internet.

Democracy Now! chief broadcast engineer, Nick Marcilio, explains why he opted for an InnovaSON console over anything else. "There were a number of reasons," he remarked. "I'd seen the board side by side with a number of other digital console brands at a recent AES show, and was struck by the versatility of the d

New Zealand - Processing devices from BSS Audio have helped bring a new aviation heritage centre, majoring on World War 1 aircraft, to life. The highly anticipated Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre is an exciting new concept specialising in aviation history. Located just outside Blenheim in the Marlborough region of the South Island of New Zealand the centre's first exhibition, Knights of the Sky, occupies 3,000sq.m of purpose-built display area. The collection is managed by the 14-18 Aviation Heritage Trust, chaired by the New Zealand film Director Peter Jackson and comprises one of the world's largest collections of World War 1 aircraft and memorabilia; this has been brought to life with a number of dramatically staged static displays along with functional planes.

From the AV perspective the entire project was managed by Grant Collie of technical solutions company LDPS, Ne

Denmark - Architects Dissing + Weitling have created a combination of form and function in Bryggebro, a 190m long, 7m wide bicycle and pedestrian bridge that forms part of Copenhagen's growing network of pedestrian and cycling paths. Inaugurated in September 2006, Bryggebroen is a swing bridge for the passage of large ships, and the first bridge built over the city's harbour in 50 years.

Besides saving Copenhageners several minutes on their commutes, not to mention providing a safe and beautiful alternative to the noise and trafficked roads, visually Bryggebro connects two sides of Copenhagen - Islands Brygge with Havneholmen - while defining the space of the harbour.

At night the bridge stands as a lighted ribbon over the water thanks to built-in linear luminaires designed by Dissing + Weitling in collaboration with Martin Professional. The bridge's central spine, which divid

Japan - Two major QSC system installations in Japan have been reported by distributors, Tokyo-based ComodoMattina.

At Iruma Municipal Hall, QSC Installation Line Array (ILA) and Modular Design (MD) components were specified for the refurbishment of this 1,100-seat auditorium, located in the Saitama Prefecture. Whereas the pre-existing system had been installed inside the proscenium arch, this time the main sound reinforcement system has been designed in front of the arch in order to generate a higher SPL and better coverage, with improved clarity.

While this acoustical solution would generally be favoured it is seldom permitted in general civic halls as it interferes with the architectural aesthetic. That the ILA system was permitted to adopt such a position outside the pros arch in this instance was completely unprecedented, believes ComodoMattina's Takafumi Asahina.

The ma

UK - Sunderland-based High Fidelity Studios has just completed the building of a fully-equipped pre-touring rehearsal suite, installing Allen & Heath's new dedicated monitor console, the GL2800M, to complement the studio's existing GL2400 FOH desk.

"The aim of the new studio is to provide a facility for up-and-coming musicians to take their music to the next level," explains High Fidelity Studios MD, David Dorn. "The suite offers bands the experience of a full blown gig, providing quality equipment they would find at a top line event. The space is set up like a venue with a fully furnished stage including drum rises, a valve back line, and top quality 32 channel monitor and FOH desks."

"We are very familiar with A&H mixers as we have GL2200's and GL2400's in our hire stock, and we come across them in most of the venues we engineer," continues dire

UK - Christie has introduced Christie ACT, a new theatre automation controller purpose-built to interface with the latest generation Digital Cinema technology. The system makes it easy to automate presentations by translating cues from connected devices to control most theatre equipment including lighting, curtains, sound, masking and projectors, says the company. The system offers a solution, enabling customisable control to suit the needs of a single screen, a multiplex facility or an entire theatre chain.

Manageable through a web interface, Christie ACT allows the user control and flexibility. It can be accessed from any web browser on a networked computer making it accessible from a portable handheld computer or laptop.

With an intuitive graphical user interface, even the novice can easily customise tasks and events to suit specific needs, says the company. Featuring pre-d

Switzerland - Soundweb London digital signal processing from BSS Audio was recently specified in the fourth biggest ice hockey stadium in the country, with a capacity of 8,000. Built in 1995 the Resega Ice Arena in Lugano is home to the Hockey Club Lugano HCL, which has won the Swiss National Hockey Championship seven times within the last 20 years.

As a result, their home games are packed, with all matches accompanied by a continuous cacophony of crowd noise. This, coupled with a critical reverberation, explains why two different installed sound systems have both been replaced within the last ten years after being deemed unsatisfactory.

In spring last year, the town of Lugano issued a tender for a new sound system which needed to fulfil the sound reinforcement requirements of a wide range of events and also meet the EN 60849 regulation for evacuation purposes.

The concept o

Singapore - Singapore's growing infrastructure - requiring the need for ever more professional staging services - is already having a positive effect on this year's Event 360º show, which makes its debut under the wing of the umbrella PALME Asia expo in July.

Some 1,000sq.m, a quarter of the overall capacity at Singapore Expo, will be set aside for Event 360º Asia. Heartened by the initial response, Davin Er, who is responsible for developing this sector, believes that interest has not only been stimulated by the support from the Singapore Tourism Board, but the building of the S$3.85bn Marina Bay Sands complex, housing casino, hotel and convention centre.

Event 360º Asia will also be working closely alongside Singapore-based UnUsUal Productions, who are among an increasing number of local companies that have the capability of offering world-renowned ev

USA - Los Angeles night club, the Temple Bar in Santa Monica, has installed Allen & Heath's iLive Digital Console, now providing mixing duties for the club's nightly live music schedule.

Based in LA's fashionable Santa Monica area, the Temple Bar is a unique music venue hosting local, national and international artists performing a spectrum of music covering the genres of jazz, electronica, indie, hip hop, soul, latin, reggae, and world music. There is also a house DJ performing between acts, and the venue regularly organises film screenings and poetry nights.

The Temple Bar's music director and chief mixing engineer, Swan, commented, "The sound of the console is magnificent, I've been mixing at the Temple Bar for five years, I have never hear the room sound like this before. It brought our sound system alive! Its compact footprint fit perfectly in our sound booth, and ou

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