Pharos - Leaderboard - May 2024

Sound

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Olympic Countdown - Spectators who attended a preview of the Olympic Games opening ceremony have been urged to keep the details secret and not spoil the surprise for others. Thousands of people who attended a rehearsal on Monday were asked not to circulate images or videos. Danny Boyle, the ceremony's artistic director, reportedly addressed the audience to "save the surprise".

About 62,000 are set to attend the opening ceremony at the Olympic Stadium in Stratford, east London, on Friday. The event is expected to be watched by an audience of billions worldwide. Olympic organisers Locog said the technical rehearsal for the opening ceremony "went very well". "The reaction from the attendees has been overwhelmingly positive on social media and crucially they are still helping us to save the surprise for the rest of the nation on Friday," it said.

Peop

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UK - Audio, lighting and video specialist, Oxfordshire based RealSound and Vision, has completed the installation of a Community sound system for Cedar Sports Management Ltd. at Bar Sport in Maidenhead, Berkshire.

The new Bar Sport venue is located at Grenfell Island, a popular area in the town for cafés, bars, restaurants and the cinema. "Being a sports venue, Euro 2012 was the major event that dictated the timescale of opening for business", commented RealSound's managing director, David Nibbs. "This defined a tight schedule for the sound and dance floor lighting to be designed and installed, but with a decisive client and good service from our suppliers we were able to complete the installation on time."

RealSound designed the system using Community ceiling loudspeakers to maintain clear sightlines to the bar's 42 video screens in the low ceiling

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USA - Industry veteran Greg Oshiro has joined Community Professional Loudspeakers in the position of senior design engineer. Oshiro will play a key role in new product evaluation, design and development.

Oshiro comes to Community after several years as president and principal consultant at Arlington, TX-based Greppen Solutions. Previously, he served as technical director for L-Acoustics US, where he was responsible for a wide range of technical manufacturing processes. He has also held high-level engineering positions at Universal Studios Japan, Advanced Media Design, Maryland Sound, and Clair Brothers Audio.

"We're thrilled to welcome Greg to Community," said Community president and founder Bruce Howze. "He brings a wealth of expertise and knowledge to the position, and I'm certainly looking forward to working with him. I have no doubt Greg will add a significa

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USA - College Park Center at University of Texas Arlington has installed a spectacular distributed audio system featuring more than 30 Meyer Sound loudspeakers. The 218,000sq.ft venue, which hosts university sports, concerts, speakers, commencement ceremonies, and more, anchors the emerging 20-acre College Park District and is stimulating a revitalization of downtown Arlington.

Austin-based acoustics and AV consultant BAi, LLC was hired by the University of Texas at Arlington and the architect, HKS, to design the sound reinforcement systems as well as distributed television and scoreboard systems. Grand Prairie, Tex.-based integrator ABLe Communications was contracted by Hunt Construction to implement the systems.

"What the project comes down to is a very well-designed system that was in turn installed per specifications. It ended up being a fantastic system," says J

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USA - Audio-Technica has announced that Wadsworth, Ohio-based Online Marketing has been presented with A-T's President's Award, for their work representing Audio-Technica in Indiana and Kentucky. Additionally, the firm sells Audio-Technica professional products to retailers and sound contractors in Ohio, Michigan, Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

Online Marketing sales associate Steve Grigdesby accepted the award, which recognizes a leading manufacturer's representative for outstanding commitment and dedication during the Audio-Technica 2011/2012 fiscal year. The award was presented by Philip Cajka, Audio-Technica US president and C.E.O., and Michael Edwards,

The A-T President's Award was presented at a ceremony during the 2012 InfoComm Expo on 13 June in Las Vegas.

Michael Edwards commented, "Online Marketing has been presented with this honor for their strong d

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Argentina - Roger Hodgson, one of the founding members and voice of Supertramp, recently completed the first leg of his Breakfast in America Tour 2012 in South America. A total of 16 concerts were offered across the continent, and in Rosario, Argentina, where Hodgson played to a full-house at the city's Salón Metropolitano, D.A.S. Aero Series 2 sound systems provided sound for the event.

Local company Marti Audio, with Ariel Marti at the helm, rolled out the big guns for the concert. A comprehensive D.A.S. sound system was set up, which included Aero Series 2 line arrays, specifically 12 units of the large D.A.S. Aero 50 for the PA, set up in two arrays of six units each on either side of the stage in a traditional left-right configuration.

Another 12 units of the powerful D.A.S. LX-218R subwoofers were brought in to reinforce the low frequencies at the concert. The un

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UK - Some of live music's leading audio professionals have been inspiring the next generation of talent at Backstage Academy, the West Yorkshire based training centre for careers in the entertainment industry.

The Prodigy's drummer Leo Crabtree, P!nk and Sade FOH Engineer Chris Madden, and audio mixing author Dave Swallow delivered a variety of masterclasses for the students on the new Foundation Degree in Live Events Production, as part of their month-long Live Sound module.

Leo Crabtree talked to the students about the importance of protecting your hearing when working at live music gigs, a topic recently brought to the spotlight by the Chris Martin and Plan B backed Loud Music charity campaign.

Veteran audio engineer Chris Madden, whose credentials include mixing audio for P!nk and Sade on their worldwide tours, spoke about his experience on tour, how he got into the indu

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Israel - Spain-based live engineer Fabrizio Piazzini, a veteran of concert tours and venues throughout Europe, has recently been appointed as a live product specialist for Waves Audio, the industry-leading developer of professional audio digital signal processing technologies. Piazzini's credits include such acts as Patrick Wolf, Tindersticks, Delorentos, Kula Shaker, Amy MacDonald and many others.

In his new capacity, Piazzini will communicate with other live sound engineers across the continent, demonstrating Waves plugins and typical workflows. "They become engrossed. Once they see how they can integrate plugins in their live workflow, they are hooked. It's a simple job, really," he notes.

Piazzini is currently finishing off a stint of promotional gigs with Amy MacDonald, where he has been using a Waves MultiRack Native setup, as most of the gigs are on analogue c

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UK - DPA Microphones played an important part in delivering an evening of classical music to over 10,000 people who attended a summer concert organised by Heritage Events at Leeds Castle in Kent.

This beautiful Castle provided a dramatic backdrop to a spectacular concert that featured the Royal Philharmonic orchestra conducted by John Rigby, the Central Band of the Royal Air Force and the Military Wives Choir. There were also solo performances from tenor James Edwards and soprano Claire Rutter.

Sound, lighting and PA specialists SRD Group provided all of the equipment for the concert, including a large selection of DPA microphones, which it leased from sound engineer Ian Barfoot.

"DPA microphones were ideal for this project because they always deliver fantastic audio quality and are very rugged, which means you can put them through the mill without having to worry about

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Azerbaijan - German L-Acoustics certified provider and rental network agent Toneheads, Cologne provided the entire PA system for the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest produced by Brainpool TV GmbH. This year's contest took place in the newly-built Crystal Hall in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Florian Kessler, head of audio at Toneheads, Cologne, relied entirely on L-Acoustics systems, deploying a grand total of 180 Kara WST compact line source loudspeakers, 96 SB18 subs and 80 Kiva ultra-compact line source speakers with 30 Kilo low frequency extensions, powered by 30 LA RAKs and flown from the ceiling of the venue. Six arrays of Kiva line source elements driven by LA8 amplified controllers were used as nearfield monitors.

L-Acoustics' proprietary acoustic simulation software, Soundvision, was used to design the sound for the new and unfamiliar arena.

(Jim Evans)

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USA - Featuring a full electric praise band regularly augmented by strings and other acoustic instruments, services at the Living Hope Church's new permanent facility in Piperton, Tennessee are extremely contemporary. When Memphis-based designer/integrator, Elite Multimedia Inc. set out to provide a highly flexible system to meet the needs of Living Hope's growing congregation, they chose Lake's LM 26 signal processor.

"There's a substantial difference in the quality of this system compared to the one they used when they operated as a portable church," explains Wade Russell, lead systems integrator at Elite. "One of the main reasons we selected the Lake LM 26 was the fact that it did 96k AES. We're running AES from a Midas PRO2C console to the LM 26 and the amps, and integrating the Midas and Lake processing was key to creating a very dynamic system that was power

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Singapore - Production company Showtec Communications has added three units ofARX MSX 48 16 channel mic / line splitter to their existing ARX inventory, bringing their total MSX 48 channel count up to 112.

Showtec's audio production manager Chandra Mohan confirmed that the first outing for Showtec's expanded MSX 48 Splitter Racks will be the feature celebrations for Singapore's 47th National Day to be held at The Float @Marina Bay, Singapore.

This year Showtec's audio system will feature 32 replay tracks from a ProTools HD system and 36 channels of Shure UHF-R radio mics mixed for FOHon an Avid Venue D-Show console feeding a d&b FOH System consisting of 64 x J-8s and 32 J-SUBs powered by D-12Amplifiers.

Monitors Mixer duties are to be provided by an Avid Venue Profile console feeding 40 Sennheiser IEMs from 12transmitters.

Mohan reports that all ProTools tracks, radio mics

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Belgium - Crestron International has continued to grow its global presence with the expansion of its Belgium office. The new building next to the Crestron offices in Rijmenam, will allow Crestron to provide a better service for customers, including extra space for training and technical support. The expansion comes as a result of Crestron's considerable success in growing business with key integrators in the region.

"Our customers in Belgium are recognising the great value that working with Crestron can bring to their businesses", says Frank van Meeuwen, CEO Crestron International. "Our technical support departments needed to grow to support this success so we have added 11,000sq.ft of extra floor space to the department. We are really excited to be opening the new office, as it represents the fruits of the hard work and dedication of our staff in growing our busi

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Lebanon - Lebanon has a growing economy and the pro audio industry is benefitting from this trend. FBT has been present in this market in the past, and the Italian manufacturer has now secured a fresh distribution partnership.

Following a meeting at NAMM and another at the Frankfurt Prolight & Sound 2012, FBT and Boujikian Bros. Co. Ltd. have recently agreed a new distribution agreement for Lebanon. Boujikian Bros. Will handle the professional audio and installed sound lines of the Italian company.

"We were very pleased to meet with Mr. Gary Boujikian during his recent visit to our factory in Recanati where he received information about our work processes and our products, as well as a complete demonstration of our different product families," says FBT's export manager Roberto Mataloni. "Of course, this interaction has been also important for us to understand be

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UAE - The demand for professional audio training in the Middle East is constantly on the rise. The most recent event, a three-day training on the theory and use of EASE acoustic simulation and measurement software took place from 15-17 July in Dubai.

It was organized by the regional office of Bosch Communications Systems in conjunction with Ahnert Feistel Media Group (AFMG).

Attended by 13 participants ranging from Egypt over Lebanon to Oman, the training was the first of its kind in the region for Electro-Voice and Dynacord partners. The three-day courses, hosted by AFMG's trainer Paul Malpas, took place at the Robert Bosch Middle East's training facilities in Dubai. The detailed workshops covered EASE, the worldwide standard for acoustic simulation both inside rooms and in open areas.

"The demand for training in the Middle East is generally very high", says Tony

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Spain - Work has recently released the first EASE data files (.gll format) available for its products. With it, Work provides "a first class tool to audio engineers, in order to evaluate and predict acoustic performance in a determined area".

EASE data files group useful information. Loudspeakers' dispersion has been precisely measured thanks to an anechoic chamber, using as much points of reference around the loudspeaker as possible.

These EASE files can be downloaded from the Equipson website (www.equipson.es) and in the own database of AFMG (http://www.afmg.eu), so users who update their loudspeakers library will automatically get them.

The following loudspeakers and ceiling speakers are included: NEO 3, NEO 4, NEO 5 and 5A, NEO 6 and 6A, NEO 8, RCS 001, RCS 002, RCS 003, IC 50 T, IC 60 T, IC 80 T, IC4 PRO and IC6 PRO.

(Jim Evans)

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UK - Last month millions turned out in London to mark Queen Elizabeth's 60 years on the throne. An event of this magnitude required a reliable and flexible networking transport, and Audinate's Dante was chosen as the digital media network backbone for all the live sound events and festivities.

Audio production house Britannia Row Productions was responsible for all the live sound. Joshua Lloyd was the system designer who designed the sound system (that needed to be invisible) for the seated invited audience around the temporary stage constructed on the Queen Victoria Monument. "It was necessary to create a large distributed system to achieve this goal" comments Lloyd. "We used 24 stacks of Outline Butterfly loudspeakers, for a total of 96 boxes, to create this complex system. Each stack of Butterfly's was driven by a Lake LM series processor, and all were networke

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UK - Liverpool based technical solutions provider Adlib supplied sound, lighting, scenic video and crew for Radio City Live, a regular Summer pop event at Liverpool's Echo Arena, hosted by Liverpool's biggest radio station.

Adlib's relationship with Liverpool's hit station Radio City goes back more than 20 years, when it worked on their roadshows - and both companies have become Liverpool music institutions in their own right.

Some of the biggest names in UK pop were lined-up for the 2012 Radio City Live event including One Direction , Professor Green, Will Young, Labrinth, and Stooshie & Rizzle Kicks among others who performed to a capacity 10,000 crowd at on a sunny Saturday Liverpool evening .

Steve Hill and David Andrews (of EMO LTD) oversaw the event planning and management, with Andy Grey and Neil McDonald in place as production managers and Steve Pottinger stag

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USA - Alternative rock act Neon Trees have joined Audio-Technica's stable of artist endorsers. The announcement was made by Roxanne Ricks, Audio-Technica artist relations manager, and reflects the ongoing expansion of A-T's artist roster in all music genres.

On tour, the band (Tyler Glenn, Elaine Bradley, Branden Campbell and Chris Allen) and their production manager Mike Bangs have come to rely on Audio-Technica microphones "for their sound quality, durability and versatility".

The band's arsenal includes the Audio-Technica Artist Elite 5000 Series UHF Wireless System with AEW-T6100a transmitter, used for lead vocals, as well as the following hardwired models: AE6100 Hypercardioid Dynamic Handheld Microphone, ATM250 Hypercardioid Dynamic Instrument Microphone, AE4100 Cardioid Dynamic Handheld Microphone, ATM450 Cardioid Condenser Instrument Microphone, ATM650 Hyperc

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USA - The City of Sturgis, South Dakota is ready to deliver big sound for the 72nd annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally with significant extensions to its downtown PA system. The expanded system, featuring nearly 50 Technomad advanced audio loudspeakers, will deliver entertainment and public safety information to the expected crowd of nearly 700,000 strong - and at a far greater capacity than in previous years.

The Technomad loudspeakers, which previously covered a four-block radius, now blanket the entire downtown area with intelligible voice and high-quality musical reproduction. Pete Torino, who specifies and installs PA systems, almost exclusively uses Technomad loudspeakers due to their fully weatherproof, MilSpec design and ability to project high-quality audio with broad dispersion over long distances.

Torino uses high-power Technomad Berlin and Noho models on downtown build

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Hungary - Dóm Square in Szeged (literally, Cathedral Square) is one of the largest squares in Hungary. Every year its 12,000sq.m of open space are transformed into a massive 4000-seat auditorium to host the Szeged Open-Air festival. With a tradition stretching back over 75 years, the festival is Hungary's largest open-air theatre and music event and the most visited summer cultural event of the region.

The unique nature of the festival with its stunning backdrop of the Szeged cathedral is enhanced by a flamboyant programme of world premieres and internationally ranked stage shows and concerts, and every year, the stakes are higher in the quest for technological perfection and flawless sound.

This year, ES Audio's Sandor Elek who has been managing audio for the festival for the last 12 years via his rental company, Votec, decided to raise the bar even higher and opted for a co

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Australia - Iconic performer, satirist, artist and comedian Barry Humphries, is taking his final bow during his farewell tour entitled Eat, Pray, Laugh!. While the Honourable Sir Les Patterson, Sandy Stone and Moonee Ponds' legendary housewife, Dame Edna are not officially retiring, Australia's greatest Dame insists that this will be her final tour.

During the all-singing, all-dancing spectacular, Dame Edna promises to "empower" audiences as she meditates on the big issues of gender, ethnicity and climate change.

While Act One of Eat Pray Laugh! features Humphries with his friends, this really serves as "just a bit of foreplay really before I make an orgasmic appearance in Act Two", Dame Edna says.

Norwest Productions are providing the audio for the tour and FOH operator for the show is one of their long time employees Aaron Mason. The show

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UK - If, like the rest of the world, you were completely blown away by the London 2012 Opening Ceremony, don't miss this once in a lifetime opportunity to meet the technical teams responsible for turning Danny Boyle's vision into reality!

The first session to be revealed in The Olympics Uncovered programme at PLASA 2012, Backstage at the London 2012 Ceremonies is your chance to hear technical director, Piers Shepperd, and team present an overview of the mega staging, flying, audio, AV and special effects behind the London 2012 Olympic Ceremonies.

The bumper line-up includes:

Piers Shepperd - technical director

Jeremy Lloyd - technical manager - technical design and staging

James Lee - technical manager - aerial & closing ceremonies

Nick Jones - technical manager - lighting AV and power

Scott Buchanan - technical manager - services and special projects

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UK - Acoustic Technology Group reports that one of the premier venues in Edinburgh, Sneaky Pete's, is upgrading its monitor system to LS1000 enclosures.

The existing Logic Systems monitors will be upgraded to six LS1000M and an LS1000NF providing four mixes totalling 5.4Kw RMS. The system is powered by Crown MA amplifiers.

(Jim Evans)

  1. PLASA 2012: RCF set to fly new HDL20-A
  2. Optocore network for new Tokyu Theatre Orb
  3. London 2012 Opening Ceremony - The World Responds
  4. Wohler on Olympic duty with NEP Visions
  5. Creative industries urged to build Olympic legacy
  6. Hammersmith Academy installs flexible PA system
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