30 September 2020 marked the #WeMakeEvents Global Action Day, in which countries from across the globe came together in solidarity to highlight the plight that is currently facing the worldwide live events industry. In total, over 25 countries took part at 8pm local time, with activations delivering a range of creative responses, such as lighting iconic buildings in red to highlight how the industry is in red alert, as well as beaming shafts of white light into the sky to highlight the mass job losses.

As lockdown measures begin to ease, live producers are tentatively starting to investigate how events can be held that will bring people together again, while maintaining safe boundaries for the audience and artists alike. Rather than simply returning to what was previously considered ‘normal’ in terms of production, many are using what they learned during lockdown to evolve the concept of what a live event can deliver.  As part of an arts and culture festival in the medieval walled city of Templin north of Berlin, electronic DJ collaboration “ambientkarawane”, played a live, socially distanced set and decided to capture the event with a newly established streaming and recording set up, built around the ATEM Mini Pro.

The Live Event Industry has always been there in times of need. Not unlike the Red Cross, the Live Event Industry shows up every time we are asked and provides artists, stages, lights, sound, video, lasers, pyro, crew, venues, catering, staging, busses, trucks, and support to raise awareness, money, and love. We always work for free to enable all of the money raised benefits those in need. We give greatly of ourselves and our companies each time, no questions asked.

Genelec Smart Active Monitors are at the heart of the Tokyo College of Music’s (TCM) new Nakameguro/Daikanyama campus. The campus has been created to give TCM’s composition students access to even higher quality recording facilities with Genelec providing monitoring solutions to a variety of spaces in both stereo and immersive formats.
The highlight of TCM’s Genelec monitoring solutions can be found in the flagship recording studio. “The studio is used mainly by students who major in the Fine Art/Film Scoring course within the composition program,” explains TCM lecturer Hideaki Sano. “The course focuses on composition, arrangement and performance, but also studies practical techniques related to pre-production, studio recording, producing, and so on. The studio needed to be capable of recording an entire orchestra, and since we have a concert hall and other large performance spaces on campus, we wanted the studio to make efficient use of these facilities.”

This was in solidarity with the #RedAlertRESTART action in the USA which saw over 2000 buildings lit in red all over North America on the same date, to highlight the critical stage of the live events and entertainment industry globally during the Coronavirus pandemic and the need for support and roadmap to re-starting. Pula’s world-famous arena is the only remaining Roman amphitheatre in the world to have four side towers and all three Roman architectural orders – Doric, Ionic and Corinthian – intact! It was constructed between 27 BCE and 68AD, is among the largest six surviving Roman arenas worldwide and is also the best-preserved ancient monument in Croatia.

In early September, Brown Note Productions (BNP) teamed up with their client to deliver an incredible virtual music festival in Colorado. A staggering 7,500,000 fans tuned into the concert, hit play, and plunged into the first-of-its-kind immersive experience. BNP supplied all audio gear required for festival production, including Clear-Com^®’s FreeSpeak II^® Digital Wireless Intercom, for a completely wireless solution at the client’s request.  

Set in the tranquil parkland and ancient woodland of a stunning Berkshire country estate, Medicine Festival 2020 proved to be the perfect tonic for attendees and crew alike. It had been at least six months since most had been involved in any form of public event, but with safety measures in place, the five-day festival prescribed a healthy concoction of music, ancestral wisdom, art, wellbeing, future thinking, food, environmentalism, spirituality, dance and performance. Audio Feed had been appointed as the sound partner long before Covid-19 turned the world upside down. When the organisers decided to go ahead, the Funktion-One specialists were tasked with updating the sound system designs for the three-stage set-up.

Street art fans from around the world will be virtually welcomed to the streets of Bristol as UPFEST announces Virtually Upfest an online version of the world-famous street art festival 25^th-27^th September. Working in collaboration with virtual reality studio, ZubrVR and with the help of Arts Council England’s emergency response funding, the team at UPFEST has reconstructed Bedminster’s North Street with a TRON style feel, and designed an alternative way for users to experience the festival after the Covid-19 pandemic forced 2020’s edition to be cancelled.

The European ARTificial Intelligence Lab is now offering artists who are working with artificial intelligence or experimenting with its applications the chance to complete a residency at the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute in Mountain View, California, and the Ars Electronica Futurelab in Linz. The residency is divided in two parts – with an initial 4-6 weeks at SETI Institute where the winning artist will have an especially dedicated science mentor to inspire him/her and his/her work. The second part consists of 3-6 weeks with the members of the Ars Electronica Futurelab in Linz where the artist will produce the work inspired by the residency at the SETI Institute. The research that takes place at the SETI Institute should be meaningfully reflected in the artworks that result from the residency. Special emphasis will be placed on projects that consider artificial intelligence, ponder the beginnings of life, and critically reflect on our anthropocentric world view. The AI Lab is led and organised by Ars Electronica in collaboration with 16 partners across Europe and the SETI Institute. The deadline for the online submissions is October 7, 2020.

vog.photo It was very different. But it was a huge success. The first hybrid Ars Electronica in the era of Corona. “It wasn’t easy, but it was absolutely the right decision to let the festival take place,” Gerfried Stocker said in a first review. On site, everything went smoothly – the security concept worked, and the requirements were understood and accepted by the audience. And it was virtually sold out, the first “Kepler’s Garden” on the beautiful campus of the Johannes Kepler University Linz. “We offered 3,490 tickets and we issued them all,” Gerfried Stocker is pleased to report. “It’s really great that even in times of a pandemic there are obviously many people who are happy about cultural offerings and take advantage of them in a responsible way.” The Festival Mile in the city center with the OK in Upper Austria’s Kulturquartier (1,664 visitors), the University of the Arts (1,284 visitors) and the Ars Electronica Center (2,223) was well attended and registered 5,171 visitors. Last but not least, the physical presence of 668 artists in Linz was also very gratifying because it’s no longer a matter of course to bring so many people together for an event.

With Covid-19 lockdowns worldwide and health authorities urging people to self-isolate and practice social distancing on a massive scale as part of an enormous effort to #FlattenTheCurve of this global pandemic … we are reaching out to industry friends, colleagues, associates, partners, etc., and asking them to share their #StayHome and #QuarantineandChill activities with us during this extraordinary time.

In the age of social distancing, how can an orchestra and choir create a great musical performance when they cannot be in close proximity to each other? During the coming season, Switzerland’s renowned Zurich Opera House will rely on Lawo IP technology to solve exactly this problem. The need to find a solution for future performances became clear in early 2020, after Switzerland’s lockdown went into effect on 15 March. That solution came in the form of an IP-based Remote Production installation from Lawo, designed specially for WAN-based remote productions. Equipment includes a Lawo mc²36 console, Compact I/O stagebox units, and V__remote4 devices to transport and process video and audio signals, plus an upgrade of the Lawo Nova73 HD Core already installed at the Opera House which adds RAVENNA networking and additional SFP Ethernet ports.

Astera products played their part for the recent #RedAlertRESTART campaign in the United States on 1^st September, a collective lighting action that saw over 2000 buildings, places, structures, landmarks and spaces lit in red to highlight the critical situation facing live events and entertainment … and the demand for Congress to pass the RESTART Act (S.3814) soonest to offer some sort of relief to the industry and try to get things moving again. John DiEleuterio, sales / project manager for from Wilmington, Delaware-based dry hire company Main Light Industries, reached for the company’s stock of Astera AX5 TriplePAR battery powered LED fixtures … in support of the event.

HEX! Museum of Witch Hunt, has recently opened in Ribe, Denmark, complete with a Smart IP loudspeaker solution from Genelec designed and installed by the Moesgaard Museum Exhibition Design Studio. As Denmark’s oldest town and home to Maren Spliid, the country’s most famous witch, the setting is ideal for a museum that aims to tell the stories of these witches - who they were, why they were so feared, and the myths and superstitions that surrounded them. In order to create the best possible visitor experience, HEX! turned to the museum technology experts at the famed Moesgaard Museum led by Johan Ahrenfeldt. Having recently used Genelec’s Smart IP technology with great success on one of his own exhibitions, Ahrenfeldt had no hesitation in recommending it for HEX!

The famous Palais des Papes in Avignon, France came alive bathed in a vibrant collage of colours, shapes, and textures – thanks to 12 x Robe ESPRITE moving lights – which were part of a design by LD Fabien Chamakoff for the 2020 Helios Festival. Launched in 2017, the event highlights – with silent projection / visual works and light art pieces – Avignon’s stunning architecture and rich, diverse heritage as the ‘City of Catholic Popes’ between 1309 and 1377. It remained under Papal rule until 1791 when it became part of France. The Palais des Papes (Pope’s Palace) is one of the largest and most important medieval Gothic buildings in the whole of Europe.