Short Takes is THE MIX's very own bulletin board - this is the place for dealer information, recording courses, price changes and idle gossip

Kerridge To Chair APRS

The Association of Professional Recording Services (APRS) announces the appointment of a new chairman. From the first of January, Adrian Kerridge takes over from Dave Harries, who has just completed the designated three years in the position.

Adrian has been closely involved with the APRS for the past six years, serving for most of that time as Chairman of the Administration, Finance and Legal Committee. His appointment sets the seal on his longstanding commitment to the audio industry, as evidenced by over three decades' experience in the recording business.

More from: Philip Vaughan (Contact Details)

Students Support Local Talent

Sound Engineering students at Arnold and Carlton college and are looking for Midlands-based bands, performance artistes, comedians, DJs etc. for a multi-media mash-up on Bank Holiday Monday, 29th May. A&R men and agents are promised to be present!

As this is a charity event, acts cannot be paid, however expenses will be funded. Free recording time is also on offer to attract artists, and a compilation tape featuring those recordings will follow.

More from: Pop Music Dept, Arnold & Carlton College, (Contact Details)

Pulsar Masterpiece Software Updates

The latest software for the Masterpiece 48 is version 1.85, while the latest for the masterpiece 108 is 2.0. Version 2.0 breathes life into the Masterpiece 108's theatre and live section. The AB Master sliders are now fully operational with very powerful, yet straightforward facilities.

There are additional features for the scene and scene-chase fade times, while joystick velocity allows you to use scans as follow spots. Keyboard action now gives you the possibility of 54 keyboards, rather than just 18. Even the very first Masterpiece can be upgraded free of charge to the latest specification, by simply changing the EPROM.

More from: Pulsar (Contact Details)

Music From Holland

With this slogan, the Dutch music industry will present itself in a big way during MIDEM 95 in Cannes, which takes place from 30th January - 3rd February.

Considering Holland's international success, recently scoring hits with 2 Unlimited, Twenty 4 Seven and others, the country will play a special role at MIDEM 95. The Dutch schedule is as follows:

Monday Jan 30 - Dutch Dance Night Palm Beach
Twenty 4 Seven, Atlantic Ocean, T-Spoon, Doop, WARP 9, Quasar, Jaydee/Daydream, the Dreamteam and DJs Dimitri, Ronald Molendijk and The Prophet.

Tuesday Jan 31 - Dutch Pop Night Noga Hilton
Laura Fygi, René Froger, Mathilde Santing, Ten Sharp and The Rosenborg Trio.

Wednesday Feb 1 - Dutch Rock Night Martinez
Urban Dance Squad, Bettie Serveert and Claw Boys Claw are to perform at the Martinez Hotel.

Led Zep Lives!

The 25th of February sees an evening of Led Zeppelin music with a difference at the Castle Tavern, Church Street, Christchurch, Dorset. The venue is in a beautiful 18th Century pub that towers over an 11th Century keep - truly an appropriate setting for an ancient music form such as this!

Acts to appear will incude Grass Roots, Cold Turkey, Ray Foster, Izabel Von Crippen, Pete Foster and Tony Messenger. The gig starts at eight and you'll be pleased to hear that it's absolutely free! Additionally, between five and eight o'clock, there will be a demonstration of a Theremin which, in case you didn't know, is an electronic musical instrument developed by Barry Wooding.

More from: Barry Wooding (Contact Details)

Pink Floyd win award

Legendary psychedelic survivors, Pink Floyd have been presented with the Ampex Golden Reel Award, for the group's smash multi-platinum recording The Division Bell, which was recorded on Ampex 499 Grand Master Gold audio tape.

Guitarist and songwriter, David Gilmour accepted the award on November 22, 1994, at the conclusion of Pink Floyd's extensive and massively successful world tour. 'The Division Bell' has now sold over seven million copies since its debut earlier this year.

CP-Gen Price Slashed

For a limited period only, CP-Gen is reduced to £29.95 to promote wider usage prior to the release of version 2 later this year. For your money you get an unrestricted copy of version one on CP-Gen, a sample panel disk, a hard-bound 130-page manual, free access to the helpline, and free membership of the CP-Gen users association.

If you purchased version 1 before the special offer, you are entitled to a free upgrade. Also, if you want a free copy of CP-Gen 2, then there is an opportunity to test it out, report any bugs and suggest improvements.

More from: GRI-Soft (Contact Details)

AES News

The Audio Engineering Society's upcoming convention in Paris is Europe's premier pro-audio show, and will be attracting exhibitors and visitors from around the world. Held at the Palais des Congres, between the 25-28th February, AES Paris offers the perfect way to combine a romantic weekend with a peak at what's new in the industry. There'll be a strong British presence again, with support coming from APRS and DTI, and it's a perfect excuse to travel the Channel Tunnel and stock up on booze. See you there....

APRS

Over thirty UK manufacturers will soon be heading for the AES Convention and Exhibition (to be held in Paris, 25-28 February 1995) in a joint venture organised by the APRS. The venture offers the chance of a valuable DTI subsidy for qualifying companies who have products or services of British origin, to exhibit to the international professional audio market.

More from: Philip Vaughan (Contact Details)

Soundscape sound out

Soundscape Digital Technology will be showing for the first time at AES Paris version 1.16 advanced software for their highly acclaimed SSHDR1 Hard Disk Recording System, of which over 1000 systems have been installed in Europe over the past 12 months. New software features on V1.16 include audio scrubbing, 999 nameable markers, punch in/out on existing physical track, real time fade in/out curves to specified volume levels, new take directory listing, defrag disk and shrink takes.

SDT will also be launching the SSHDR-1R with removable hard drives. Mainly aimed at the broadcast and professional studio market, the SSHDR-1R has two removable drive bays on the front panel. Each bay will take a standard IDE type drive up to 1.7GB in each bay giving 10H 30 min recording time. For quick task switching, each project can have its own removable drive, or once full, drives can be quickly replaced with a clean drive without the need to back up during costly studio time. Back up can be done either off line or in the early hours.

More from: Soundscape Digital Technology (Contact Details)

The Music Technology Roadshow

This course aims to help confused MIDI and recording enthusiasts negotiate the maze that is modern electronic musical equipment. The couses are presently running at arts centres in the Thames Valley area and are being set up in Bracknell, Reading and Windsor.

There are separate courses available for MIDI and multitrack recording, available at either elementary or advanced levels. There is a limit of seven students per course, allowing plenty of scope for hands-on experience.

The elementary MIDI course goes from general concepts to the setting up and use of a MIDI system, including basic sequencing. The advanced course explores sequencing in greater depth, including event management, synchronisation and integrated technologies.

Elementary recording covers the practicalities of recording, mixing and treating a variety of signals to produce professional sounding results, while the advanced course emphasises production techniques on professional equipment. Students can choose between a one-day seminar or four two-hour evening sessions.

The Music Technology Roadshow is sponsored by Spirit and Fostex, and would like to thank Alan Townsend and Dave Marshall at Roland for their support.

Elementary MIDI - £40, advanced MIDI - £45. elementary multitrack - £40, advanced multitrack - £50.

More from: Marius Kane (Contact Details)

Erasure Wins 3M Award

Erasure is the latest recipient of the 3M Visionary Awards, for their album I Say, I Say, I Say. The project was recorded over a six month period between Vince Clarke's private studio in Amsterdam, Dublin's Windmill Lane Studios and the Church in London. It was tracked on 2 x Sony 3324s and then mixed onto 3M 996 1/2" high output analogue mastering tape at the Strongroom in London, with engineer Phil Legg at the helm.

More from: Joe Clerkin (Contact Details)

Soundcraft At The Palace

Perched above the dance floor at London's newly refurbished Camden Palace, a Soundcraft Vienna 2 live console and Soundcraft D-MIX 1000 DJ console take pride of place.

The new club cost around two million pounds to refit, and will double as a dance and live venue. At the same time it succeeds in blending in the original features of the grade 1 listed building with state-of-the-art sound and light.

Camden Palace is owned and run by European Leisure, where Regional Director David Chipping was responsible for the decision to use exclusively Soundcraft consoles: "Having talked to various bands and our in-house engineers, the Vienna 2 was the obvious choice. It's simply got every feature we need," he commented.

Soundcraft also launched their latest brain child, the KI live mixing console at Camden Palace, and I can honestly say that the whole set-up was highly impressive. This was the perfect venue for a toast to an exciting new live mixing desk for the 90's.

More from: Soundcraft Electronics Ltd. (Contact Details)