
NAMM Show Is Virtual, Features Wealth of Pro Audio Introductions target immersive audio, podcasting, broadcast sports By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Thursday, January 21, 2021 - 10:48 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The annual NAMM Show may be virtual this year, but the pro-audio products using it as a launch pad are very real.
Online this week, the event is produced by the trade organization for the musical-instrument industry, but the National Association of Music Merchants' expo - which dates back to 1902 and had Thomas Edison as a member and exhibitor - began embracing pro audio several decades ago, focusing on personal-recording technology as the AES's own annual U.S. conferences saw a steady decline in attendance. That trend was de facto formalized in 2012, when the TEC Awards, which recognize excellence in audio production and products, moved its ceremony to the NAMM Show's main Anaheim Convention Center venue, conferring pro audio's imprimatur on NAMM's foundation of drums and guitars.
(The AES Show co-located with NAB Show New York at the Javits Convention Center from 2017 to 2019; the two events were held virtually in 2020. Both organizations will co-locate their main events this year in Las Vegas: the AES Show will take place at the Westgate Hotel Oct. 11-13, adjacent to the Las Vegas Convention Center, where the NAB Show will be held Oct. 9-13.)
The AES has its own slate of events on the NAMM Show conference program this week, with panels covering how pro audio can best deal with the ongoing pandemic ( Pandemic: Panic or Pivot ), near-field monitoring ( Secrets of Near-Field Monitoring ), and file management ( Organizing Chaos - Top Engineers Discuss File Management ).
The stream of new audio products, including those relevant to broadcast sports, has continued unabated, pandemic notwithstanding. Here are some highlights from the NAMM Show - virtual though it may have been - this week.
Lectrosonics SMWB transmitters
Lectrosonics introduced two transmitters as the latest generation in its Digital Hybrid Wireless SM Series product line: the SMWB/E07-941 (single AA battery) and SMDWB/E07-941 (dual AA battery), covering the Part-74 license-only frequency range from 941.525 to 959.825 MHz. The new transmitters have the same dimensions and features as the earlier UHF SMWB and SMDWB units, including the ability to act either as a transmitter or as a body-worn recorder. RF power is selectable at 100, 50, or 25 mW. The transmitters feature the standard TA5 connector with servo-bias mic input used on all previous SM Series units and all current TA5 beltpack units, such as the LT and LMb. Any lavaliere microphones wired for the other Lectrosonics transmitters will also work on these new models. The new units can be configured as either a transmitter or a recorder, with files stored on Micro SD card memory, allowing use as body-worn recorders. Audio files are recorded in the industry-standard Broadcast Wave (.wav) format at 24 bits, 44.1 kHz sample rate. The Micro SD memory card can also be used to update firmware in the field.
Electro-Voice RE-20 Variable-D broadcast mic
Electro-Voice is showing its broadcast-microphone line topped by the RE-20 Variable-D, which was designed to mitigate the proximity effect on speech tonality. Other microphones in the series include the RE27N/D, a high-output, neodymium-equipped voice-production microphone, and the RE320, also equipped with Variable-D proximity control and an integrated humbucking coil and integral pop filters for virtually noiseless performance.
AKG K812 studio headphone
Priced at over $1,000, AKG's K812 flagship studio headphones are not inexpensive, but they are unique. The K812's 53-mm transducer is the largest that AKG has ever built. The 1.5-tesla magnet system offers highly accurate imaging, and a copper-covered aluminum voice coil extended frequency response up to 54 kHz.
An Immersive Show As immersive audio moves closer to reality for broadcast, support in the music sector is also on the rise. Avid has announced it will support independent music distribution in the Dolby Atmos format to streaming services Amazon Music and TIDAL, via Dolby Atmos Music and AvidPlay. Meanwhile, Sony's 360 Reality Audio uses Sony's spatial-sound technologies to establish an object-based, immersive-audio system for headphone virtualization. The final mix is encoded in MPEG-H and can be delivered at a bitrate of up to 1.5 Mbps, depending on the streaming service used.
Podcasting, which has become well-entrenched in sports media, is also well-represented at the virtual NAMM Show. Shure's MV7 microphone was inspired by the SMB7 broadcast mic but has pivoted nicely to podcasting with a USB connection and its Auto Level Mode, part of the ShurePlus MOTIV app, to control vocal tone and distance from the microphone.
See lots more gear here (requires free registration).
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
20/11/2025
15 March 2012
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Cinegy and Vericom are pleased to announce the recent deployment of Cinegy Archive for production and as...
20/11/2025
6 September 2012
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
FIC Turkey supplies media content to Pay TV under Fox TV Channel brands in Turkey.
At the start of s...
20/11/2025
25 June 2014
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Last month VIVA finalized its Cinegy installation in order to produce and broadcast the World Cup Brazil ...
20/11/2025
1 October 2014
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
With 5 locations spread out around Baden-W rttemberg, Schw bisch Media required a scalable end to end s...
20/11/2025
27 April 2015
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Cinegy, which develops and produces media asset management products that are used in flagship production...
20/11/2025
12 August 2015
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany, 26 October 2015 - Cinegy, which develops and produces software technology for digital ...
20/11/2025
5 November 2015
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany 3 November 2015 - Cinegy, which develops and produces software technology for digital ...
20/11/2025
12 February 2016
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany 9 February 2016 - Cinegy, which develops and produces software technology for digital...
20/11/2025
22 June 2016
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany 21 June 2016 - Cinegy today announced that ABS BROADCAST, one of the largest independentl...
20/11/2025
10 January 2017
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Find us on page 12 of the Program Guide 2016
Tags
NewBay Media Awards , Program Guide 2016 , broadc...
20/11/2025
15 March 2017
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany 15 March 2017 - Cinegy today announced that Thailand's Next Step direct-to-home Free...
20/11/2025
12 December 2017
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany 13 December 2017 - Cinegy today announced that it is making its Cinegy Air Cloud Pack...
20/11/2025
25 June 2018
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich 25th June 2018 - Cinegy today announced that Canada-based Accessible Media Inc. (AMI) has implemen...
20/11/2025
27 May 2019
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
The best quality live video from the worst networks - Haivision
Although DVB and the World Wide Web are...
20/11/2025
24 November 2020
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
ATV Expand and Increase their Playout and Editing Capabilities using Cinegy Software
Munich, Germany...
20/11/2025
1 September 2021
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany, 1st September 2021:
Cinegy GmbH, the premier provider of software technology for di...
20/11/2025
20 September 2021
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
ElectronicVerve continues a strong history of supporting Cinegy customers in India
Munich, Germany,...
20/11/2025
1 November 2022
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Munich, Germany, 01 November 2022: Cinegy, a premier provider of software technology for digital video...
20/11/2025
31 October 2023
SHARE Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email
Britt Broadcast at TBC...
20/11/2025
CINCINNATI Oklahoma Community Television (OCT) has selected GatesAir and Triveni Digital as key technology partners in an ATSC 3.0 deployment that establishes a...
20/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has opened a wide-ranging inquiry into the relations between broadcast networks and their affiliates that could...
20/11/2025
NEW YORK Ad spend in the creator economy has more than doubled since 2021 from $13.9B to $29.5B in 2024 and that amount is projected to reach $37 billion in 202...
20/11/2025
Graduate Spotlight: Krysta Mirsik DePuy The educator from Hackettstown, New Jersey, shares how it took her 11 years to find the right graduate program for her...
20/11/2025
LONDON The winners of the Rise Awards 2025, which recognize women and companies whose achievements have stood out in the media technology industry, have been an...
20/11/2025
SANTA MONICA & NEW YORK Lionsgate's Worldwide Television Distribution Group and Debmar-Mercury have launched MovieSphere Gold in more than 30 million homes....
20/11/2025
ALAMEDA, Calif. Clear-Com has introduced its four-channel HelixNet beltpack, a next-generation advancement of its widely used two-channel model, and anticipates...
20/11/2025
NEW PROVIDENCE, N.J. Streaming technology and services provider Kiswe has launched Kiswe Core, a next-generation cloud-based platform designed to simplify the s...
20/11/2025
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. Dolby Laboratories has signed on as an official signature partner of the Bay Area Host Committee (BAHC) for the 2026 Super Bowl and the we...
20/11/2025
STUTTGART, Germany 3 Screen Solutions (3SS) has announced that the Canadian multiservice operator Telus has launched its Telus TV+ entertainment platform on Sam...
20/11/2025
Major League Baseball has announced deals with ESPN, NBCUniversal and Netflix covering 2026-2028 that make ESPN the exclusive distributor for MLB.TV, put regula...
20/11/2025
Berklee Presents Holiday Extravaganza: Duke Ellingtons The Nutcracker Suite and ...
20/11/2025
It's the Late Late Toy Show BIG BIG Ticket Giveaway day!
It's the Late ...
20/11/2025
Editor's note: This post is part of Into the Omniverse, a series focused on how developers, 3D practitioners and enterprises can transform their workflows u...
20/11/2025
The How To Gael pocast gals, comedian Chris Kent and quizzer Darragh Ennis drop by for the fifth episode of The 2 Johnnies Late Night Lock In
In the penultimat...
20/11/2025
Tonight on RT Prime Time, Marie Crowe on how a Reading School changed her son...
20/11/2025
The NVIDIA Blackwell RTX upgrade is nearing the finish line, letting GeForce NOW Ultimate members across the globe experience true next-generation cloud gaming ...
20/11/2025
Tanya Berger-Wolf's first computational biology project started as a bet wit...
19/11/2025
Sphere Sound Kicks Up Its Heels at Radio City Music HallUltra-immersive system from the singular Las Vegas venue is also ready for sportsBy Dan Daley, Audio Edi...
19/11/2025
The Future of Stadium and Arena Video Control Rooms: Tech Leaders Talk 4K, IP, a...
19/11/2025
One Year at Intuit Dome: Walking Through the Stunning Arena's Advanced Video...
19/11/2025
SVG Sit-Down: IMG's Francois Westcombe Goes Inside IMG's Annual Digital ...
19/11/2025
Inside Brighton & Hove Albion's fan-first media machine By George Bevir
Tuesday, November 18, 2025 - 10:10
Print This Story
Brighton & Hove Albion'...
19/11/2025
Rock Chalk Rebuild, Part 1: Kansas Athletics Brings New Production Power to Rebu...
19/11/2025
Rock Chalk Rebuild, Part 2: A Pro's Guide to Kansas Athletics' New Video...
19/11/2025
MLB Media Rights Shakeup: NBC Inks Three-Year Deal for Sunday Night Baseball, Pe...
19/11/2025
Rohan Parashuram Kanawade attends the premiere of Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears) at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival at Egyptian Theatre on January 26, 2025, in Pa...
19/11/2025
Awards season is heating up, and the International Documentary Association just ...
19/11/2025
Aerojet Rocketdyne President Ken Bedingfield and Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders were joined by state and local officials to celebrate the groundbreaking o...