PSI enjoys an appointment with Mr Yeats

29 November 2010

Ireland - Production Services Ireland (PSI) supplied lighting and video equipment for the An Appointment With Mr Yeats show by The Waterboys - a concept musical performance set to the poetry of the Irish poet and dramatist, WB Yeats - which has just finished its first Irish tour.

PSI's Sean Pagel was asked to create a lighting and visuals design following on from Belfast based PSI's supply of equipment to An Appointment show earlier in the year, a one off at Dublin's Abbey Theatre,

Say's Pagel, "It is a great honour for us to be involved something as original, interesting and special as this show. Mike Scott knows exactly what he wants and his attention to absolutely every detail is impressive."

Pagel's brief was to design a complimentary theatre show for the performance that was practical to tour in a rock 'n' style, and fitted nicely into all the venues - which were generally around 2000 capacity theatres.

The lighting rig consisted of 12 Vari*Lite 2500 Spots, 16 Robe ColorWash 700s, 18 Source Four Profiles, nine Cantata 1.2K fresnels, four 4-cell moles and two MR16 Birdies at the front of the stage.

The Sanyo XF45 10K video projector was rigged at the FOH position and beamed onto two surfaces. The first was a 4m diameter circular screen stretched over a trussing framework. Taking full advantage of the flying facilities at all the venues, this was rigged so it could be flown in and out at the appropriate moments, appearing stage centre behind the drums, so it was low, intimate and connected to the band.

All the video content was commissioned by Mike Scott and programmed onto two Green Hippo media servers. Some of it, stored on a Hippotizer, was MIDI triggered by drummer Ash Soan's Mac Book Pro running ProLogic Express. This was linked to a Hippo Express at FOH, used as a Zoo Keeper and triggered by Pagel's Avolites Diamond 4 console running the latest TITAN software.

Upstage - behind the 'moon' - was a 14m wide by 8m deep white silk, revealed by a black drape in front of it being kabuki dropped. The silk was lit by six Robe ColorWashes after the reveal, and used for two projection pieces.

(Jim Evans)