Germany - In April 2019, singer / songwriter Lena Meyer-Landrut released her fifth, critically acclaimed studio album, Only Love, L. In June, the Only Love tour of 12 dates took the band through small to medium-sized halls in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Designer JoJo Tillmann developed a reduced set with a scalable lighting design for single-trailer transportation. Although there were four musicians, two backing vocalists and two dancers on stage, alongside the singer herself, the show was not conceived to be ‘over-staged’. "I designed the set on a very stripped-down basis,” reports OPUS award winner JoJo Tillmann. "Apart from a small ramp leading up to a platform, there were no set building elements on the stage. As a result, versatility became all the more important." For his lighting design, he mainly used fixtures from the GLP catalo
UK – For Marillion’s orchestral UK tour dates in November, lighting designer Yenz Nyholm chose the the VL2600 Wash fixture from Vari-Lite. The Marillion With Friends From The Orchestra tour saw the band joined by string quartet, In Praise Of Folly, plus Emma Halnan on flute and Sam Morris on French horn. Culminating in two nights at London’s Royal Albert Hall, the tour coincided with the British band’s 40th anniversary and the 30th anniversary of Steve Hogarth as its lead singer. Nyholm’s challenge was to deliver the required level of spectacle for the celebratory shows. “My brief called firstly for ‘big’, and then for ‘bright’,” he said. To achieve this, he chose the new, LED-based VL2600 Wash luminaire, supplied by Siyan. “My main priority was output,” said Nyholm. “Plus, we needed to match the colors of the video content to the lig
UK - The Knight of Illumination (KOI) Awards has announced the introduction of two new awards to the Concerts & Events category for the 2020 ceremony. The new awards are being added to the line-up to accommodate the ever-evolving high standards of production in live events. The new Award for Festival Headliner, sponsored by Ayrton, will be open to submissions for any festival headline set that has been designed with additional packages without relying solely on the use of the pre-installed festival rig. To accommodate the entire festival season, eligible performances will have been performed between 1 January and 31 December 2019, and the closing date for submissions is 30 June 2020. Long-standing Concert & Events chair Jess Allan says, "We have seen such incredible growth in festival design over the last few years, with more and more designers implementing th
South Africa - DWR Distribution will present its first official MA3 basic training course from 25 to 26 February in Johannesburg. Presented by DWR’s Jannie de Jager, the two-day workshop will focus on familiarising the operator with the basic functions of the grandMA3 software and lighting consoles, as well as the operating philosophy. The content will include patching, presets, phasers and timecode. The course will also touch on networking aspects of the MA3 family. Delegates are requested to bring a MA3 console or MA3onPC Software on a laptop with an additional screen and a valid ID. The course will be held at DWR Distribution, C1 Kimbult Industrial Park, 9 Zeiss Road, Laserpark, Honeydew. The cost is R1,200 and includes a light lunch and refreshments. Bookings will be confirmed once payment has been received. Bookings on-line: http://dwrdistribu
Estonia - "Now our students will be able to have a taste of their future lives as creators, and practice on big stages,” declared Professor Ivari Ilja, rector of Tallinn’s Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre on the opening of the school’s new concert and performance centre in late 2019. Students will have their talents nurtured at the school’s new 12m Euro concert and performance centre. Among the benefits it offers aspiring actors and musicians is a state-of-the-art stage lighting system that features 50 Chauvet Professional Ovation F-265WW high output Fresnel fixtures supplied and installed by RGB Baltic OÜ. At the heart of the 6,000sq.m concert and performance facility is the 482-seat concert hall, which serves as a platform from which the institute's promising rising musical stars to demonstrate their talents. Here, 34 Ovation fixtures provide front and
USA - At the end of its regular season of Shakespeare in the Park, New York’s Public Theatre stages an open-air production at Central Park’s 1,800-seat open-air Delacorte Theatre. This past season, the story of Hercules was presented, a theatrical pageant brought to life by some 200 performers with a lighting design by Tony-award winning lighting designer Tyler Micoleau. The designer turned to Elation Professional’s multi-use Proteus Hybrid luminaire to provide visual impact in the outdoor environment. Micoleau had worked on two Shakespeare shows in Central Park earlier in the summer, but it was a very different plot he knew he needed for Hercules. “The musical Hercules, in a theatre as large as the Delacorte in Central Park, required (pun intended) very muscular lighting approaches,” he comments. “The Elation Proteus Hybrid provided just th
Columbia - Teatro Colsubsidio Roberto Arias Perez is a 1,000-seater venue opened in 1981 in central Bogota that has established itself at the centre of quality live entertainment, culture and performing arts. It’s renowned for high production values and imaginative shows offering a lively mix of concerts, musicals and classical performances. The theatre has recently purchased its first Robe moving lights - 10 Pointes and 10 x Spiiders. Added to the house lighting rig, these have already started making a difference to how shows can be lit and presented. The theatre is owned by a large commercial enterprise and independently run, and the new Robes were part of a general lighting upgrade that is ongoing to improve the technology and the levels of production on offer. The upgrade also includes several LED fixtures, and before these new fixtures, they had six older
USA - Magowan’s Infinite Mirror Maze has been a staple of San Francisco’s Pier 39 tourist area for over a decade. When the original lighting fixtures installed for the attraction’s opening began to fail, the venue’s resident ‘light artist’ chose ADJ units to replace them. This not only completely rejuvenated the look of the attraction, but also provided a wealth of creative potential for generating new looks and effects through colour mixing and DMX control. Pier 39 is a popular shopping and entertainment centre built on a pier close to the famous Fisherman’s Wharf district in San Francisco. Located on the second floor of the complex, Magowan’s Infinite Mirror Maze opened in 2009. It is an immersive attraction featuring a labyrinth of small mirrored rooms. Despite its popularity, the owners of the maze are committed to investing in new technology and ef
France - The style and panache that has made The Village Outlet so popular throughout the Isère department was on full display at a recent celebratory event at the outdoor retail centre in Villefontaine, 40 minutes outside Lyon. Adding colour and glamour to the occasion was a lively L&DB lighting design that featured Chauvet Professional Maverick MK2 Wash fixtures and Geyser P7 atmospherics. “Our goal was to blanket the area in colour to support the spirit of the event,” says Romain Plantier, CEO of L&DB. “The Maverick MK2 Wash excelled in this regard. We also relied on its zoom feature to tighten the beam and create dramatic effects against the fog from the two Geyser P7 units we had on site. The powerful jet and the colorization of the smoke that we got from the Geysers provided a striking effect.” L&DB used six Maverick MK2 Wash fixtures at The
USA - When the ninth Annual NFL Honours was held the day before Super Bowl LIV, lighting designer Jon Kusner selected a complement of Ayrton Diablo LED profile luminaires from PRG to supplement the house lights. The awards presentation by the National Football League honoured players from the 2019 season. It was hosted by Steve Harvey and pre-recorded for same-day broadcast on FOX. The venue for the show was the Ziff Ballet Opera House at the Adrienne Arsht Centre in Miami. The Diablo fixtures were the first Ayrton luminaires to be used by Kusner, a member of the Los Angeles lighting design co-op, 22 Degrees. Kusner mounted 14 Diablo on the balcony rail to backlight the audience and act as a stage wash when crowds filled the set and follow-spot traffic was compromised. “The balcony rail typically holds conventional fixtures,” he notes. “The lights we chose
Slovenia - Croatian singer-songwriter and actress Severina played four major arena concerts in the Balkans this fall - at Split and Zagreb in Croatia, Belgrade in Serbia and culminating at the Dvorana Stožice in Ljubljana, Slovenia - which were lit by Slovenian LD Crt Birsa who added over 150 Robe moving lights to the lighting design for the three concerts in Croatia and Slovenia. Crt, whose work is well known internationally was to light these four special shows for the superstar. Talks originally started back in April 2019 when Severina invited him, set designer Greta Godnic and show director Nejc Levstik to submit ideas. They asked Den Barca of ThenVision to join the creative team and work on the video design and visuals. “It was a complicated design and setup,” commented Crt, who was delighted when his initial lighting scheme proposal was accepted. “We had a
UK - White Light has supplied the lighting equipment for Leopoldstadt, which opened at the Wyndham’s Theatre in London’s West End this week. Written by Tom Stoppard, Leopoldstadt tells the story of three generations of the same Jewish family living in early 20th century Vienna. It is directed by Patrick Marber and features a lighting design by the Olivier Award-winning Neil Austin. “Leopoldstadt is a truly exceptional play which encapsulates the experience of the Austrian Jews through one family’s journey,” says Austin. “Beginning in the period of cultural and scientific explosion in Vienna at the turn of the century, it spans a near 60-year period ending in 1955. To achieve the passing of time it’s an abstract set of gauzes and items of furniture, which represent the one room through the years.” As such, Austin’s brief on the piec
USA - Bandit Lites once again provided the lighting for the Winter Jam Tour Spectacular, Christian music’s largest annual tour. According to Pollstar, attendance often outpaces any other tour’s attendance during the year’s first quarter. The evening of live concerts by top Christian artists includes a roster of Passion, Crowder, Austin French, Andy Mineo, Hillsong Young & Free, Building 429, Red, Louis Giglio, Newsong and more. After a few years with an in-the-round design, the tour returned to an end stage arena design, allowing the space for a large upstage LED wall. Due to an 8 mil blow through LED panel, production designer Jerry Holcomb was able to place Elation Paladins behind the wall. “With the tour having several more worship-oriented bands, we knew we needed a lot of upstage light looks punching through the bands,” Holcomb explained. To
USA - On 12 December, college football’s most talented student-athletes were recognised at the 2019 Home Depot College Football Awards presented live on ESPN from the College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta, Georgia. Justin Garrone and production design firm Innovative Show Design (ISD) have been involved in the show since 2012 and again produced the visuals for the 2019 edition, employing a setup that featured Elation Professional products. This was Innovative Show Design’s eighth year doing the College Football Awards and fifth year since it moved to the College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta. ISD served as a one-stop-shop for ESPN for the production, handling every aspect of the show from the first truck’s arrival to the last truck’s departure. Not only did they create and manage all lighting, scenic and graphics, ISD handled complete fabrication and ins
Monaco - From 12 July to 28 August, 2019, the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco hosted the prestigiuos Chaumet in Majesty. The exhibition provided a rare chance to see up close a spectacular set of jewels of the Parisian Maison Chaumet, some of which belong to the Empress Josephine de Beauharnais and the Princess Grace of Monaco. Darian Srl was involved in setting up the installation and decided to use 350 units of Prolights Minieclipse to enlighten the precious jewels. Daniele Giordano, chief executive for Darian Srl, said: “The Grimaldi Forum is one of our most important clients, and the event was very exclusive, therefore the lighting had to be appropriate, granting the proper relevance to the displayed jewels. I’ve chosen Prolights because I’ve been impressed by their professionalism and products’ quality. “MiniEclipse turned out to be a perfect choic
Germany - Berlin rockers punk rockers Alex Mofa Gang recently completed a 15 leg German tour in support of their latest LP Ende Offen. Backing up the band’s music was an intense Gabriel Paul designed lightshow that featured a collection of 22 Chauvet Professional fixtures supplied by PM Group. Working and touring together with the Alex Mofa Gang band members, Paul developed a staunchly defiant lighting concept, that focused virtually all of its energy on backlighting the quintet on stage. Illuminating the band from this angle, without the reassurance of front light and top light, evoked an arresting sense of uncertainty. Key to helping Paul accomplish this were the four Rogue R2 Wash and two Rogue R1 Wash fixtures in his rig. “The Rogue R1 and R2 Wash fixtures were instrumental in creating the overall look and feel of the band's visual concept," said P
USA - On Sunday, the Kansas City Chiefs won their first Super Bowl in half a century. In the heart of downtown, at the Kansas City Live! block, a happy group of 10,000 fans soaked up the victory in a sea of wild cheers and streams of confetti, accented by displays of light and coloured fog created with Chauvet Professional fixtures and atmospherics. Jason Bradley, the director of entertainment and production at the Kansas City Power & Light District, that houses over a dozen restaurants, bars, and nightclubs, recalls the experience. “It was something special to be a part of,” he said. “Adam, Pete and Taylor from Harvest Productions, my technical staff for the event, put in some very long hours to make this vision a reality. “Our guys were well prepared,” said Bradley. “We had a great cue made for the win to highlight the victory. Pounds and pounds of c
USA - Lighting director Marc Tiskewicz works with the Pabst Theatre Group and the Riverside Theatre in Milwaukee, where Greensky Bluegrass played three epic shows, including a New Year’s Eve concert featuring a lighting design from Andrew Lincoln. The lighting rig at Riverside included 12 High End Systems SolaPix 7's, 12 SolaPix 12's and six SolaFrame 1500s. The Riverside opened in 1928 as a Vaudeville theatre and is now one of four venues operated by the Pabst Theater Group. These days. The Riverside hosts a wide variety of show from comedy, rock, dance to major political events. Tiskewicz says PTG purchased their Hog 4 Full Boar console in 2016 from Studio Gear. “We next added the SolaFrame 1500s that mostly live on a mid-stage pipe where I can get the most out of them show to show. Then, during the Greensky Bluegrass three-day NYE show, we used 12 SolaPix 19's
Czech Republic - Lighting designer Michael Kuehbandner worked closely with creative director Achim John from Jack Morton Worldwide and the show direction team from Quinton’s Concept to deliver a spectacular visual extravaganza for the VIP launch of the new Škoda Octavia car at the Prague National Gallery’s Trade Fair Palace. Assisting Michael were over 180 x Robe moving lights – a mix of MegaPointes, Spiiders, LEDWash 1200s and DL4S Profiles. The eye-catching event was production designed / produced by marketing and communications agency Fischer Appelt in collaboration with leading global brand experience specialist, Jack Morton Worldwide. Michael was working directly for adhoc engineering, German-based interdisciplinary events and technical specialist, who were responsible for coordinating the full technical production and implementation led by Maik Ragh
UK - White Light has supplied the lighting equipment for Holes which is currently touring venues across the UK. Presented by The Children’s Theatre Partnership, Holes is the creative new stage show based on the multi-award winning novel and Hollywood blockbuster. Adapted for the stage by the novel’s author Louis Sachar, the piece is set in a labour camp where a boy, Stanley, has to dig the same sized hole every day while a tyrannical warden looks on. The show features a lighting design by Prema Mehta and an associate lighting design by Guy Jones. Guy comments: “I have dual roles on this production as associate lighting designer to Prema as well as production electrician, with my overall brief being to recreate the original lighting design in a touring format. Many of the tour moves are in and up in a day so one central aim has been to replicate the looks
UK - Ayrton’s new IP65-rated Perseo LED profile fixtures saw their first Scottish engagements when they were specified by lighting designer, Grant Anderson, for two major outdoor winter events in Glasgow, created and produced by online marketing and events company, itison. The first in a series of major events from itison, the spectacular GlasGLOW, returned at Halloween to Glasgow Botanic Gardens for the second year running, drawing over 100,000 visitors over its two-and-a-half week run. This sound and light extravaganza took visitors through the Gardens on a 60-minute, 2km interactive trail of light, through nine differently themed worlds that delighted with fresh surprises at every turn. Twelve Perseo fixtures were employed to dramatic effect by Anderson in three of these worlds: Arcade, The Dragon’s Lair and Area G12 where they were deployed at low-level with g
Germany - The Staatstheater Nürnberg is one of the largest multi-discipline theatres in Germany. Under the auspices of general music director Jens-Daniel Herzog, 600 employees in the opera, drama, ballet and concert divisions currently facilitate more than 750 performances per season for almost 300,000 visitors. For the ballet Sacre, directed by Goyo Montero, the Staatstheater Nürnberg used Robert Juliat SpotMe for the first time, in conjunction with a Robert Juliat Victor followspot and Robert Juliat Maestro server. Robert Juliat SpotMe is a 3D tracking tool for followspots and the only tracking device for performers on the market that puts the followspot operator in control by enabling ‘slave’ lighting fixtures to follow the movements of a followspot. Because movement is based on the position determined by the followspot, no cameras or sensors are necess
USA - In a recent production of the musical Man of la Mancha by the MNM Theatre Company at the Raymond F. Kravis Centre, West Palm Beach, Don Quixote’s flowering dreams, were brought vividly to life by a Clifford Spulock lighting design that featured Chauvet Professional fixtures. Positioning two Rogue R1X Spots on the house box booms and four Rogue RH1 Hybrids on upstage truss, Spulock built a variety of looks for the show. “I wanted the lighting to evoke myriad emotions from the audience,” says Spulock. “The setting of the play is already dark, so I wanted a clear delineation between the prison and Cervantes’ ‘story within the story’ to draw the audience into this imaginary world, which seems bright and happy, but slowly becomes more sombre and complex as the emotional state of the characters is revealed.” The iris edge function of the Rogue R
UK - A large number of ADJ Hydro Beam X2 and 32 HEX Panel IP fixtures were used to create the outdoor lightshow to launch the international Mayflower 400 commemoration year. As part of the Illuminate festival of light in Plymouth - the port from which The Mayflower set sail on its legendary journey, the display filled the maritime city's historic waterfront with vibrant colours and piercing beams that could be seen from miles around. 2020 marks the 400th anniversary of the sailing of the Mayflower from Plymouth in the UK to what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts. Mayflower 400 is a year-long initiate that will champion the values of freedom, faith and personal liberty that informed that original journey. At the same time, the commemoration will recognise the impact of the Mayflower’s journey on Native American communities and address themes of colonialism and migration, provi
