Making Progress - Theatrecrafts.com

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July 2011 entertainment, presentation, installation

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MakingProgress

LSi visits Take That on tour

Shrek the MusicalArrives in the West End

ABTT in ReviewLSi reports from London

Technical: LEDsThe State of Play . . .

Also Inside . . .

WOMAD: CáceresMusic amid bewitching beauty

PLUS! . . . The NSA’s Apprentice Schemes • APG at FOMFest • RSAMD’s Audio UpgradeMidas on Broadway • Recollected Works • Audio File • Crew Cuts and more . . .

Cover:Cover 11/07/2011 08:55

Steve Moles reports from behind the scenes of Take That’s Progress Tour,

from rehearsals at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light and from the fifth night

of their eight-night residency at the City of Manchester Stadium . . .

Making Progress

Most of you will know by now the stories of the 70ft

(21m) tall robot that graces the Take That stage. Known

as OM, derived from the French homme, he’s more

affectionately known by most of the crew as OM the

‘Other Man’ (as opposed to BM, the ‘Big Man’, a giant

with a 200ft (61m) arm span who enfolds the stage and

holds the main PA from his finger-tips). OM is a walking

behemoth. As Donald Rumsfeld famously said, “there

are known unknowns, and there are unknown

unknowns”. In terms of audacity, Take That’s production

team has stepped boldly into the realm of unknown

unknowns, and - take a bow all of you - has pulled it off.

There are, in fact, several significant elements to thisproduction that break new ground. For those of you whoscan my preamble and then jump to their own discipline(lights, sound, set or video) know this: promoters SJM gotto sell several thousand extra tickets to every show thanks toan innovation that The Production Office (TPO) supremoChris Vaughan has been stealthily marching towards for

several years now - no front-of-house tower, no delay towers,no obstructions to the punters at all. This in turn forged a dramatic response from the PA department, and hats off toCapital Sound and Al Woods (a direct employee of TPO) formaking it work. This was not a new PA system, just one ofthe systems that we all know are the top pick for audio at thehighest level; it was down to the way it was applied. Theresult was easily the best stadium sound I’ve heard, ever. Itremains to be seen whether the cost/benefit analysis of extraseat sales can justify the expense of this unusual applicationof off-the-shelf audio.

While video and lighting may not have broken new ground insuch spectacular fashion, they certainly pushed theboundaries: the Nocturne screen on main stage transcendedmere ‘LED VID’, becoming an integral part of the non-stoptheatricality cooked up by set designer Es Devlin and theimagination of choreographer Kim Gavin (and choreographerisn’t a big enough word to encapsulate Gavin’s input).Lighting designer Patrick Woodroffe, meanwhile, confirmedsome applications for stadium lighting that I’m sure we’ll beseeing used for his Olympic opener in London next year.

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But in the end, production laurels must go to stage set; thesimple fact that Brilliant Stages, Total Solutions Group andTait Towers were all heavily involved tells you pretty much allyou need to know about the breathtaking scope of thisshow’s ambition.

A Brief Description . . .

The Big Man (BM) defines the stage, his arms, shouldersand head dwarf the stadium and top off the Stagecostructure that holds the compendium of gags andtechnology that is the Progress Tour. To right and left themain PA suspends from BM’s finger-tips: beyond thesestand two portrait screens for IMAG, and further still, theside-hang audio systems, some 260ft (80m) apart. TheBridge spans 160ft (49m) across stage. Upstage of thebridge is BM’s torso, not revealed till the last third of theshow when all the theatrics of the Bridge are finallyexhausted and the torso opens to reveal OM curled within.To either side of BM, huge walls of video are also revealed.Concealing these elements for most of the show is theapparatus from the Bridge: soft kabuki screens with wovenLEDs sit upstage of the so-called Venetian, though in realitythe Venetian blinds are steel scrambling nets upon whichballetic aerial dancers scamper. The main stage screenhangs in front on a track: Robbie Williams’ grand entrancethrough it is just one of the tricks up the screen’s sleeve;there are numerous others between screen and venetians.

Forestage is multilayered, the band stood within two trackingdollies that flank the central focus. A long peninsula of deckruns far out into the audience and onto the B stage, whichhas more props and lifts concealed within it than a West Endmusical, and yet tucked neatly into it, looking towards stage,sit light, video and sound control beneath canopies just 5ft8” (1.7m) tall. As for OM, when he eventually appears, hefirst lifts the Boys up on his hands as he sits up for a song on

the main stage, then carries them out along the now loweredpeninsula deck and deposits them on B stage, whereafter heslowly stands up - and 55,000 people stare open-mouthedas he towers above them and stretches out his arms.

Audio: Capital Sound

The approach to sound epitomises how this productionchallenges the established mores of stadium rock. The lackof FOH or delay towers impacts Gary Bradshaw in his role ofhouse engineer: would he be able to see and hear properly?Would flown delays off the grandstand roof be adequate?The answer to the second question is yes, of course: theoval of a stadium is a simple shape to handle, perfect inmany ways because flying off the roof puts the speakerscloser to the listener and at a much better angle than a delaytower (providing the venue allows enough to be flown in theright places, and that production has the budget to committhe necessary resources). But that didn’t mean it would besimple. “I was genuinely worried,” Bradshaw began. “Therationale behind Chris Vaughan’s idea is about sightlinesand more seats, and from that perspective it works reallywell. But there is a sound benefit too. I’ve been out for thePet Shop Boys (PSB) set and listened from all over thevenue; compared to what we did for Circus last time, theclarity from the Ring is even better, especially at the back.”

The PA crew refer to the flown grandstand system as ‘theRing’, and it functions on a similar rationale to the Ringsystem employed for Eurovision (see LSi June 2011), but atrock show rather than TV show SPLs. I too spent theopening set by the PSBs walking up and down everystaircase in the stadium; I also talked with as many puntersas I could. The consensus was positive: they liked the opensightlines, though most hadn’t noticed the absence of a FOHtower till I pointed it out (no surprise there?). Many hadnoticed the excellent intelligibility, however, even if they


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hadn’t spotted the Martin Audio system hangingfrom the roof. The clarity from the mid/highs wasexcellent, that proximity benefit was all tooapparent, and though there was a degree ofseparation from the low end coming from stagethis wasn’t troublesome for the listener. I don’trecall ever seeing subs way out in the house forstadium gigs, so situation normal really.

“From a mixing perspective, last time we wereway off-centre, here to one side of B stagewe’re much more central and I can see the mainstage pretty much down to front barrier level,”says Bradshaw. That’s a crucial factor anypromoter contemplating the ‘no towers’ policymust not overlook: The simple fact is that thecrowd barrier around the B stage gave a muchmore generous gap than normal in order toaccommodate the multiple props and the largenumber of people needed to manage them, andto shepherd OM out into the stadium. Thus FOHsound world, although at exactly the same levelas the audience, had a good five to six metresin front before they met the back of a punter’shead. It’s that gap which is absolutely essentialand allowed Bradshaw to see and hear andthus to do his job correctly.

“The other thing is the roof of our shelter: builtby Tait as an integrated part of B stage, it canbe whipped off or on in two seconds, so I mixwith it off as it gives me perfect view when theband are on B stage, which is often, and anuncompromised sound.” He also has fromDiGiCo some nifty custom transparent coversfor the desks with a letterbox slot at the leadingedge: “I’ve tried them and you can operate withyour hands poked through the slot.” And doeshe suffer the acoustic bounce of main PA off

a temperature inversion layer above a hotsweaty crowd? “The Martin Audio temperatureand humidity correction takes care of that,though of course we have noticed some groundeffect from dampness. We also started inSunderland by sending more drive to the roofRing system. I was anxious there wouldn’t beenough vocal presence, but in the end it’sproved unnecessary. The mix that goes up therenow is the same as the mains left and right.Here at Man’ City, the stadium is quite dryacoustically compared to Sunderland; thereverb is short and smooth.”

Bradshaw emphasised the importance of theunrestricted view of the band: “Capital has usedspeaker dollies for main and backup desk; theracks beneath have been custom-made sowhen I’m sat on my drum stool, my knees fitunder the desk. When I’m stood, the dolliesallow me to wheel the desk around when theboys come out to B, rather than twist my neck.”

With five vocalists out in front of a big PA systemyou can understand his need. “We’ve switchedto DiGiCo SD7s for this tour,” he says. “Mysession is also in the second (PSB) desk ifneeded. The big change from D5 last time isquality of sound, first and foremost; I’m alsohandling up around 80 inputs; it’s a big band,including Gary Nuttall from Robbie’s band.Besides instruments, four of the musicians singBVs and they’re all an important part of the TakeThat sound. The band is split on two riserseither side of stage and each has a transparentshelter; because of the rain effects on stagethey’re always covered, but this hardly affectswhat I take from them; the guitars, for example,have all their amps off-stage in isolation boxes,

Top, The emergence of OM.

Crew, from top:

Dennis Gardener, lighting operator

Gary Bradshaw, front-of-house engineer

Ben Leach, Pro Tools and show caller

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and having the drums in the shelters actuallyreduces any element of cymbal splash from theboys’ mics, though it does still affect the BVs.The Bass player, who’s a really good singer, isright next to them, so I have to roll off the highs.

“The other thing I like about the SD7 is we nowhave three fader blocks of 12 channels, not 8,that means I’ve split the duties three ways,drums and percs, rest of the band, and voices -perfect. The boys all use Sennheiser SKM 5200mics with MD 5235 dynamic capsules - theypick up less ambient noise. It isn’t a super hi-fimic, but it’s no compromise. The caps alsohandle the rain better.” (Robbie Williams pointedout to the audience it had rained at every showso far.) “The boys go for it but you can’t justhave all five vocals flat out, so I take lead vocaland the main harmony voice, then thebackground harmony beneath. They all pull themic away to fade off and I ride all five faders tomatch, but new songs apart, they do it at thesame places they’ve always done, so it’ssecond nature. I drop the fader like you changegear in a car, without thinking. I like the soundof the Sennheiser anyway, but it’s just so muchbetter than anything else in this application. Inthe desk we have dynamic EQ. Before, I usedXTA’s SiDD, now I can pull that 7-8kHz on Gary,the 3-4kHz on Robbie in the desk and it’s justas good. I also have some dynamic on the roofring output to pull a little high/mid. Overall, thesystem EQ is much flatter and I have enormousheadroom in the vocals; that’s down to a combination of the capsules and how well thesystem sounds.”

PA System The PA set-up is the work of Al Woods, a member of the TPO team. As system tech’ heworked intensively with Capital Sound to ensurethat the ‘no towers’ sound solution workedwithout compromise for the audience. “There’snothing too fancy,” says Woods. “Within thepitch and roof delays an XTA226 is integral toevery amp station, so we can address delayand EQ individually to each position.”

There were 10 hangs of Ring PA around theroof, with four stations of pitch stack delay at thefar end. The stage main PA is Martin Audio’sW8L Longbow, with side hangs further off stage

also W8L family: the only flown subs hangvertically flat immediately behind these latterhangs, with a floor array of subs below.

“Everything in the air is fed from S/L and S/Rdolly systems, PA cable sits in the hopper ontop for trucking.” Identical really to whatVaughan had Skan make up last year forMuse’s stadium/arena outing. “The wholesystem has been refurbished by Capital; weinsisted that it had to look pristine, cableSocapex connectors have been replaced, eventhe front speaker grilles. I’m employed by TheProduction Office and I pick the crew: team ismost important. Capital was determined bychoice of system, as Longbow is one of myfavourite three systems.” I managed to elicit theother two - K1 and Vertec.

Because of the OM track there is no cross-stage link, so linking is via out front. “Wethought long and hard about the audiodistribution in the roof,” says Woods. “We runanalogue to and from the desk with a standardarena multi-core each side. Then AES from thedollies; the runs are long, so Ian Coleville atCapital and I researched a fibre solution. Tworeturns from FOH run to the floor SUB dollies,then to main dollies left and right upstage, then

Take NotesFred Opsomer & Tait Technologies

• “Chris Vaughan called mebecause he was concerned aboutspeed. The dollies were the way togo, the total package was forspeed and strength, simple asthat. We also provided the kabukisfrom Tait Tech, the mechanism arefrom our standard stock, but thefabric is quite different. They havea printed outline, the humanfigures from the album cover, butEs Devlin was adamant that theseoutlines shouldn’t be visible whenfront lit, so they could appearmagically when lit from behind. We did a lot of test until we foundsomething with the right amountof transparency but enough weaveto hide the outlines; it comes fromShowtex, the Belgian theatredrape maker. The LEDs sewn intothe fabric are just off-the-shelfunits. There was no need todevelop something for just 300pixels.”

• Pete McGlynn: “The two bandpods can’t link backstage becauseof the OM trackway, so gettingsignal to the SD7s from the bandand back to the outputs has itsown complexity. DiGiCo have beenfantastic in helping with that. Theyalso helped sort a few niggles, andSennheiser have been the same,especially with water-proofing.Without them we would be introuble. Apart from that it’s verystraightforward.”

• Microphones: A quick note onmicrophones: this is a Sennheisershow, the BVs use 935s, and mostof the backline is variousSennheiser, but Bradshaw putShure SM57s on the guitars.


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Optocore up to the roof: we run fibre from eachside of stage all the way round in bothdirections, so we have a fully redundant loop.There are also fibre returns to FOH so I canmonitor the full system from there. I also hadCapital build me a bespoke rack-mount PC withAudioCore and three Meyer Galileo - one formatrix, one for system and a spare. I also haveSmaart in there for reference and a 5G wirelesssystem to link to tablet PC and an Electrosonicmic for RTA and the transfer functions - it meansI can look at stuff on the spectrograph and useit for time-aligning.

“Also, because we’ve hung the subs flat behindthe main side-hang, I’ve curved the subs in timeso the departure time matches that of the mainarray in front. By coincidence, the subs end uppretty much an exact horn length distance fromthe Longbow in front. It’s very smooth, theycross over at 65Hz and there are no nullsanywhere. Because of the stage configurationthe side hangs are in fact time zero; the mainsystem, 5-6 metres in front, is delayed back tothem.”

The Subs are not a heavy component in thisshow, more an effect, so even though Woodshas put a substantial number on the floor, thelevel for audience members nearby is muchkinder than many a comparable system. “Thesystem also has unexpected benefits, we’re a good 5dB under noise limits outside thestadium - a direct advantage of the roof ring.Even at 120m everyone gets a good sound. I always ask myself, am I sitting in an £80 seat,and is it worth it?” It certainly is.

Monitors This is a two-hander: Steve Lutley from DeltaSound mixes for the boys, Simon Hodge does

the band (and also provides the commssystem, via his company SurfHire). The stageleft monitor shelter is also inhabited by BenLeach who runs the Pro Tools rig and for fun isthe show caller. Lutley is delightfully modestabout his position: “I’m here because way backI did monitors for Gary Barlow’s solo tour and I seem to have been here ever since.”

The monitor set-up is provided by Delta. TheIEM system is all Sennheiser SR2050 withG2000 receivers and Ultimate Ears inserts.Lutley says: “I like ‘engineer mode’ - I use onepack, programme in five different frequenciesand then don’t have to go through pre-fade tolisten to each of the boys - that’s very useful.They all have quite a big band mix - they’resimilar, but each has his own individual mix.Although B stage is far away I do havereasonable line of sight, much better than lasttour . . . For rehearsals Pete McGlynn, who setsup the desks and stage, drives the desk and Isit out at the B stage and watch - especially thenew songs. Both me and Hodge have moved tothe SD7: we wanted the spare desk option ofusing identical boards that can mirror eachother’s session.”

The mixes can be quite nuanced: “Gary evenwants reverb on the snare, and Mark wantsvocal distortion on one of his songs. When Garysings a ballad he wants none of the other voicesin his mix. The point is, either desk can doeverything, if needed.”

Hodge explained: “Each band member is a producer in their own right, so they knowprecisely what they want to hear. We were alsoblessed with lengthy band rehearsals before theboys came in, so we had it nailed. The band areall controlled, no-one gets carried away, levels

rarely change. They all have their own full mix.As to the SD7, I’d mirror what Steve said: I likethe power in the desk. I’m driving a lot, all 40dancers have ear packs too - there’s no otherway to keep them in time. This way thechoreographers can talk to them as well. That’s20 channels for the band and boys in total, andanother two for the dancers.”

Both men pointed out the benefits of the littlevideo monitor in the SD7’s meter bridge: “Onshows this scale you can never see everywhere,so a video feed to this is great.”

Hodge says: “The MD5235 capsule has provedincredibly robust, considering they sing throughthe rain drenchers, and Robbie sings upsidedown as he descends from the bridge throughwater: they’re amazing. In eight shows we’veonly lost one and that not through moisture. Wereally thought we’d lose one a show.”

Pete McGlynn added that the capsules weretreated with conformal coating to add to theirwater resistance: “Even so, they are damnimpressive,” he said. As McGlynn is one of themost experienced stage audio techs in thebusiness, you have to say that’s praise indeed.

VideoThere are two elements to the video - contentand IMAG, inevitably - with the LED screenscoming from XL Video and Nocturne. XL’sStuart Heaney was kind enough to provide anoverview, while Richard Shipman (another directcontractor to TPO) front-of-house, explainedimage and screen management.

“The Nocturne screens are all V9 (two portraitscreens to the sides for IMAG - mostly), and thecentre tracking screen which has a door


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function and also splits left and right,” Heaneybegan. “The XL screen is our new F11 (11mmpixel pitch) 1080 tiles in two halves either side ofBM’s torso. The frame structure and roadpackaging for the F11 is built by TaitTechnologies (see side-panel, page 45) and thePPU is also packaged for the road by Tait.”

For stadium-scale touring, Chris Vaughan hasembraced the US concept of big, forkabledollies to minimise cabling and load in/outtimes. “He’s even attempted to get fork slotwidths on the dollies unified,” said Heaney, “sowe don’t have drivers having to jump off to re-set forks as they shift from video to PAdollies.” You’ll note ‘attempted’, meaning they’renot quite there: time for a published standard?

The dollies are in fact enormous, over 5m long,and are able to sit directly beneath the screenready to receive as it descends; the speedgained is obvious, and the amount of panelcabling that travels in situ another time-saver.Could they work for arena touring? Mostly, yes.

One point of note, XL fly their screens withmotors floor-mounted, with wire rope overgallows masthead-type pulley blocks integratedby Stageco, into the main stage structure above- a typical engineering solution from them thatnegates the need for climbing riggers - wellworth the effort.

“All the PPU and camera kit is from XL,”continued Heaney. “Content playback off theUVA D3 system is supervised by Richard

Shipman. For the live IMAG work we have tencameras, all Sony HXC, used in standarddefinition. Matt Asken, who directs the livevideo, uses our Grass Valley Kayak: he’s beenwith the band for years.”

Asken was also preparing for the first shoot forthe live show DVD; with a doubling of camerasand additional lighting to contend with, he wasunderstandably unavailable, but he clearlyknows his chops. His cuts were slick, part of thesequenced whole: I especially loved the giantfacial close-ups.

Richard Shipman is a keen adherent of UVA’sD3: “I’m in love with D3,” he says. “I’ve usedthem all - Hippo, Catalyst, and this is the one I want from Santa. It’s a great pre-visualiser forvideo, we just took the stage CAD drawings andimported them, added in the screens and youhave an accurate picture of what the stage willlook like with content running to scale - great forshowing to the band. On the song ‘Shine’,where Robbie’s image (from content, not live)jumps from centre to side screen, fromlandscape to portrait, the D3 knows the numberof pixels from one screen to the other and treatsit all as one big image. Most of the set list isMIDI timecode, or to click-track; there are lots ofmanual cues for the opening.”

Why is Shipman positioned FOH? “It’s mucheasier to balance the screens from here; that’sespecially advantageous now when we’reshooting the DVD, so I can readily tone downscreens in the back shot of the cameras.”

From top:

XL Video’s Stuart Heaney

Richard Shipman, screens director

System tech’ Al Woods of TPO.


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The content is provided by Sam Pattinson fromhis company Treatment: “His footage isabsolutely cracking,” says Shipman. “He reallyunderstands how LED works, as opposed tosome content providers who hide away andwork from HD studio screens; Sam works to theexact amount of pixels we have.” It’s a measureof how compelling the live show is that I paidscant attention to the content, but when I wasn’tbeing assaulted by gags, dancers, pyro, props,elevators, rain effects, aerialists, confetti androbots, I looked - and yes, Shipman is right:cracking.

Lighting: Neg EarthI spoke to Patrick Woodroffe at the SunderlandStadium of Light during production rehearsalsas he would not be present for my visit toManchester. As ever, Woodroffe does notdesign to a formula but finds his creative musefrom the elements around him. “I approachthese stadium shows in a different way,” hesays. “I started by discussing the show in itsentirety with Es Devlin and Kim Gavin and thenwe let the set take the lead on the design. Youneed to light the scenic pieces and you need tolight the band but after that you must considerthe essentials rather than the style of thelighting.”

He continues: “It was the Stones’ Steel Wheelstour that first dispensed with roofs for bands,roofs that gave an obvious but fixed place tohang lights. But the roof never kept the banddry anyway, so being able to turn to the setdesigner - Mark Fisher in that case - and say,you do your thing, we’ll figure out where to hangthe lights afterwards, was hugely liberating. OnTake That we could see early on that the Bridgewas the essential light position as the stagedemanded a coherent set of lights for thedonkey work of lighting the performers, and forthese we used a row of Vari*Lite 3500 wash FX.Above the video screens, at the rear of thestage, we rigged Coemar Infinity washlights andon the side torms we had Clay Paky Shotlights

for a hard, theatrical side-light. And then weneeded something across the front of stage. I always like to put something there to define thefront edge of the performance area but untilnow I’ve never found a light that could do thatand provide something usable to light the act.Sometimes there are 40 cast members upthere, so now with the Martin MAC 301 we’vegot a 21st Century footlight.”

Nevertheless, it’s a huge stage to light and iteats up fixtures. “Clearly, with something on thisscale you have to hang a lot of lights - to lightthe audience, to give variation to the looks, tocreate drama and spectacle. But you don’tneed to insist on the traditional things like a lighting position at 45 degrees to the front ofstage. That might seem like a sacrifice for thelighting alone, but the payoff is that you getsomething unique and the other things don’tmatter so much. Because of the nature of theProgress album, this show is a little darker thanthe last tour - more robotic and less organic,without the same level of joyfulness as Circushad. So the choice of lights is different this time,with a design that is more syncopated andmore about the narrative than simply themusic.”

How does Woodroffe respond to the ‘no towers’ethos? “It inevitably raised big questions: Wheredo you put your followspots and how do you getfront light on the stage? So we doubled up thefollowspots - five Lancelots a side in the house,and for audience light we took what would havebeen the traditional spot towers, and figurativelyspeaking, turned them horizontal and riggedthem from under the grandstand roof. We dothat a lot when filming stadium concerts so weknew how effectively that can work. We haveClay Paky Alpha Beam 1500s on each of theside trusses. They are a terrific light - clean,white, pokey and accurate. They became thekey light for the action on the B stage and thefront of the A stage and also for the higherscenery like the head and the hands of the Big

Man. They literally reach the parts that otherlights cannot reach!”

Woodroffe is fortunate in having such a boldtableau to light: “We have an open stage, a mixof pop and rock and some heavy conceptualpieces, all cleverly and theatrically directed bythe amazing Kim Gavin. He’s very collaborative,cool and imaginative and it’s unusual to find allthese talents in one person. And of course hehas the complete trust of the band.” I witnesseda similar level of trust shown by the boysthemselves that evening, as they comfortablyfell into conversation with Woodroffe about thisor that element of the show.

Dennis Gardener runs the light show. “He’s oneof Patrick’s best operators and has been doingstuff for Patrick for years,” said the show’sprogrammer and co-designer Dave Hill (anotherindispensable member of Woodroffe’s team)during rehearsals in Sunderland. “I love runningthese big shows,” said Gardener two weekslater. “The fine-tuning is what I enjoy, especiallyon a show like this where you get to workclosely with someone like Matt [Asken, videodirector], evolving the live video content lightingas we also settle the big show picture.”

Gardener was especially animated this evening,“We’re tuning the show for the DVD. I’ve got anextra dozen followspots in the house - 22 I’mcalling in total.” You’ve only done eight showsso far, don’t you use a caller? “No, I love it, I callit all by name. I don’t believe in working to a script - do that and you end up becoming a machine. If you call from memory it keeps yousharp.” Sharp? He must be deadly.

Of the GrandMA 2, used to programme andoperate the show, he says: “Layout is good, thebig screens especially; I found the switch from 1 to 2 easy. MA haven’t tried to re-invent thewheel, so much of it is very familiar. It’s very fastfor programming and networking. We have twofull-size desks, one mirroring the other. I’ve


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found that if the console does crash, 90% of the timeit’s software, not the CPU, so type ‘auto start’ andyou’ll be back up and running in well under a minute- much faster than a total re-boot.” Maybe MA won’tlike to see that in print, but then nobody believes in a totally crash-proof desk, and speedy recovery isan asset in any operator’s book.

“The touch-screen down on the console surface isespecially useful - grab a fixture on the tilt displayscreens and the full colour mix appears below; alsogreat for lamps with shutters were you can manuallysqueeze to fit very precisely. MA has also providedfantastic back-up through rehearsals - send PhilNorfolk at MA UK a complete 21MB show file with a bug in it and it’s back 30 minutes later.”

Woodroffe’s lighting choices include someespecially long range positions with practically all Bstage lighting out on trusses rigged off the leadingedges of the grandstands, typically a 70m throw ormore. Gardener says: “The Alpha Beam 1500shandle most of the long-range stuff; we used themon the Circus tour at comparable range. They’remore than enough for the cameras. For me, the funlights are the Martin MAC 301s in OM’s hands andeyes, and the pair of PAR 64s with a bit of Lee 106for his heart.”

There are another 35 PARs in this high tech rig,mainly up on the bridge to downlight the watereffects. The Panalux LED clusters in the corner ofeach OM body panel are worth a mention; like somany things in this show they’re an obviousplacement but could easily have been omitted onthe basis of cost (OM is already fabulously

expensive) but they weren’t. Such attention to detailis what makes the quality mark of this show so high.

Gardener reminded me that Woodroffe, with whom I had the pleasure to work on a couple of big toursin the mid-80s, still uses an old conferencing device.“He brings a white board to rehearsals and putsanything relevant to each song on it - colour, video,props used, etc. In some ways it’s a job ofsubtraction, having many options and then refiningout what works best. From final rehearsals inSunderland we sent back at least a truck-load oflights in the end.”

Finally, I asked Gardener for his stand-out momentsand he said something I can only agree with:“Whether you think you’re a fan or not, you can’thelp but enjoy their performance. Richard and Iconstantly sing along out here. If I was to point toanything it would be ‘SOS’ and ‘UndergroundMachine’ - great video and lighting combination, itjust works. And the touch of Kim Gavin on everysong - well, he just does a very, very good job”.

StagecoStageco is an international church: I spoke with WeisBaaten, a Dutchman amongst the Belgiancontingent and the man supervising the stage teamfor this venue. This is a roofless stage, with largeamounts of flown technology integrated into thesupport structure, and a great deal of custominterfacing is required to accommodate these items.Baaten was understated: “It’s what we do,” he saidwith a shrug. “The bridge is supported by fourcolumns across the stage plus where it picks up ateach end, but actually that’s pretty simple. It’s the

Des FallonAlthoughit’s StuartHeaneywho runsthe XLVideo teamon tour,Take Thatwas, ofcourse, one of the regularprojects of Des Fallon, whohad managed video for everyouting since their return. AsHeaney reminded me, “he hadput this one together in hisinimitable fashion before hewas snatched away.” Hismark is in the attention todetail that typifies this tour; inthat respect you could saythis will stand as a fittingtribute to his life. His workhere is a seamless part ofwhat is, by any measure, anoutstanding show. Fallon’sPA, Tracey Donnelly, hastaken up the reins back at HQ,and is by all accountsmaintaining his higheststandards in what must be anemotional period for everyoneat the company.


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box structures at the end where the sidescreens are flown that are most tricky. There’s a lot of weight there and accuracy of position iscritical.”

The box structure looks quite simple: four tallcolumns with horizontal beams linking themtogether at the top, the base area is small andalthough they ultimately tie to the main stage,they are precisely craned into positionfreestanding. “To base out this stage, (tomeasure and mark the footprint) is most critical,pretty much to the millimetre because the waythe parts fit together is so tight. Normally, by thetime we’ve unloaded the trucks on the first daywe have based out and can start, but with thiswe take our time - three to four hours. Backcentral area first, then the two side boxes, thenthe main stage. We build the BM torso on stageand hoist him up, and then the arms, hands andhead are craned into position. There is nothingsimple about the BM and although TotalSolutions have made a good structure it’s noteasy to travel because of its size.”

Amazingly, the Stageco gear takes 14 trucks,the BM another eight. “The main thing is co-operation,” says Baaten. “We have manymore decks on the pitch than normal to allowroom for big pieces to be assembled, but wesave time elsewhere - no FOH tower, no delays.That helps, but it is three full days. If you look athow the OM drives out through the centre ofstage you realise that even the simple substage decking has to be placed extremelyaccurately, the tolerances are tiny.”

It’s amazing what the Stageco crew achieve.They exemplify how Belgium has managedwithout a government for so long. Maybe wecan learn something from them?

Take That - Stage SetFor Es Devlin’s stunning stage set the divisionof labour runs three ways: B stage and Bridge -Tait Towers; main stage and OM - BrilliantStages; the Big Man (BM) - Total Fabrications(TFL). Before you read on, you should note thatbetween Sunderland and Manchester, the firsttwo venues, all these spectacular feats ofengineering were subject to ferocious weatherconditions - storm-force winds in Sunderland,monsoon conditions in Manchester. They allpassed with flying colours.

The BM is massive. His arms span over 200ft(61m); his head tops out at approximately 100ft(30m) above stadium floor: when I attendedSunderland the BM’s head protruded above thegrandstand roof by 20ft (6m). Weis Baaten fromStageco commented on the ease of assembly,even if the size of BM proved somewhatproblematic. I asked Chris Cronin from TFL justhow you negotiate strapping a 60m giant to a 25m tall stage structure. “Even before weknew quite what we would build we made a tripto Belgium to talk to Stageco; me, my structuralengineer Malcolm Richards, and Nigel Tranterfrom TFL who would be my project manager.The solution is rather elegant, though possiblycommonplace in large building structures wherehuge cladding panels are craned into place. “Insimple terms it’s a series of vertical cones fixed

to the trussing sub-structure of the man weeventually built. These point downwards andlocate into receptacles on the Stageco system;as you crane parts of BM into place the conesbecome self-centreing devices and once fullylowered, the BM part is secure.”

The other gee whiz factor with BM is the factthat the main PA system hangs from hisfingertips. “They certainly were an extraordinarychallenge,” admitted Cronin. “What you seefrom the audience perspective is an index fingerwith a line-array beneath, but transferring twoand a half tons of PA back seven metres to theStageco tower proved a work of art.”

Cronin devised a custom truss structureconcealed within the hand to transfer the load,“It actually looks more impressive when thehand is unclad - well, to an engineer like me itdoes. We had to calculate back from a finitefinger size and build trussing with extra thickchord walls and strengthened web; even so,with all necessary safety factors calculated wewere using 85% of load capacity. If the PAweighed three tons then Big Man would haveneeded some chubby fingers.”

All other elements of the BM are based uponTFL’s SMD truss, although in non standardlengths, the cladding is from nine millimetreplywood and fixes to a strut type device fixed tothe truss. Cronin revealed that building the twoBMs (to leapfrog venues with the main stagesystems) took 200 people over 12 weeks, “anda team of eight scenic artists to apply the


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fire-retardant coatings and decorative finish.” Sadly,like U2’s claw, BM is one of those objects that youmay find quietly decomposing in a field one day,which is a shame - he’d look splendid at the bottomend of the A1 in time for the Olympics. Go on Boris,make an offer.

The robotic OM is the stand-out feature of the show.Tony Bowern of Brilliant said that much of themanufacture was undertaken by a hydraulic machinespecialist. “We would have built much more of OM inhouse,” he said, “had the commitment to the mainstage and other projects not been so heavy.”

But what of the risky nature of OM? An animated 70fttall man weighing several tons standing in the midstof thousands of fans, while exciting in concept, isplainly bonkers. A twinkle came into his eye. “Itwouldn’t be fun if we didn’t take on things like this.Besides, we do have the option to say ‘no’. In termsof the mechanics it’s a lot more known territory than itmight appear. But as with the BM, we didn’t actuallyget to fully assemble and energise him till Cardington,though we were able to pre-test individual arms.”

Bowern engaged the services of Richard Hartman toproject manage OM, while Andy Cave of Kinesystook on the daunting task of making it walk. I spoketo both men at length, but first, the Tait element - for itis the B stage and Bridge that provide the thread thatruns through the show.

James Erwin, project manager for Tait Towers, hasbeen at Taits just over a year, formerly with FisherTechnical Services (now allied with the Tait group) hisexperience lies mainly with corporate events. “The Bstage has nine lifts, one large with eight smallerpersonnel-sized ones around it. The main criteriawere that it needed to be light, and to provide asmuch space as possible below deck as there are anincredible volume of props to accommodate; thedecks are custom, to give bigger spans than normal.”

Sounds simple, but imagine Piccadilly Circus at rushhour: the props and costume departments had todevise their own choreography to avoid pile-upsduring the more complex routines; then there’s pyro,special effects, and someone to control the lifts; it’sas neat a piece of functional staging and packagingas I’ve seen.

“The Bridge is an altogether more complex piece ofapparatus. At 160ft (49m) long it’s our largest singleelement and it’s full of tricks,” says Erwin. “It’s a custom package in every way. The lights mountedto it flick in and out for transport; some fold back andtravel with it like the two light Moles (P36); and somecome off but the clamping devices that hold themstay in place (Colorblaze 72). The whole thing has todisassemble in 45 minutes; that was the limit set byChris Vaughan, because when lowered in, iteffectively cuts the stage in half and prevents load-out across 50% of it.”

“The guys in the band perform up there for one song,but for the most part the Bridge’s function is toprovide the base for other theatrics on stage; it’s fullof lights and winches. As with the lights, all thewinches stay in and don’t need re-stringing. TheBridge hangs off the Stageco towers, the four towersacross the span are custom-clad by Taits, integral towhich is a vertical track with elevators we built for theband to descend to stage . . . We have gone toextreme lengths to ensure these can’t get stuck.You’ll have noticed there are only four elevators.

In another non-conventional twist tothe Take That tour, I discovered thatThe Production Office (TPO), run byChris Vaughan and his businesspartner Keely Myers, take a morerigorous control of the productionbudget and in so doing bring morecertainty to the supplier paymentschedule. “With any production we’retrying to deliver to the band the showthey want for the amount they wouldlike to spend. What we have done atTPO is to look at a widerresponsibility, taking control of theproduction finance as well; thatmeans we have a perspective not juston the show, but on the profitabilityof the tour. Being allowed to see thebig picture we don’t get bogged downwith small issues; we’re not fightingover the pennies. It’s good for theartist as well; big or small they canclearly see what their expectedearnings will be. With income from livetouring so important these days,that’s crucial. From the supplier pointof view, when they agree terms withus they know that’s it; there isn’tgoing to be some distant accountantlooking at the special effect spendjust before the band goes intoproduction rehearsal.”

And how exactly do you determinethe budget of something on as granda scale as this tour? “More is knownthan you might think. We can makesome accurate estimates - forty-fiveproduction trucks, a dozen steel, somany crew, so many hotels. Sameapplies with most equipment, lighting,video, cameras, sound - the spend fora stadium show is fairly well defined,and actually that’s the biggest part ofthe budget, even for a show like this.Put that template to the band and I can then ask them, how much doyou want to spend on what makes itspecial - the set, the theatrics?Because they can see the costs ofeverything else, that becomes a mucheasier decision for them to make.”

What prompted TPO to take thisfinancial role? “We took it for practicalreasons. We found in the past thatoften our suppliers weren’t gettingpaid on time; this way we can give

them certainty. Also, if the band don’thave to finance that cash flow itmeans even small acts, with perhapslittle or no funds behind them, canseriously look at how they mightbudget in a production spend abovethe necessities of sound and lights tomake their show special.”

Vaughan revealed that Myers role ispivotal: “She keeps it tight throughthe tour . . . she can usually present a pretty accurate overview just two orthree days after the tour ends.”

Which just leaves the unknowns, howmuch does it cost to make an OM?“That’s one of the pleasures ofworking with Take That: they morethan many, are prepared to allocate a big part of what would be theirprofit towards making a trulyspectacular and enjoyable show fortheir fans. They are definitely not a take-the-money-and-run band;because the revenue stream is clear,they know exactly what part of theirprofit they will need to commit tomake their show special.”

Vaughan also revealed a generalacceptance of the no FOH towerpolicy, “Venue managers weresurprisingly open to it, some of thatcomes from the relationship you build.We’ve taken a stadium productionthrough the UK every summer forseveral years now so the venues andthe local authorities know us. SJM,who promote this, have said they seeno reason why any sold-out stadiumshow shouldn’t be doing it this way.Certainly, if you’re doing multipleshows at one venue, the increasedticket revenue more than justifies theadditional costs of rigging extensivesound and lighting through thestadium roof. In terms of the peoplewho would normally be on that tower,their reaction was professionallycautious, but once they’d thoughtabout it they were all for it. The keywas the catwalk to B stage - thatgives the seated operators, sound,light and video, enough open accessto see and hear what they need to.”

> www.tpo-online.com

Take That: TPO


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Robbie swallow dives off the Bridge’s centrespan attached to a new winch we’ve developed;called the Stage Automation T Winch, it’s a Fisher/Tait product. Designed to be small butable to handle a useful pick-up weight at speed,it has variable capacity through a variety of drivebelt change. Paul Sapsis, son of Bill, is our‘flight’ guru, he’s excellent at reassuring artists.He works with Casey Roche, who’s theNavigator programmer to drive it - they’re anexcellent team. Paul develops amazing moves.”

For the tour, Gareth Williams, who also drivesOM, runs the Navigator control system for theshow: “I spend two thirds of the show at a Navigator station stage right, then dash outfront for the last third and drive OM.

“There are other tracking winches,” continuedErwin. “These are for the aerialists across theVenetian blinds we’ve built to mask the XL videoscreen behind.” The Venetian blinds are frontedby steel scramble netting with horizontalaluminium rungs to form a scaling surface forthe aerialists to work off. “There is also a Nocturne video screen suspended from theBridge; in two halves which track in acrossstage on the downstage edge.” The screen hasa scenic border so when the two halves aremated it gives the appearance of a PC monitor.“Taits developed the hanging system forNocturne’s V9 LED panels. We’ve alsoincorporated hinged door panels that open inthe suspended tracking video wall.” There a song scenario where Robbie Williams istrapped - ‘sucked into’ the internet through thescreen. “He beats on the screen from behind,the doors blow open and another T winch whipshim up through the opening onto downstage.”

“There’s another track upstage with three moreT winches trolley-mounted, which pick up theaerialists who perform vertical and horizontalacrobatics,” adds Erwin. It’s a highlycompressed bit of lifting mechanics in there,just upstage of the aerialists on the three dolly-tracked T winches are a set of 30 staticmounted Cyberhoists in five blocks: eachsupports an individual who scales the Venetian.To complicate matters, a further set of winches

over the Stageco tower tops lifts slim horizontalscenic panels which the aerialist on the trackingdollies can then scamper across the full stagewidth. “Flown upstage of the bridge are theVenetian carts with more T winches to raise andlower the blinds, and then from the carts’upstage edge is an LED Kabuki. The five kabukipanels have printed upon them the Darwinian‘ascent of man’ style images off the Progressalbum sleeve, the soft string LEDs by Showtexoutline these in silhouette. The Venetian cartsalso house more lights, and a rain bar. There’s a fair bit of water works in the Bridge: each ofthe rain curtains can flow 600 litres per second,and this is cascading down from 40ft above thestage decks below. As the boys’ elevator podsdescend there are rain blast nozzles aboveeach of the band members’ heads as well, justfor a touch more drama. They are shielded fromthe water by polycarbonate domes we built, buttheir trouser cuffs get splashed. There isanother set of fountain nozzles that blaststowards the front row of the audience.”

So not only are there all these interwoven axesof motion - LED screen, aerialist on static andtracking winches, horizontal ascending scenicpanels, Venetian blinds and kabukis - but thewhole assembly is hosed with hundreds ofgallons of water.

Erwin says: “All the water catch tubs below aredecked with grilles so the aerialists can walkacross them - at the right time, of course . . . We use aerated nozzles to enhance the visualeffect of the water. It’s in areas like this whereTait excels, I believe; nobody specifically taskedus with a number of nozzles in fixed pointsacross the stage, they just described the effectthey wished to achieve and we developed it forthem.” Erwin revealed that Taits learned a lotabout water management developing the stagefor Kylie: “We’re now expert in this field.”

And then there’s OM. A Brilliant Stages creation,OM is largely the brainchild of Andy Edwards,Brilliant’s hydraulic genius in residence (it wasEdwards who built the Bridges to Babylonextending bridge). The control system is byKinesys, with Andy Cave overseeing

development of how to move a uniquestructure, while Gareth Williams runs theKinesys for the show, and Richard Hartman is inhis all-too-familiar position of project managingthe unknown. I spoke to Hartman first. “Themain area of difficulty is when he stands up. It’sthe combination of what he’s doing and whatthe trailer on which he travels is doing below.”

This difficulty will become clearer: suffice to sayOM is mounted on a modified articulated lorrytrailer. Complexity derives from 19 axes withinOM - one electric, 18 hydraulic: all movement,says Cave, “is achieved to within a fewmillimetres”. The arms, unclad in rehearsals,look deceptively like the robots you see in carfactories, but they’re not - they’re all custom-builtand much, much bigger. “And the ones used inautomotive plants are generally all electric, nothydraulic, and thus much easier to work withfrom a control perspective,” says Cave.

“OM’s truck trailer is custom”, continuedHartman. “The rear bogey and fifth wheel bogeyparts are separate and there’s anextending/contracting spar between them. OMis permanently mounted so the whole thing getstarp’ed and hauled by a regular tractor on theroad, so it all has to be road legal. The tractordrops it off in the stadium, then we have a tugthat picks it up and drives it into position, thenout-rig legs extend horizontally, we fit wheels tothe ends of them, add end-plates to the wheels,and so you end up with the trailer running onrails like a train, except the wheel flange is onthe outside edge.”

Some rails: at 4m gauge, each eight foot steelsection weigh 1500kg and is essentially a heavyduty ‘I’ beam. “All the pumps, electrics andhydraulics are self-contained; only the decorativecladding is removed, so it all folds down to 2.4mwide and 13m long for the road. Using thehydraulic extender/contractor device we canshrink the trailer to 9m to get into tight stadiums.He weighs 23,800kgs, add the trailer it comes to35,000kgs. Atelier One calculated all the centreof gravity stuff for wind speed tolerance, anythingabove 15m/sec and he can’t stand, above20m/sec and he has to remain crouched.”

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It’s that ‘centre of gravity stuff’ that makes thestanding up tricky that Hartman mentionedearlier; the distance between fifth wheel bogeyand rear bogey has to expand and contractduring his ascent to maintain Centre of Gravity.Essentially, OM’s spine extends through hisbackside down to the trailer - his spine being a large cherry-picker hydraulic arm.

Having established the general complexity,I asked Hartman about running the project.

“The go-ahead came just at Christmas. Frankly,anyone taking this on that late needs their headexamined,” which didn’t stop Hartman,I noticed. “You start by having to work when all

of industry either slows down or stops for fourweeks. That immediately presents seriousproblems - all the actuators and sensors comefrom Italy, and all the slew rings from China, andhave to be ordered immediately. Unfortunately,manufacturing industry doesn’t work to rockand roll deadlines - 8- to 12-week lead times aretypically as short as they get.”

This is undoubtedly one of the main reasonswhy OM hasn’t behaved himself quite as well ashe might have. That and the fact that pushingboundaries as ambitious as these reallydeserves a good six to eight weeks rehearsal tosolve the unexpected.

“The form of the cladding is down to Kim Gavinand Es Devlin’s input,” continued Hartman.“They modelled it; then we scanned their modelby laser to produce the CNC moulding. Theshell is fibre glass with a metal frame. JohnPrentice at Brilliant kept on top of that element -he managed the CAD drawings so that it all metup. Trouble is, OM was too big to assemble at

Brilliant, it didn’t all come together tillCardington; even with the best CAD you cannotpredict where the cladding will preventmovement; you just have to run it and seewhere it conflicts, then cut the fibre glass andre-fit. And let me tell you, the way the clevis pinsattach the cladding to the skeleton is a work ofart.”

Cladding clash as the arms moved was stillhappening to a small degree during rehearsalsin Sunderland. “You also have to track all thehoses to see they don’t get caught. Then theywanted to put lights in it, and that produces a debate over who has precedence on space.There are lights in the hand palms for up lightwhen the band is there. The arms and legs areessentially cylinders, relatively simple, but thechest is a three-dimensional form - again, JohnPrentice managed the drawing out of thatframework. It’s really complex in there, and Johndid a great job accommodating everything.

“There is an operator position within the chest,so in the event he can be manually controlled todescend from within. It’s like a submarine inthere. When the large hydraulic cherry-pickermast pushes him up through the inside, the legsmove passively during that process. We have tostop ascent just before the slew rings of hisknees pass total vertical, otherwise he might sitback down with knees bent backwards, so therelationship between mast and feet is critical.”

On balance what does Hartman think of OM?“Trouble is, as the Greeks noted when they builtmonumental art into their theatres; whatever islargest diminishes the others, so OM’s impact islessened by the presence of his big brother on

the stage.” This is true: maybe next time BM willstand up instead and frighten the wholeneighbourhood?

Andy Cave had similar unique challenges indriving OM. “In terms of sensing positionsthere’s nothing out of the ordinary, we putstandard encoders into the hydraulics andstring encoders into the axes. Unlike normalstructures, with OM you have to movesomething to learn how it will respond.Hydraulics is 18th century technology and bynature it’s lazy, whereas an electric motor isinstant and precise. Hydraulic movement is notnecessarily always proportional to flow, theprotection against hose failure requires a certainover-pressure to initiate movement, so it tendsto run away too fast and you have to throttleback just as quickly to bring that under control.That in turn can set up shudders - oscillationsthat, considering the lengths of the limbs andtheir weight, can run for some time.”

Cave continues: “The difference with electricmotors is you can easily tweak a move; withhydraulics there’s no such thing as a quicktweak. We spoke to manufactures and they saidthat to affect the way something like this movesyou have to start looking at changing the typesof valves, you can’t do it in the control of thepumps. There is, unfortunately, no fast andcertain way of predicting valve behaviour, theyadvised us it’s just faster to swap them and tryalternatives,” which was what Cave was doingthe night before dress rehearsal. At Manchester,I asked operator Williams if this change hadimproved movement? “Yes, it made all thedifference, much smoother, but we are stilllearning how he behaves.” And still are.

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From far left: Action on the B Stage; Behind the screens; one of the DiGiCo SD7s consoles under a rain cover; view from rear of stage showing the mainPA hangs, with OM out front . . .


Making Progress - Theatrecrafts.com

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