Choirs can be cool, but including them on tour can present problems. You never know, for example, if one of them may decide, out of political principle, to quit on you if a gig rubs them the wrong way. Chance the Rapper and his production designer/creative director Michael Apostolos didn’t have to worry about that for the “Magnificent Coloring World” tour, however, as Apostolos himself explains.
“Within Chance’s music, you often hear a large choir, and we wanted to represent the choir live on stage. While maintaining the theatrical goal, we chose to create the choir using a blend of Chance’s energetic and vibrant aesthetics with a Jim Henson-like aesthetic. To create a theatrical and ‘vintage cartoon’ image, we decided to use animatronic puppets as the visual representation of the backing choir. Art director, OJ Hays, Chance and myself worked on the design of the puppets and, once completed, OJ and I created 3D renderings and models of the puppets. Following that, the designs were handed off to the animatronic team to bring them to life.”
—Michael Apostolos, from “Wide Focus,” PLSN, Dec. 2016, page
