Kings of Leon Production designer Paul Normandale unveiled a new design for the Kings of Leon’s “Walls” 2017 tour, with Hunter Firth as the operator. U.K. audiences got their first peek at the show in February, with the U.S. arena leg starting March 11 in Broomfield, CO. Normandale graciously shared his design in a rendering of the Kings of Leon’s U.S. arena tour, as press is not yet being approved.
Bruno Mars’ 24K Magic
We caught Cory FitzGerald loading in to rehearsals with Bruno Mars’ 24K Magic world tour for 2017. The tour starts March 28 running through Europe and the U.K. The U.S./Canada leg kicks off July 15, with dates to Nov. 11. LD LeRoy Bennett and FitzGerald worked with Mars’ past tours and, most recently, worked on the artist’s two performances at the 2017 Grammy Awards, including Mars’ tribute to Prince with an electrifying “Let’s Go Crazy” that followed a tribute from Morris Day and the Time. Mars also performed his solo, “That’s What I Like,” from the 24K Magic album, with a set featuring pyramid-shaped lighting structures. FitzGerald had a busy night, as he also did the lighting for Beyonce’s performance, with help from the Full Flood team. (For a
video, go to plsn.me/Bruno-Grammys.)
Sooner, Now and Later
Checking in with production designer/show director Sooner Routhier, we found her in the middle of putting five shows in production this month. “SRae Productions is doing the lighting design for Es Devlin on The Weeknd’s tour. We are doing full creative, production design and show direction for the “Game of Thrones Live Concert Experience” (which kicked off Feb. 20). We’ve also done production designs for The Lumineers (See “Production Profile,” this issue, page 38), Cole Swindell and Justin Moore. Lots more to come in the upcoming months! It’s going to be an exciting year!” (For a Game of Thrones preview, go to plsn.me/Sooner-GOT.)
A Plethora of Programming Projects
Programmer Troy Eckerman has had a plethora of projects, saying, “It’s the busiest year so far I have ever had.” Eckerman programmed and operated the “NFL Super Bowl Gala with Tim McGraw” and is currently doing some previz programming for Tim McGraw and Faith Hill’s “Soul2Soul The World Tour 2017.” This is Eckerman’s 17th year with McGraw, and this time around it’s with production designer Raj Kapoor and LD Mark Butts. The tour’s U.S./Canada leg kicks off April 7 in New Orleans with dates to Oct. 27, with different support acts each week.
Next up: programming for LD Peter Morse for a gig with X Japan at Wembley in London, and later this year, with LD Rob Koenig for Metallica’s “WorldWired Tour 2017.”
Quick Cues
Production designer Bruce Rodgers of Tribe and LD Eric Cathcart pooled their creative talents for country music artist Chris Stapleton’s tour. Cathcart, who will also direct the lighting on the road, says it’s shaping up to be something quite spectacular in terms of lighting and sound. The tour starts in March in Canada, with Stapleton also performing a few dates on Tom Petty & The Heartbreaker’s 40th Anniversary tour.
LD Alex Ares designed, programmed and is out directing Deadmau5’s tour. “The new cube show is going to be tons of fun,” he says. We’ll have to find out what that means when the tour starts March 11 in New Orleans.
Richard Neville of Mandylights is production designer and lighting designer for the Backstreet Boys’ residency at The Axis at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas. The band’ “Larger Than Life” show opened March 1, 2017; a total of 18 shows are slated March 1-18 and June 14-July 1.
Lighting director Joey Troup just finished DNCE’s “Live in Concert 2017 Tour.” He tells us, “I had a rig by designer Jesse Blevins and everyone was an absolute pleasure to work with from start to finish, top to bottom.” Also the LD for Vance Joy, Troup will journey with Joy to South America for the Lollapalooza circuit there in March; the Sao Paulo event is set for March 25-26.
LD Craig Rutherford is on the road directing his new design for Alan Jackson’s “Honky Tonk Highway Tour” of arenas, amphitheaters and festivals. Rutherford has been with Jackson for three years now, this being his second design for the country artist. While the design features a large LED screen in center stage as a major element, Rutherford says he makes it a point to make sure the lighting rig “harmoniously blends together.”
LD Liam Tully is heading out with Jack
Savoretti for a U.K. tour.
Tosar Taps into Energy
LD Jonny “Tosar” Tosarello with Lynyrd Skynyrd is featured in “On the Road,” this issue, page 16. We ran out of space for his full interview, including our question, “What Do You Like about What You Do?” Here’s his reply; we assume many will relate: “I always sound corny when I answer this question,” Tosarello says, “but I like to tell the story of when my beautiful wife, Rebecca, asked me a similar question. It was the first time we had met, and it happened to be at a show I was LD’ing. She asked, ‘Why do you like doing lights?’ This was during set change so all the house lights were on, and I said, ‘Watch this.’ I slowly brought up the audience moles, and the crowd went nuts! ‘Hear that? Feel that energy from the crowd? All these people are having a great time — but, that guy over there may have lost a loved one recently or that girl might have lost her job today. For a few hours everyone comes together, forgets about their problems and has a frickin’ blast, and I get to be part of that.’ Not to sound like a Skynyrd song, but my mama told me when I was young, ‘Find the job you love, and it will never be work.’ She was right, because I simply love what I do and will keep moving forward doing it!”
Email Debi Moen at dmoen@plsn.com.
