Tour: Chicago
Dates: Chicago tours solo until Oct. 1, 2016, then co-headlines with Earth Wind & Fire starting on Oct. 19, 2016.
The Design: “It’s driven by space — I get two-thirds of a truck for lighting — and venue sizes: casinos, arenas, theaters, ballrooms. I have to be super flexible. I don’t go crazy with side lighting, in many venues it’s not possible. I like symmetrical designs, color saturation. The band moves around constantly, so I use song pace or their onstage positions to dictate the design. Robert Lamm doesn’t like spotlights. I use moving truss lights or Lekos to manually follow him around when he sings lead. He likes to be darker than the others.”
BACKSTORY
Home Base: Northern Minnesota on a lake.
Career Spark: “Minneapolis-St Paul, end of 1982. Parents said I had to leave home after high school, so I moved in with a friend of mine who ran sound for Rock Central Sound & Lighting. They needed a lighting person, and he taught me. I loved it. I was running lights right away.”
First Lighting Experience: “My first board was a homemade distribution panel with 12 household switches, each with a quad box of Edison. You ran Edison cables to each light and you had to run it to the side of the stage.”
First Gig as an LD: “With Warrant, in 1990.”
Big Break: “After five years of bar bands, I moved to L.A. and worked for Showlights. In 1987, I was at Mötley Crüe’s ‘Girls Girls Girls’ rehearsals. LSD’s Nick Jackson, the lighting vendor, taught me to wire the tumbling drum riser. LSD had shiny, sparkly new lights — I wanted to work with them. I joined them in 1988. My first big tour was Prince. I needed to start from the beginning — to be a good lighting tech before going back to being a good LD. There was a lot of competition for touring guys to rise in the ranks to be an LD.”
Mentors: “I became the go-to guy for intercoms and spotlights. I climbed a lot. That’s how I got on big metal tours in late 80s, early 90s. David Davidian, Cosmo Wilson and Ollie Olma gave me opportunities to run opening acts. I learned to call followspots — more board op than design.
Other Tours: “LA Guns, Kings X, Faster Pussycat, directed Scorpions in 1994, Travis Tritt, Lynyrd Skynyrd; went back to being the crew chief “replacement guy,” then chose Chicago over Godsmack.”
With Chicago: “Since 2003. I went from crew chief to lighting director to lighting designer by 2005.”
What do you like about what you do? “I grew up as a rock and roller, and touring works for my personality. I like the scheduling, [and] the freedom as a designer. I’ve also been lighting auto shows for 10 years when Chicago’s tours end.”
