Designer Insights

Global pop star Pitbull is out on tour where we caught up with lighting designer & director Michael Smalley and Team Pitbull on the sold-out co-headline date with Enrique Iglesias. We got some background on Smalley who says “I was always playing with lighting and sound gear since I was a child.” He got involved in those aspects in school, and when he got to college, he pursued a degree in technical theatre. His focus quickly changed to concert lighting and set design after seeing a few notable concerts, such as Phish and Chris Kuroda’s lighting design. Smalley worked shows in local bars, and then, in early 2004, hit the road with a band called Moonshine Still.

In his teenage years Travis Shirley dreamt of the day when he would be a lighting & production designer. He remembered contacting designers like Steve Cohen, Joe Paradise and Joel Young asking them every question he could think of. As fate would have it, Shirley’s father became golf buddies with the highly successful country act, Brooks & Dunn, which led him to their very talented lighting designer, Larry Boster. He studied and watched Larry for as long as he can remember and he says, quite honestly, Boster is the reason he is in this industry.

We caught up with the Eric Church tour in February and spoke with Butch Allen (lighting, set and production designer) and Rob Koenig (associate lighting designer, programmer and director) about the tour, which has exploded along with Eric’s popularity. Eric’s devoted fans in Salt Lake City got something extra when both band and crew got a bad case of the stomach flu. Instead of canceling the gig, Eric went on with the show solo, playing 19 songs with no fancy lights, video or stage production, just spotlights for a rare performance. He also told the crowd that they would get a free makeup show later in the tour.

Will Potts has been working professionally in the industry since graduating from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland) in 2006 with a BA in Technical Production Arts, although his first paid jobs specifically in lighting were in 2003 at The Arches, a multipurpose arts venue in Glasgow, Scotland. Here he was given the opportunity to light concerts, clubs and theatre, gaining valuable creative experience while working closely with all sorts of artists in different genres of performance.

For her 2014-15 Prismatic world tour, Katy Perry treats her loyal fans to an extravaganza of visual and musical delights. In support of her fourth studio album Prism, the show has it all — a prism LED wall along with a huge pyramid shaped extended B-stage, pyro, lasers, Katy flying through the air, and it wouldn’t be a show without cats, a Perry staple. Along the way, there are some neon scenes, an Egyptian horse and lots more to delight the eyes.

Before embarking on a second three-year Million Dollar Piano residency at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas this month, Elton John headlined a New Year’s Eve concert at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, NY. The Barclays Center show incorporated set elements and visuals from the artist’s 2013-2014 Diving Board tour — which marked the last chance for LD Patrick Woodroffe and the late Mark Fisher of Stufish Entertainment Architects to collaborate on the look of an Elton John concert. Fisher died June 25, 2013; the tour launched Nov. 8 and ran through Feb. 28, 2014.

Eric Cathcart says that, in terms of a career, he really hasn’t done anything but lighting. In high school, he was involved in the theatre tech departments, then was a technical theatre major in college when he picked up a gig with a local production company. From there, he worked in the San Francisco Bay Area with Morpheus Lights and a few other California lighting companies. He move on to Midnight Lighting in Austin, TX as an LD and tech and did his first tour for Asleep at the Wheel. From there, it was on to Nashville, working for Bandit Lites (Def Leppard, Brooks & Dunn, Reba McEntire and many others). In 1995, he was given the opportunity to be the designer for Olivia Newton-John. From there, the design/director gigs started trickling in. He’s also working as LD under Dan Hadley on tours. Prior to The Black Keys he’s designed Michael Bolton, Thievery Corporation, LCD Soundsystem and The Darkness. The last couple of years he’s been doing CAD drawings for Premier Global Production, including designs for some sizeable festivals.

Following the mid-June release of Linkin Park’s The Hunting Party album and 30 Seconds To Mars’ Love, Lust, Faith and Dreams in mid-May, “The Carnivores” tour, which also featured opening act AFI, took shape this year. The 25-date arena and shed trek kicked off in early August at the Cruzan Amphitheatre (West Palm Beach, FL) and we caught up with the tour where it wrapped up Sept. 19 at the Concord Pavilion (outside San Francisco).

Designer Rob Sinclair has just completed a tour leg for Queen + Adam Lambert that finished in New Zealand Sept. 3. We caught the show while the band was touring the U.S. and spoke with Sinclair about the tour he directed as well. Among some of Sinclair’s credits — Miley Cyrus, Peter Gabriel, Pet Shop Boys and Keane (all covered in past PLSN issues). He’s also designed for Adele, Vampire Weekend, Goldfrapp and many more. Here’s what Sinclair had to say about the Queen + Adam Lambert tour.

LeRoy Bennett’s resume of clients is any designer’s dream. In just the last few years alone, his work as production and lighting designer has included the likes of Beyoncé, Paul McCartney, Bruno Mars, Nine Inch Nails, Katy Perry and Kelly Clarkson, and that’s not even the full list. Returning to the stage on her Artpop Ball Tour of 2014 is Lady Gaga. Bennett’s first venture with her was back in 2010 on her Monster Ball Tour and, since then, handled visuals for her DVD and iTunes Festival shows. Along with a few words with Bennett, PLSN touched base with touring lighting director Whitney Hoversten about the latest Gaga extravaganza.

Halcyon Days might imply times of languid repose, but with Elie Goulding’s fast track to success, the U.K.-based singer/songwriter has been busier than ever, and her career keeps hitting new crescendos. Her first album, Lights, sold more than 850,000 copies after its 2010 release. Together with her second album, Halcyon, released in Oct. 2012, which was re-released as Halcyon Days in Aug. 2013, her total album sales have topped the 4 million mark.

Switchfoot’s ninth studio album, Fading West, shares its title with a documentary film that combines behind-the-scenes band member footage with their surfing exploits in exotic locales. Although brothers Jon and Tim Foreman along with drummer Chad Butler have been performing as Switchfoot since their first album release in 1997 (Jerome Fontamillas and Drew Shirley officially became band members in 2003 and 2005, respectively), Switchfoot has deftly switched between different musical genres and eluded the Christian Rock pigeon-hole.