Grammy winner Eladio Carrión’s performance on stage has as many facets as diamond. Blasting his way through a freestyle repertoire of trap, reggaeton and other sounds, he leaves no stone unturned as he takes fans on a musical journey. On top of that he leaves them laughing too, drawing on his background as a comedian to serve up witticisms along with his music. The stage on Carrión’s The Sauce Tour shines as brightly as a diamond too, thanks to a fast-moving and majestic lightshow by renowned Lighting Designer, Andrés Campos.
Campos’ touring rig varies by locations on the multinational tour. For the Latin American leg, it featured 68 Color STRIKE M motorized wash-strobes and 54 COLORado PXL Bar 16 motorized battens from CHAUVET Professional. In the United States, the tour excitement is driven by 30 Color STRIKE M units, 32 COLORado PXL Bar 16 battens, 32 Rogue R2X Beams, and 12 Maverick MK3 Washes.
The lighting design of this tour has been created to be carried out in three scales: one large, one medium and one small for the United States, according to Campos. “The main objective was to be able to generate the same show quality regardless of the size of the design, so we decided to use as many functions as possible that we could have in each type of fixture,” he explained. “Our main equipment on which the programming is based, are the strobes and the bars, in the same way in multiple instances. Additionally, we decided to use lasers in the show to make a variation of the light.”
For the concerts held in Colombia, the local rental company Línea Estratégica was in charge of supplying the lighting equipment specified by Campos. “Línea Estratégica has become a reference company for others, due to its good service, quality of staff, and its impeccable work, which is a reflection of its success,” said Campos. “The specific use of the Color STRIKE M and the COLORado PXL Bar 16 was to be able to generate different environments, moments and sensations with the same luminaire. I decided to use CHAUVET Professional products since I found everything needed in them,” continued Campos. “Chauvet has had notable growth in the industry and the new products offer an immediate response to the needs of the designs.”
Campos approached the Chauvet company a little over a year ago when he contacted Paula Ortiz, Business Development Manager for Chauvet in Latin America who recommend the new COLORado PXL Bar 16 so he could incorporate them into the tour. Speaking of another fixture on the rig, Conrado Santamaría, General Director of Línea Estratégica, commented that the Chauvet’s Color STRIKE M is setting an industry standard with “several key characteristics that make them an ideal option for a wide range of applications.”
Thinking about the creative aspect of the show, Andrés Campos recognized that “the design is inspired by a vanishing point, which is represented in a central truss, from there we start with two side screens, to finish with the lighting rig.” He points out that each show is different every show, with each concert delivering different emotions. They all have their mark and their own impact, in his view. “Of the more than 100 shows we are doing, the most important were in Colombia, because it was playing at home and that pressure is very strong,” said Campos. “I want to highlight the incredible work of integrating lighting, video and laser programming that was done for this tour.
“The most important people to highlight in this project would be: first Walter Medina, our production manager, who was the first to trust Chronos Creative to carry out this project; the second, and no less important, is Yomi, the owner of Rimas, who believed in us. And thirdly, to the person who has trusted the most in my design madness, Alejandra González, who is the director of Ethereal Vision, the creator of the visual content of the show. There are also Carolina Londoño and Urban Lighting, the laser programmer, with whom we made the perfect match to be able to integrate this new element into the show and use it at the ideal moment and without being exaggerated.”
When referring to how color influences the scenography, Campos emphasized that “the color and temperature of the light is the most important thing, I feel that color and intensity is what leads us to visually represent emotions and music.” Representing the myriad moods and emotions conveyed by his client on this tour, Campos treated fans to a production that not only shined like a diamond, but also glittered like gold.
