Keith Urban ‘embraces the square’ with Ayrton
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The tour’s production design firm, FragmentNine, chose 68 Ayrton MagicPanel-R fixtures, supplied by Upstaging, to add depth, dynamism and texture throughout this creative and dynamic show.
Video designer, Jackson Gallagher and lighting designer, Jeremy Lechterman of FragmentNine explained that part of the reasoning behind their choice of MagicPanel-R was largely due to its square face and special abilities, which fit into a mostly geometric and ‘square’ design. Forty-eight panels were rigged to four custom-built pods which automated as the most upstage visual element on stage, with two more pods left and right at stage level to provide low-level sidelight on the band.
“The MagicPanel-Rs are the workhorse of the show,” says Gallagher. “Originally Keith, who was quite involved in the design process, wanted a show that was entirely of video, with no lighting, to give a modern look and tone that was a departure from the traditional country style. However, knowing that video only wouldn’t provide us with enough key-light to see Keith and his band, we guided him away from this towards some form of illumination, and the compromise was to use non-traditional sources of light, something more atypical, which is where the MagicPanel-Rs came in.
“The MagicPanels helped enforce the architecture we’d designed with the video panels, and pushed us away from some of the things we were seeing other artists do. In terms of the atmosphere and the lighting of the show, we really leaned on the MagicPanels entirely. There are some more traditional wash fixtures for keylights, but a lot of the power of the show’s lighting comes from the MagicPanels.
“The MagicPanels in combination with the rectangular video screens created an architectural three-dimensional location for the band to perform within. They are great for that – you just need to embrace the square!”
The Keith Urban tour continues in Australia in January/February 2019 and Europe in March, with further American festival dates in Summer 2019.
(Jim Evans)
