GLP fixtures light up RodeoHouston’s TAIT stage
- Details
Running for 20 days in February-March, it attracts the very top names in country music, from Garth Brooks through to Brad Paisley, who perform after the main rodeo event each day.
Such high calibre artists demand top concert production values and this year the Rodeo boosted its technological infrastructure by purchasing a new stage - built by TAIT in Lititz, PA. Working closely with TAIT, and leaning heavily towards GLP fixtures, were Houston based LD Systems. The company has been servicing the rodeo since 1985, and provided all technical design, live sound, concert lighting, HD video screens, custom truss structures, rigging equipment, production crew and logistics throughout the season.
LD Systems is headed by Rob McKinley, who has specified over 300 GLP fixtures, comprising 140 x impression X4; 70 x JDC1; 108 x X4 Bar 20 and 16 x X4 Bar 10.
The process of designing and building the new stage started after the 2015 event, which is when LD made the recommendation to HLSR to engage TAIT to provide a vibrant structure for the 72,000 capacity stadium. In deference to the Lone Star state, this was conceived as a five-pointed star as depicted on the flag of Texas.
Having successfully pitched the idea to HLSR to take the next step in sound reinforcement, the benchmark was set to elevate the production value generally.
The new rig measures a massive 125ft across - from star tip to star tip - and the revolve is 48ft in diameter. The stage height is 7ft and the dynamic video/lighting back wall is 28’ft high above the stage deck and spans 56ft wide. The entire stage weighs in at 350,000 lbs and supports no fewer than 434 lighting fixtures. “It is absolutely Texas size,” states Rob McKinley.
LD Systems lighting designers, headed by lead designer, programmer and operator Nathan Brittain, deployed a stadium wide arrangement of moving lights creating spectacular displays in combination with HD video content displayed on high-resolution 5mm and 7mm LED video walls arranged to provide an immersive video experience for every audience member.
“Having 20 shows in a row with a variety of genres, you want to be able to generate something unique and specific to whoever the artist is on any given night,” believes Brittain. ”Knowing that, we tried to load the system up with lighting tools that allow us to accomplish that goal.” And for the most part this was GLP.
LD Systems’ experience of GLP products dates back to the impression X4, which they invested in shortly after it was released. “It quickly became our most popular and hardest working wash light,” he confirmed. “Since then, we have increased our inventory of X4’s as the demand was so high.
“In fact we have had such a good experience with the X4, both in performance and quality, that GLP was at the top of the list of products to explore when working on this project. We also knew we wanted a ton of sources for the stage but needed to keep power needs under control, so going with primarily LED fixtures was important. GLP had the range of options we needed for this, we knew the quality would be good and their products are sought after by many others in the industry.”
In summary the designer says, “The fixtures have been just what we expected from GLP - great output, reliability and a wealth of options to continue to impress audience members.”
(Jim Evans)
