Dead & Company played two nights at Madison Square Garden (photo: Katie Friesema)
USA - The stars truly unite for Dead & Company, the celebrated group featuring original Grateful Dead members Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann and Bob Weir alongside singer/guitarist John Mayer, Allman Brothers’ bassist Oteil Burbridge and Fare Thee Well and RatDog keyboardist Jeff Chimenti.
Reflecting the stature and profile of the band, the first gigs of their recent tour were two sold out nights at Madison Square Garden for which LD Chris Ragan of Raygun Design created a fresh and spectacular lighting scheme utilizing 24 of Robe’s new MegaPointes, 36 x Spiiders, 37 BMFL Spots and six BMFL Blades, all of which are at the core of the rig.
The tour followed a series of summer stadium shows where Chris’s rig included 70 x Spiiders and 60 x BMFL WashBeams, also supplied by Upstaging, the lighting vendor for the tour.
The tour trussing configuration comprised a straightforward 48ft downstage truss, with six overhead trusses mid-stage and a 14ft. diameter circular upstage truss. The moving lights are distributed across all of the trusses.
Twelve of the MegaPointes were rigged around the circular shape and framed the stage geometrically. The downstage truss has 12 x Spiiders for general stage washes and the six BMFL Blades for key lighting.
The circular truss was flanked by two 16 x 9 ft LED walls and at the bottom of these are six MegaPointes with six more upstage on the deck.
Chris programmed and operated the Dead & Company show on a grandMA2 console, assisted in the programming process by Jim Rood.
(Jim Evans)

Latest Issue. . .