Tenth Avenue North get festive with Chauvet
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Supporting this musical mix with richly coloured visuals that evoke images of different Christmases from times past is a Mike Marcario lighting design that features Chauvet Professional Rogue and Nexus fixtures, supplied by Bandit Lites. Marcario’s transformative lighting seems to move through time with the music, changing colours and the tempo of its movement to reflect the passage of holiday seasons through the years.
“This show is definitely fun to do from a lighting standpoint,” says Marcario. “We need to be able to create looks for every decade, while avoiding carrying gear from each one. We change up the kinds of colours and gobos we use for different decades. The show begins very warm with little movement, but as we approach the 1990s and 2000s, we have added more aerial effects and colour, also pulling out more tricks from the fixtures to create a contemporary feel, while still maintaining a holiday mood throughout the entire show.”
Making this feat especially impressive is that Marcario accomplishes it with a rig that fits in a bus trailer. To add to his challenge, the November-December tour stops at large churches, many of which have limited available power and rigging points.
Helping Marcario achieve his design goals despite these obstacles are the six Rogue RH1 Hybrid fixtures in his rig. Positioning four of the 330W beam/spot movers on the downstage edge of two 8’x 8’ risers, and two on upstage road cases, he has them fill a wide variety of roles.
“The versatility of the hybrids is critical to this show,” says Marcario. “As always with bus trailer tours, transportation space is limited. Plus, some venues have low power and no rigging points, which limits my options. This, coupled with the need to create a different look for each decade, means that I have to expect a lot from my fixtures. What makes the Rogues so valuable, aside from their compact size and efficiency, is that they can do so many things well.”
For key lighting and front colour washes, Marcario relies on the Nexus 4x1. “Given that the tour stops at churches, we don’t always have downstage front lighting or spots,” he said. “I count on the Nexus 4x1 to be my go-to shin kicker. They give me clean colour mixing, across all dimmer levels, and an even field of light.”
A 16’ x 8’ video wall hung from upstage truss is at the centre of Marcario’s design. Although impressive and critical to conveying the mood of different decades, the wall inevitably creates dead space in the area around it. Marcario addressed this issue by filling in this space with 15-meter strands of Chauvet DJ Festoon hanging décor lights.
(Jim Evans)
