Designer Watch

Production, lighting and media designer Justin Kitchenman started the New Year by creating a new company, Align Design Group in Nashville. “The focus of the Align Design Group is going to be live production, mainly concert touring,” he told PLSN. “But, as with all ventures, the future is a great mystery, with many twists and turns! I look forward to the future and all of the opportunities it brings.”

Across the skyline, as dusk settled in, a dynamic beacon of light sparkled, shimmered, beamed and beckoned from atop the London landmark The Shard. Woodroffe Bassett Design created the holiday lighting installation for the second year in a row, illuminating the Shard’s spire, the highest 13 levels of the 95-story building, for the festive season. The Shard, at 309.6 meters (1,016 feet) in height, is the tallest building in the U.K.

Sleigh bells ring, are you listening? They’re alerting us to other long-running holiday shows — beyond TSO. Designer Watch checked in on Brian Setzer, Oak Ridge Boys, Mannheim Steamroller, Amy Grant & Michael W. Smith, Ian Anderson, and Johnny Mathis tours.

Author and LD Paul Dexter made an LDI appearance to autograph Concert Lighting: The Art and Business of Entertainment Lighting 4th Edition, co-written with James Moody. Dexter says the previous editions are text books on college campuses, and this edition provides even more valuable tips that future lighting designers may need, notably diverse accounts by some of our industry’s most renowned designers.

Peter Morse spent the past two years designing the elaborate lighting for a large German production show, The ONE Grand Show, which runs for two years in residency at the Friedrichstadt Palast in Berlin. The extravaganza, called “the most lavish show in Europe,” started previews at the 97-year-old theatre on Sept. 22, with the world premiere set for Oct. 6 and more shows planned through mid-2018. With a budget of 11 million Euros ($12.3 million), the show aims to take the audience “on a dreamlike journey through time in search of the person who means everything to us: The One.”

LD Joel Reiff grew up listening to Alice Cooper on the radio, so he was familiar with the songs. What he had to learn to light were the stunts that Alice pulls onstage on his current tour. The “Spend the Night with Alice Cooper” tour entertains with props and gags galore, as Alice has done since the 1970s. Reiff says Cooper and his manager, Shep Gordon, create the ideas for the stunts with James Randi as one of the stunt designers.

While his design for Coldplay’s “A Head Full of Dreams” world tour made its way to North America, we heard from U.K. production designer/LD Paul Normandale, who was winging his way to Chicago to make sure the show was playing out as planned. When asked to describe his design in one sentence — as there’s no space to cover the entire production here — he says it’s “a cascading waterfall of vivid stars.”

There are so many sad stories regarding the recent Orlando Pulse nightclub massacre. LD Kevin Cauley shares one of them. Cauley has been doing lots of programming lately, including the May 26 Red Nose Day live broadcast from Los Angeles for NBC, which raised money for needy children. He was now starting on programming this season of La Voz Kids, a Spanish version of The Voice for youngsters, produced by Telemundo. “The show tapes three rounds in Orlando over a four or five month period,” he explains. “We had just reconvened for the third round. The attack (at Pulse nightclub) happened the night before.”

LD Martin Thomas of Relentless Entertainment Design LLC informed us of a new DVD/Blu-ray release of the Alan Parsons Symphonic Project, Live in Colombia, which was originally performed in Medellín in the late Aug. 2013. While Thomas designed and directed the show, video director David Davidian directed the cameras and cuts live.

LD Philip Ealy has designed the much anticipated reunion tour for Guns N’ Roses. Aptly titled “Not In This Lifetime” — referring to the fact that nobody believed it would actually happen — Ealy is working with lighting programmer Rob Koenig and content programmer Chris Lose on the stadium tour.

The Imagine Dragons film, Smoke + Mirrors Live, uses scenes captured at their Toronto show on July 4, 2015. The movie premiered for one night only March 2 in select cinemas worldwide. It’s now available on Blu-Ray. Imagine Dragons LD Sooner Routhier and lighting director Mitchell Schellenger worked with film director Dick Carruthers, director of photography Rob Scarborough and a film crew of about 45 people with an audience lighting package to help make the live show appealing to the cameras.

Venting his frustrations, LD (and frequent flyer) Joe Paradise jotted down notes as he navigated the world’s airports. Four years later, his notes built up into a book. His paperback, The Courteous Flyer: The basics of good manners while traveling by air, is now selling on Amazon.