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Bruce Springsteen 2016 'River' tour photo by Steve Jennings

Q&A with Jeff Ravitz and Peter Daniel on Bruce Springsteen’s 2016 ‘River’ Tour

“Can you recreate a 1980s concert look in 2016?” Bruce Springsteen asked of his longtime LD Jeff Ravitz. Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band’s The River Tour 2016 commemorates the release of the double album of the same name in 1980, and Bruce wanted the old vibe of yesterday to flow into his new shows today. A challenging idea, especially since fixtures and video equipment are light years ahead of where they were then. LD Jeff Ravitz has been working with The Boss since 1984, but he shuddered when the phrase “PAR cans” was bandied about. And video? Not much in 1980. PLSN looked at the lighting from Morpheus Lights and video production from Pete’s Big TVs on this current tour.

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Ultra Music Festival main stage photo by Adam Kaplan

Miami Ultra Music Festival 2016

Words cannot quite capture the visual extravaganza that is Miami Ultra Music Festival (UMF) 2016. Now in its 18th year, the hugely popular electronic dance music (EDM) event held annually on Bayfront in downtown Miami, played host to a sellout crowd of more than 165,000 over three days, from March 24-26. The event’s Main Stage, Carl Cox & Friends Stage and World Wide Stage would each be, by themselves, impressive enough to anchor a major music festival. Combined and extended by other stages, including the U.S. debut of the flame-shooting Arcadia Spider on the Resistance Stage, the Ultra Music Festival retains its perch as a world-class blockbuster event.

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Mythos light used as FOH spots pick out Pete Wentz. Photo by Justin Segura

Robb Jibson is Just So Midwest

Fall Out Boy Wraps Up a Two-Year Tour with a Fresh Look

It’s been about 20 years since Robb Jibson graduated from high school and got his tail back to Chicago, the town he loves and swears his allegiance to. He’s been practicing lighting ever since, and from what I saw at the Fall Out Boy (FOB) show the other night in Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, MN, he has mastered his skill. Even as he claims, “I’m never done building this show. I will be refining it until the last gig.”

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The band played behind a curtain of laser beams from Lightwave International. Photo by Erik Kabic Photography.

The Killers Help Launch T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas

Major Laser and Light Show Augments a Dynamic Evening in Vegas’ Biggest Venue

The opening weekend of MGM Resorts $375 million T-Mobile arena in Las Vegas was filled with non-stop action from several shows. Starting off with the best that Vegas has to offer on April 6 were hometown heroes The Killers. A large production was designed by long time production and lighting designer for this act, Steven Douglas; with all the production elements one would expect for a first class rock show opening a mega venue.

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Seth Jackson joined TPI earlier this year. Pictured here, from left, are Gene Brian, Seth Jackson, Elizabeth O’Keefe and Michael O’Keefe.

LD Seth Jackson’s Ever-Evolving Career

One remarkable and impressive transition after another has happened for Parnelli Award-winning lighting designer Seth Jackson’s career since he was a teenager growing up in St. Louis. “I hate to say this, since my students might see this, but I only got my first job with a resume. Everything else has been an evolution of relationships,” he says. “I have always had such a passion for this business and this industry. I worked hard, I did a good job, I built the relationships, I studied the people that came before me, and the result is that I kept getting opportunities. It was never planned, per se, but I was obsessive about getting where I wanted to be.”

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In the dramatic last moments of Dialogues of the Carmelites at Eastman Opera, Blanche makes her way to the guillotine bathed in the light of the cross. Photo by Nic Minetor

Opera Lighting: Broad Strokes, Big Drama

When the production staff at San Diego Opera opened the containers from the rental house — the ones that were supposed to contain the Michael Yeargan-designed set for their production of Aida — they could hardly believe what they saw. They saw nothing. The containers were empty. Their one-week production schedule did not allow for setbacks, nor could they replicate the set in their own scene shop. The automated, winch-driven scenery with its steeply raked floor had to exist somewhere, but finding it could take hours, or even days.

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George Clooney and Jimmy Kimmel on the set. Photo courtesy ABC

Light Night Conversations: Christian Hibbard Lights ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live’

“Light Night Conversations” is a new recurring series of PLSN interviews with the lighting designers of the various late-night talk shows on television. These designers face many interesting design challenges that go beyond simply lighting a desk and an interview area, which, for the record, is not as simple as it may appear. Late-night LDs need to light musical guests, often both inside and outside the studio, design sketch comedy setups, audience interactions, man-on-the-street exchanges and full show location remotes. We start on the West Coast with Jimmy Kimmel Live’s LD Christian Hibbard. –ed.

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Joe Paradise has handled the band's impressive visuals for a decade.

311 Returns to New Orleans for 3-11 Day Celebration

The highly diversified band 311 once again took the stage at the Smoothie King Center (formerly New Orleans Arena) on March 11 to celebrate the unofficial holiday they created back in 2000. The biannual celebration happens on March 11 (on even years), in a numeric parallel with the band’s name. Once again, there were just too many songs on the set list to fit in any one performance, so 311 Day 2016 included a concert on March 12 as well.

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Martin Atomic 3000 LED Strobe

Martin Atomic 3000 LED Strobe

Martin Professional has a very long history in the entertainment lighting and effects industry, starting way back in 1978 when founder Peter Johansen created a smoke machine from a coffee maker. Since then, the company has conceptualized and brought to market a huge number of effects, including the wildly popular Atomic 3000 DMX strobe, which has for many years dominated the market for strobe effects in concerts, special installations and live events. With the evolution of the market away from arc-based sources and toward LED, however, the creative minds at Martin decided it was time for a significant update to their flagship strobe.

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Robe BMFL WashBeam

Robe BMFL WashBeam

I have always been critical of hybrid lights. That’s because, for several years, I have heard boasts from several manufacturers that they have come up with the ultimate Swiss Army Knife of a fixture. Yet every time I drive a new one on a gig, I find something missing, or a trade off in certain features, that leaves me disappointed. I find lights where the lumens disappear when I pop out the tight narrow lens or a color system that is not up to snuff with what I desire. So I’m putting the BMFL WashBeam through the wringer to see if everything’s as great as what I’m hearing on the web.

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