The Sound Of Music


Once a year, Twyford CofE HighSchool, puts on a production and this year it was the sound of music. For the first time ever the events manager at Twyford and I decided that I would program the show and hand it on to another person to operate it, this allowed others to sit behind the console. I had barley any preparation time since there was another show that I was lighting the day before technical rehearsals for this show.

Sound of music was a great production to light. In the centre of the stage we had a chandelier hanging from the ceiling which you could hot-power. We hired in some MMX WashBeams which were amazing for gobos and spots however, when you wanted to wash the stage the brightness decreased dramatically. The WashBeams were amazing when you wanted to make the chandelier glycine in the light. The stage was split into two sections, the front part of the stage being versatile for house scenes as well as an extension of the back. The back of the stage was solely an abbey. Red curtains came across the stage to separate both sections of the stage. An alter was placed on the back of the stage in the middle as well as statues either side of it. A Martin Magnum 2500hz hazer was hidden inside the alter which was facing the backdrop. This allowed for haze to be subtly appear in the scene. The backdrop was supposed to be the back of an abbey however it never got fully finished, so to make it look less bare we made a stain glass window to go it the middle. The stain glass windows was made up of lighting gel and 3 Elation Opti RGB Pars uplight it from the back. Either side of the stage at the front, were two tank-traps holding scaffolding bars which we hung 2 Longman LED pars from(2 either side). In one of the scenes there was lightning and it needed flashes, these LED pars were perfect for this. For the first time ever we decided that we would order 2 custom gobos which had a ‘Sound Of Music’ design cut into it. One of the gobos would be projected onto the front curtain at the start, interval and end of shows, while the other would be projected onto the floor outside the performance centre & the box office. The Box office was light by one MMX BeamWash projecting a gobo onto the ceiling and two LED pars up-lighting columns purple.

 

One of my favourite scenes was the abbey scene where the von-trapp family had to hide from the Nazis. A lot of haze was pumped out into the scene to give it some atmosphere and presence. There were 2 Rosco Venetian window gobos in a ETC Lustr+ either side of the stage. With the stage being darker than usual in the abbey, you could really see the gobos. The director wanted search lights to go across the audience, personally I feel like if a light goes over me half way into a show then it brings me out of the trance that a production casts on you. There was two MMX WashBeams above the audience which I ballyhoo-ed. Both Lustr+ had an effect on it which would turn the LED from being dark blue(night time) to white, which made it look like a search light was going across the window. With a lot of haze, this scene looked amazing. Overall the feedback about the show was very positive and everyone enjoyed it.

 

The kit for the production was:

Fixture List:

  • 4x Robe MMX WashBeam
  • 4x ETC Source4 LED Lustr+
  • 6x Longman RGBW Pars
  • 3x Elation Opti RGB Par
  • 2x Martin Mac 600
  • 2x Chauvet Colorado Batten 72 Tour
  • 1x Martin Magnum 2500hz Hazer
  • Bunch of Generics (1x Arri 2k Blonde, 4x Scrollers, 6x ETC Source 4 JR, and more)