When rock meets pop and hits meet rap, the combination of music can only mean one thing: ECHO, one of the most famous music award events which is held annually by Deutsche Phono-Akademie (the German record industry association). Once again National and International artists met at the International Congress Centre in Berlin to perform in front of, and be assessed by a highly selective audience.
The three hour long gala evening saw the participation of major stars such as Kylie Minogue and Leona Lewis. The event was produced by Werner Kimmig and broadcast by RTL. Nazan Eckes and Oliver Geissen presented the evening. The lighting designer Jerry Appelt used 56 Alpha Spot HPE 1200, numerous leds, 5 full size grandMA and 12 MA NSP.
Appelt comments: “the stage was larger than last year, however it had many features that all had to be carefully planned for. For instance it had few connection sockets which obliged us to resort to using special structure, e.g. for the LED wall. The Congress Centre was most cooperative in helping us implement our ideas for the evening.”
The use of a number of mobile units, the choice to ensure quality effects using Clay Paky Alpha Spot HPE and MA control highlights the importance of the event, which can now be compared to the major award shows held in America.
All the MA Lighting panels were connected a network, but each one handled a different sector: White lights, stage lights, audience lights, LEDs and support structures. “the team work definitely made my job easier and increased the level of efficiency”, stated Appelt “ this means we were able to quickly make any changes to suit various situations”.
Jürgen Schmidt-André was in charge of the set design, whilst Jan Thommen from 360Grad was the technical director. Light Operators: Sascha Matthes (stage lights), Henning Schletter (audience and decorative lights), Tanja Nowak (white lights). Lighting Foreman: Matti Hagel.
Procon supplied all the lighting and video, including the network and control system. Matthias Rau represented Procon as Lighting Project Manager, alongside Marco Scholwin as Video Project Manager and Simon Kayser in charge of the technical system / network.