ACME Solar Impulse Supports the Lady A's What a Song Can Do Tour



The country trio Lady A will return to the road this summer with a 34-city tour. The What a Song Can Do Tour kicks off July 29th at Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut, and runs through early October.



This whole design was conceptualized by myself and production manager Will Wilkinson." says lighting designer/director and programmer Mike Marcario of Lady A's What a Song Can Do Tour."We were told we weren't going to tour until fall; a few weeks later, I got a call that we were going out this summer and we needed a design ASAP." As it happened, the country trio's tour was informed by new ideas and new gear .



Wilkinson notes,"The band wanted to rely more on lighting elements and move away from the big upstage video wall, which,l feel. has allowed Mike to be more creative with the lighting and create a dynamic-looking show. We also needed to have a big reveal moment and a bit of a scene change for the stripped [acoustic] section of the show. We were able to use the center stairs for the reveal with the three artists together for the first big lighting hit and scattered Tubes around a piano and stools for the acoustic part of the set"



"During 2020, while the tour industry was at a stand- still," Marcario says, "everyone was doing live stream concerts.t had never done any kind of TV lighting, so it was my first time being more concerned with how artists looked on camera instead of the 'wow' factor of the programming. When in-person concerts came back,I wanted to carry that experience and keep the artist I'm lighting looking good on camera whether live or in-studio. The goal of the design was to create a stunning, bright, musical and rhythmic light show that make the artists pop on camera while also containing enough elements to keep it visually interesting for all 90 minutes of the show."



The stage had "six 4-wide by 8'-deep by1'-high rolling risers,configured as two 12'-wide by 8' deep band risers, with stage right drums and stage left keys and bass. The stairs were built in five levels that rose in 8' increments.The steps were inlaid with Marley and the risers had a carpeted surface. All set pieces were faced with a black poly fascia. The steps and risers were prepped by Gallagher Staging." Marcario adds,"My favorite fixture that l did not know about before this tour was the Acme Solar Impulse XA1200.It's a really bright LED profile with what seems like most of my favorite gobos from every profile l've ever used lt also has two frost filters,full CMY color mixing,CTO and CRI filters,and a full-frame shutter system. Because of those elements and the reliability they showed over the course of the tour, they are now my preferred profile fixtures for any application."



In the end,Wilkinson confides,"My biggest challenge was fitting the three support acts and the Lady A set onto one stage especially on days when there was a limited amount of stage space."Marcario notes a similar challenge. "We played a lot of different-sized venues, and the biggest challenge was getting the most we could of the rig to fit in each venue. My Upstaging techs and our rigger, Mark Knowles, were wonderful; they put everything where l wanted it to go and they have never complained about it;l really appreciated their hard work.


#Reproduced and credit to LSA online

#Special thanks to Upstaging,Inc.



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