German rental company TSE supplied lighting and sound for Lollapalooza’s Mainstage 1, complete with a full Robe moving light rig with over 100 fixtures including Robe BMFLs, Spiiders, Pointes and MegaPointes.
For the Weeknd’s Saturday night headlining set, they boosted the Robe count with a specials package of another 174 Robes – almost double the amount of lights in the production rig – part of an eye-catching design by LeRoy Bennett which was overseen and operated by Steven Mills.
Heading up the 35-person TSE team on site was Marcel Kuch. The company has supplied lighting and audio to the main stage since Lolla Berlin started in 2015, and Marcel has also been involved for all that time.
Kuch specified Robe for Mainstage 1’s production lighting design for all the reasons that it has become such a popular festival choice. “The reliability, brightness and versatility of the fixtures, plus the fact that international LDs, lighting directors and operators are all happy to work with Robe,” he stated.
Robe Spiiders were distributed between the floor and the roof. The 12 Robe MegaPointes were all on the floor, while the BMFLs and Pointes were deployed in the roof. The working stage space was 18 metres wide by 10 deep with 13 metres of clearance, and with these Robes on the rig, there was more than enough lighting options for the different artists and lively mix of musical genres.
The Weeknd’s substantial extras package comprised 27 x 6 metre runs of trusses, strapped together in 9 sections – each 1 comprising 3 truss sections and measuring 1.8 metres wide. They were built at TSE’s warehouse and installed on rolling carts 1.5 metres high at the back and just off the floor at the front.
Upstage of the wedges, a row of 24 Robe BMFL WashBeams was positioned to blast through the metalwork, and 2 downstage left and right dollies provided low-level front light positions ideal for highlighting the artist, each loaded with 6 Robe BMFL Blades.
“It’s definitely the biggest specials package we have ever handled at a festival” confirmed Marcel, “and this was the big physical and logistical challenge”.
The Weeknd’s show director LaMar Taylor co-ordinated the video content – produced by Strangeloop – as part of the overall stage visual design. At Lolla Berlin, their screen was upstage centre, starting at the back / top of the wedge trusses, augmented by an IMAG mix onto 2 side screens to ensure the large and enthusiastic audience received great views.
To accommodate the Weekend’s lighting rig Marcel ordered some additional power. Usually, one 400A 3-phase feeds all the onstage lighting including guest packages, but this year they upped it to 2 400As plus another 250 Amps of 3-phase.
The ‘house’ lighting desks were 2 MA Lighting grandMA2 full sizes, and looking after everything at FOH was Ludwig Laudan, who also ran lights for any bands not bringing an operator / lighting director.
TSE was founded by Marcel Fery and Peter Weinert 20 years ago and is now a rental and full-service technical production company – lighting, audio, video, rigging – working across Germany, throughout most of Europe and internationally. The team have built up an excellent reputation and cover all sectors – from rental and staging to concert touring, festivals, live events and corporates, and currently, have 70 people working full time at the Berlin HQ.
“Robe has made many smart moves over time, and one of these is remaining independent and in control over its whole design, development and production process. This and their accessibility and willingness to listen give them a definitive edge” Fery concluded.
