Australia – Perched on a platform at the water’s edge, the “sails” of its iconic concrete roof touching the sky, the Sydney Opera House moves the imagination as few other buildings can. Indian playback star, Javid Ali rode those sails on a beautifully flowing journey through time in May when his Rafi Aur Main tour stopped at the beloved venue.
Drawing on his astounding vocal range, Ali enthralled the sellout crowd with his well-chosen balance of romantic tunes, lively hits, and classical-style Bollywood numbers, as he moved smoothly between deep Raagas and retro golden-era tracks. Accompanying him on this magical journey was a dynamic and deeply nuanced lighting design by Roosevelt D’Souza that featured a collection of CHAUVET Professional STRIKE, Maverick and Rogue fixtures.
“We changed looks throughout the concert to keep pace with the versatility of Javid Ali’s music while also reflecting its very moving soulful quality,” said D’Souza. “So, we might have a song start off very low keyed, and then, all of a sudden there are beats of suspense music. At that point, we have lights blinking throughout the entire concert hall. The CHAUVET Professional fixtures gave me this kind of flexibility.”
The movement that D’Souza created was not always of the pan and tilt variety. He often evoked a sense of motion on stage through his adroit color changes, moving fluidly from deep blues to whites. “Congo is my favorite color,” he said. “I use this in my intros to the audience/stage for the show. It creates a space effect kind of an effect that can go with the song to give us a nice vibe. Then we add other colors for the variety and movement.”
Also helping D’Souza create a variety during the three-hour show was the staggered trim which reached 60-feet at its highest points, while some of the truss structures with lighting fixtures 16-feet above the stage and spread out with different intervals of space between them. “Having different spacing made it easier to create new looks,” he said. “The set was long, so we created 65 different looks in order to have the variety we were after.”
Anchoring this wide array of looks were the rig’s 12 Color STRIKE M motorized strobes. “It was important for me to cover the entire stage, so we had a broad canvas to work with,” said D’Souza. “In my view, there was no better way to do this than with the Color STRIKE M. We used it to light the roof to expand our design, to create strobing action, and to set different tones with color effects.”
A variety or richly textured video content, many dreamy images of the artist himself, also enhanced the mood on stage. There was also a flowing tapestry of Indian-inspired imagery. D’Souza accentuated it all with color washes from his Maverick and Rogue fixtures.
“The music of my client and the aura of the venue itself called for powerful imagery on stage,” said D’Souza. Such imagery is exactly what this inspired designer and his team delivered.
