BBC Proms – a report from behind the big organ

Lighting Director Bernie Davis is now in his 15th year of presiding over the way the BBC Proms looks to concert audiences and TV viewers. ELP’s crew chief Paul Tibbles is not far behind. Paul is now in his 14th year. So between them they have helped to stage over 1000 performances.

We caught up with the crew in their control room which is situated behind the famous organ at the Royal Albert Hall.

“After all this time people must think we don’t have anything to do all day” says LD Bernie Davis. “But there is always something new that needs seeing to. We regularly have two rehearsals per day which are quite labour intensive and then the live performance on top”

He continues “Often within each Proms performance three different musical pieces are chosen.

For example, tonight we have a J.S. Bach piece from the 1700’s, an opera from the 19th Century and then a modern piece from British composer Thomas Ades written just a couple of years ago. I have created three alternative looks to match the different eras and compositions.”

“Also every day brings a new orchestra with a different configuration so there is a lot of adjusting to do. We have to work very carefully not to interfere with the orchestra’s ability to perform, we have to take into account how the venue works for the concert audience and then we also have to make sure it works for broadcast. We walk a careful tightrope between all three.”

This year ELP supplied more moving lights than ever before and the key has been to equip the rig with silent running units.

There is a healthy stock of ELP’s Martin Mac TW1s, VL1000s and Studio Colours all of which fit the ‘silent running’ bill.

ELP’s LED Chromastrips were used to back light and dress the stage. Pixel pars were used to add colour variation to the famous Albert Hall acoustic mushrooms in the roof.

Everything was operated from Bernie’s own Vector desk from the control room behind the Organ. An ELP Hog II consul was also on hand as back up.

With over 600 lighting fixtures on the rig, ELP supplied a ten man crew to get things set up but after a couple of days this reduced to just two day-to-day running crew per day for the whole two month Proms programme.

ELP crew chief Paul Tibbles has a love / hate relationship with the Albert Hall. As he explains

“As anyone in the industry knows the Albert Hall is a notoriously tricky place to load in and out of. In recent years they made some changes and you now have to access through the basement. It’s a little better but still awkward simply due to the age and layout of the building. Plus, its a really massive space. Even if you ask someone to do a small job they usually disappear for half an hour!”

But once Paul and his crew including Mark Gardiner and Greg Fitzgerald were up and running they painstakingly and methodically go about their business.

“Every moving light has its own power breaker, meticulously labelled” explains Paul Tibbles. “When you are here for two months with performances every night you need to go to this level of detail. It gives you a real sense of satisfaction knowing that the job is just as perfect as it can be”

Another example of their “extra mile approach” is how the team constructed small scaffold stubs at equidistant lengths across the entire balcony circle of the Albert Hall just so the LD could get a more impactful beam back onto the architecture. “If we were coming in just for one or two shows we wouldn’t have the time to make it look so perfect” says Paul Tibbles, who speaks like a man who knows every square inch of the venue….intimately.

Most of the televised Proms coverage is now on BBC Four with selected highlights shown on BBC Two. There is a broadcast almost every day across the whole two month season.

Presenter boxes for beeb two and beeb four are in almost continuous use, fully equipped and ready to roll.

Bernie explains that there are certain restrictions at the Proms which curb him from getting “too creative”. For example, the canopy above the stage has to be positioned at exactly the right height to optimise acoustics within the venue. Also, the Proms organisers have strong views about how the lighting should be. They are, understandably, keen to make sure that the lighting does not distract from the musical ‘experience’.

But it seems as though this steady, incremental approach has served them (and Bernie) well over the years. Night after night the whole show looks fantastic and performs like a well drilled orchestra with maestro Davis as the conductor and Paul Tibbles his concertmeister first violin.