New Year, New Start

  I entered into my placement after Christmas with a great deal of enthusiasm, as the first event of the new year was with the band ‘Gojira’, supported by two other bands; ‘Alien Weaponry’ and ‘Employed To Serve’.  My physical involvement in this show was unfortunately minimal as the aforementioned bands had their own equipment, stage crew and roadies. It is worth mentioning however, despite the vast amount of bodies working on this event, I still found ways to offer my assistance, e.g. some of the band’s team members asking for pipe and draping in order to obscure various pieces of equipment from the view of the audience to the rear of the stage.

 As a result, this led to one of the Waterfront and Ulster Hall’s production crew members, Andy, and myself, working together to obtain the draping, poles, and base plates to construct what was requested by the musicians’ stage crew.  During this process, we discovered we didn’t have all the components for this set-up and had to coordinate to acquire additional poles from the storage. This experience taught me how to operate under duress while maintaining a cool and calm professional nature with Waterfront and Ulster Hall team members while fulfilling the demands of the show I was operating on.

   During the course of the show, we had quick changeovers between the supporting bands in order for the main band to get on stage promptly. This required all available crew members to work together as a unit in order for the next band to appear on time. We only had 30 minutes between each set to get all the instruments, amps and other equipment off the stage and change over the backdrop, I was able to assist with this procedure as I knew the process was time sensitive. I felt comfortable approaching and enquiring with more senior and experienced members of the crew about what equipment was required for removal, as I was handed various articles of equipment being instructed on what to remove for the next part of the show. This gave me great experience in not only working as a team but also proper timekeeping and equipment management.

   In reflection, I feel I could have aided more in the initial set-up of the concert as it is one of the most integral parts of the show, however, overall, from this performance I thoroughly enjoyed the learning process, meeting new people and applying knowledge from my course in this environment.

The following event I helped contribute to was the concert for the ‘Queen Extravaganza”, a QUEEN tribute group produced by Brian May and Roger Taylor. I spent most of this day shadowing the crew members but, this time I also tried to approach and speak to whomever I could. In doing so I spoke to some of the band’s crew and gained a few 1^st hand experiences of life while touring.

Watching and speaking to the crew members made me substantially more confident to offer my services post-showtime. In the aftermath of the performance, I assisted to pack away microphones and their associated stands as well as undoing the safety latches and unscrewing the front truss lights.  Even though I didn’t want to risk taking the lights off of the truss as I knew they were heavy; however, I did learn how to safely dismantle and store away expensive and important sound and lighting equipment correctly. As well as learning to manage expensive stage equipment, I also obtained a fair number of other skills such as listening and coordinating with other team members, health and safety when lowering truss bars on stage from the ceiling (hard hats are required and no member is allowed ON stage) and learning how to appropriately carry and transport heavy equipment without straining oneself.

In observation, I feel I could have offered my help more during the running of the show and during the interval while they were setting things up for the next half because there were equipment exchanges that needed to be done, i.e. in terms of backdrop and some other apparatuses.  As a result, I sensed I had more to offer the other team members and technical experiences that in hindsight I missed out on., however, I enjoyed hearing and absorbing experiences from longer termed members outside of the waterfront, enhancing my current understanding of these environments.

The final performance I observed was a comedy gig by Dan Howell in early March.  During this show, my technical input was again, minor. However, in contrast to the previous performance of Queen Extravaganza, I was instructed and shown the technicalities of the deconstruction and the erection of all the trusses on the stage, front, back and central light systems. As a result of this involvement with stage crews, I am now familiar with the processes with this necessary equipment. Furthermore, I enhanced my management with 1:1 with the actual performers and adjacent crews, to make sure all their needs were met, as Mr Howell requested a safe, private area to perform his meet and greets pre-showtime with fans and guests.

Additionally, due to the high-profile nature of the performer in question, I was allowed access to the pre-show cross-departmental meeting that overviewed all the roles in question for the evening to ensure that every member was aware of what was expected of them to allow for a smooth running of the performance. I found this experience incredibly insightful as it drew my attention to how many departments are required within this establishment to provide such a high standard of entertainment to the public.

In hindsight to this performance, I felt that I could have approached management sooner regarding excursions with one of the team leads and myself, I didn’t feel like my issues were addressed and the timing in which I chose to rectify this was poor as the show was about to start.  My overall experience of this event was a positive one and I felt like a valuable member of the ulster half and waterfront team.