America watched as country music’s biggest stars graced the stage of CMA Fest 2022, which aired on Aug 3 on ABC. The festival’s live event was filmed in June at Nashville’s Nissan Stadium and featured some of the genre’s biggest artists including Carrie Underwood, Billy Ray Cyrus, Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Wynonna Judd, Darius Rucker, Kelsea Ballerini and more, with Elle King and Dierks Bentley hosting.
PRG provided both audio and lighting support. The uniquely dazzling lighting rig was designed by Mike Swinford and his team including Mark Carver as Lighting Director, Mark Butts and Andre Petrus as Programmers, and Cole Kiracofe as Gaffer. Burton Tenenbein of PRG acted as the Account Executive for the job.
“My goal was to design something completely asymmetrical and out of the ordinary,” said Swinford. “I wanted the stage to take on a different look for all 18 cameras that were shooting it. To achieve interesting angles, rear followspots were asymmetrical as were the few static backlites.”
The lighting rig included 150 PRG 5L Wash Fixtures, and 10 of its proprietary Groundcontrol Followspot Systems using PRG's Longthrow.
“The retooled PRG 5L with the LED engine was something I really wanted to try as I have always loved the look and aperture size of the VL5. Its updated color and strobe potential were impressive,” Swinford explained. “We’ve gone with GroundControl FOH Followspots for a few years, but this was my first time with the Long Throw units and they did not disappoint at 300 feet. I don’t know of another remote fixture that can compete with its output.”
The rig included more than 570 lighting fixtures in total, among them GLP JDC-1 Strobes, Vari*Lite VL 2600s, VL3500 Wash Fx and VL6000 Beams. PRG additionally supplied all comms for the event.
“Burton and team delivered a well prepped system as always,” said Swinford. “Due to the odd and asymmetrical aspects of the truss design, it did cause some forward thinking as to how to rig and achieve the concept. They worked through it very well.”
Crew List
- Designer: Mike Swinford
- Lighting Director: Mark Carver
- Gaffer: Cole Kiracofe
- Programmers: Mark Butts, Andre Petrus
- Production Manager: Art Rich
- Supervising Producer: Bill Bradshaw
Show Crew
- Crew Chief: Rob Simoneaux
- FOH Technician: Patrick Sieg
- Dimmer Technician: Ryan Le Comte
- Ground Control Technician: Jennifer Kerbs
- Lighting Technician: Serafin Gonzalez
- Lighting Technician: Zach Hair
- Account Executive: Burton Tenenbein
- PRG Project Managers: Jim Rink
Additional Load Out Crew
- Benjamin Sammons
- Colin Bishop
Gear List
- Lighting Fixtures
- 143 PRG 5L LED Wash
- 63 Vari*Lite VL2600 Profile
- 86 Vari*Lite VL3500 Wash FX
- 8 Vari*Lite VL6000 Beam
- 12 SGM G-7 BeaSt
- 179 GLP JDC1 Strobe
- 13 Elation Cuepix WW4 LED Blinder
- 12 Robert Juliat Dalis 860
- 26 Color Kinetics iW Blast TR
- 12 Chroma Q Color Force II 12
- 25 Martin VDO Sceptron 10 - 1000mm
- Followspots
- 4 PRG Long Throw Followspot
- 2 Lycian 1295 Long Throw Followspot
- 6 Robe BMFL Followspot
- 10 PRG PRG GroundControl Followspot Controllers
- Control
- 4 Grand MA3 Full
- Fog
- 6 MDG theONE
- Truss
- 30 Tyler GT Truss 10'
- 32 Tyler GT Truss 8'
- 4 Tyler GT Truss 5’
- 19 Tyler GT Corner