USA - Las Vegas-based independent lighting designer Gregg Maltby used an array of Ayrton fixtures and a pair of grandMA3 light consoles for Peter Frampton’s The Positively Thankful Tour, which led up to his induction ceremony at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in October. Ayrton and MA Lighting products are exclusively distributed in North America by ACT Entertainment.
OSA International in Nashville was the lighting vendor for the tour, a role they played for Frampton’s 2023 North American tour, which Maltby also designed.
“I had used Ayrton fixtures before and knew they’d be really bulletproof on the four legs of this tour,” says Maltby. “We were playing theatres, arenas and some outdoor sheds and had just two trusses up and downstage and fixtures on the floor, so we could use the rig everywhere we went. There wasn’t a lot of flash-and-trash: every cue had a reason, and there was lots of great looks.”
Six Ayrton Diablo fixtures were mounted on the downstage truss as key lights. “Each band member had his own Diablo that we could shutter off and use as lekos,” Maltby explains.
“Diablos are nice and bright for their size; we get a lot of requests for them, from corporate ballrooms to concert touring,” reports OSA vice president/lighting Mark Fetto.
14 Ayrton Eurus were split between the two trusses and the upstage floor. “They did sweeps and gobos in the air and on the floor they made glows behind Peter and the band, a lot of times in colour. Peter likes dark colours – amber, teal – for his solos, which give him a starkly different look from the rest of the show,” Maltby notes. Fetto calls the fixtures, “workhorses for touring”.
Six Ayrton Zonda 9 FX were on the upstage truss acting as the main wash lights for the band. “The Zondas are our newest Ayrton fixtures,” notes Fetto. “They’re big and bright and just what Gregg needed as a beautiful wash light.”
“I especially liked how they could go tight for Peter’s solos and then be big wash lights,” says Maltby. “When you need to make everything fit in the rig, that’s very useful. I’d definitely use them again for my shows.”
Two grandMA3 light consoles, operating in sync, ran software for lighting control. “They were awesome – another bulletproof choice for the tour,” Maltby declares.
“I’ve known Mark [Fetto] for a long time and count on OSA to always give me really great stuff,” says Maltby. “And ACT has a history of providing top service with a hotline that always gets right back to me.”
