The series, which just finished its second season, shoots in and around Nashville with many of the musical performances staged in a purpose-built studio in town. Sometimes the musical sequences are shot on location; the recent two-part season finale featured performances at Fort Campbell, the US Army base on the Kentucky-Tennessee border, and at Nashville's LP Field.
"The storyline included performing for the troops at Fort Campbell and involved a mobile stage on the tarmac with Apache helicopters flying over the stage," says lighting director Steve Fallon, who works with DP Michael Lohmann on the lighting design for these segments. "Then we had the star of the show in the grandeur of a stadium performance at LP Field."
Fallon, of Fallon Media Design, has been using Clay Paky Sharpy Wash fixtures throughout season two. "They're a great light for TV in terms of color temperature and their small footprint," he reports. "But we opted for the Sharpy Beams for the stadium, and they were perfect."
The stadium was a challenge to light because Fallon had "a vast, three-level area to cover," he explains. "Sharpy was the right choice because it was the only fixture that would give us the throw distance required. And it was the only one that delivered the punch we needed."
Fallon deployed 150 Sharpys from Tony Macre of VER Nashville spread over multiple levels of the stadium, and reports no failures. "The load in was in the rain and freezing cold, but we had literally a zero failure rate. That's amazing. We're very happy with the Sharpys."
Francesco Romagnoli, Clay Paky area manager for North and Latin America, commented, "The Sharpy is a great fixture for television as well as live entertainment. This application is a perfect example of both of those."
(Jim Evans)
