Pearce Hire embraces spirit of Royal Variety
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With the show taking place at the London Palladium, the after-party took place at the Intercontinental Hotel Park Lane where Pearce Hire’s project manager Jake Vernum and the Pearce Hire team were loading in a full production package including lighting, sound, AV and cameras.
Giles Cooper of Giles Cooper Entertainment is the chairman of the Royal Variety Charity, and executive producer of the Royal Variety Performance and has been in this post for the past 14 years. He states: “My working relationship with Pearce Hire is long-standing as they are our main power and lighting suppliers on a year-on-year basis for many outdoor summer events run by my own company GCE LIVE, and so I know the Pearce Hire team to be amongst the best in the business. I was delighted when the opportunity came up to work with them in my capacity as chairman of the Royal Variety Charity.”
The Pearce Hire team was given full creative control of the room with a brief to provide a high-end feel with colour and texture throughout the room, which could translate easily into lighting for a live band performance. The package included Robe Pointes, Robe LEDBeam 150s, Martin ERA 300 Profiles, and GLP JDC1 Strobes, all operated by a Chamsys MQ100 and playback wing.
The multifunctional lighting package also included CORE Lighting uplighters and the overall impact of the lighting rig was a high-end feel throughout the hotel ballroom over dinner and during the speeches before switching it up into a look that was more energetic for the rest of the evening when the live band took to the stage.
The audio package needed to deliver a system suitable for speeches as well as the live band and so the team installed a multi-purpose L-Acoustics PA system consisting of 115XT HiQs, X8s and SB18s, all driven from LA8 amplifiers. FOH and monitor control was provided by a Yamaha QL1 with Dante stage boxes. A Sennheiser IEM system was provided for the events house band Ipop.
Pearce Hire’s video team put together a comprehensive show graphics package that ensured all 750 guests had a good view of the live action in the packed venue. The system was based around a pair of 98 inch Samsung 4k displays flanking the main stage. These were supplemented by a number of additional 65” units from the Samsung pro range which relayed supplementary content. The numerous pillars in the room were clad with 43” low profile LED monitors to both fill the gaps in sight lines and provide further branding opportunities for the end client.
Control gear and signal distribution was taken care of by an Analog Way Ascender and a raft of Blackmagic fibre and SDI channels. Live camera was delivered from a pair of Pearce Hire’s PDW-F850 broadcast cameras.
“The audience was at capacity and so we had minimal production space, but we worked in close collaboration with the venue to ensure we were able to install all we needed, in the right places, to do justice to the production for the party. With a room full of 750 high profile guests from the world of TV, theatre and light entertainment, I knew that the production had to be on-point,” reflects Jake.
(Jim Evans)
