Earlier I wrote about Ambition, and what got me thinking about it was how many different projects I have had going on over the past 3 months. I thought that I would talk a little about those projects here.
Through November into December I had three big events to manage at work. The first was an annual awards banquet which I have worked on for the past 4 events, and which always lands around the second Monday of November. This event has grown over time from a simple awards show with no projection to one that now involves multiple video clips in a highly scripted show. The first year of my involvement we did some relatively simple video on a pair of screens. After having done that event I had a better understanding of what the event was about, though it was also evolving as they were willing to put more budget towards it and ramp up the ceremonial feel.
Over the past three years the video element has become more integrated into the event, and we have designed shows with a 10′ x 30′ screen, and once designed staging and content around three 7′ x 21′ screens. This past year I designed a theme around a more contemporary 9′ x 16′ screen. In addition to being the set designer, I am also the Technical Director and Stage Manager for this event. Below is a time lapse video I made of the two day load in leading up to the show.
While working on this event I was also tasked with designing and TD’ing two more large events. The first is our annual All Employee Meeting which our CEO delivers. The design aspect of this event is relatively simple, as we do the same set up each year. What makes this event difficult is the coordination of the nearly 50 locations around the world that view the broadcast in real time via a fiber network or through a satellite link. This past year we added three new international locations, including Rio de Janeiro and Basel, Switzerland.
Video Control during Employee Meeting broadcast
This event took place the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. That following Friday I headed down to Chicago to begin set up for another large event for which I was designer and Lead Technical Director. This event involved five main meeting rooms, each with different requirements and limitations. I worked closely with a local equipment provider to coordinate the necessary gear, scenic construction, and labor and union coordination.
The main and largest meeting space.
We had two full days for set up in four of the rooms, with the remaining room being set in one day as the meetings began in the other rooms. During the meetings I Stage Managed the main room throughout the week. This meeting, unlike the afore mentioned awards banquet, was not highly scripted, which means that we were essentially making it up as we went. It was a very fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants situation, but I had an excellent crew who were adept and proficient at rolling with the punches. I did my best to prepare cue sheets by the beginning of each day based on what I could cull out of the various stake holders, but invariably there would be changes and last minute information tossed at us.
Presenter: “…and when I am done, the opera singers will go on.”
Me: “Opera singers?”
Presenter: “Yes.”
Me: “How Many?”
Presenter: “Two.”
Me: “OK. Where are they? We would like to hear them before we start.”
Presenter: “I told them to be here at 11:50.”
Me: “Your presentation begins at 10:00.”
This was an actual conversation. It turned out fine, but it’s still a pain when we’re trying to maintain high standards and are forced to incorporate unknown and untried elements into a show at the last minute. The closing session of this event involved multiple videos for multiple presenters, a Panda costume, and closed with a Tina Turner look alike – another curve ball, but we did get a sound check before we started.
So the first event was November 14, and the last event wrapped up on December 9. In between we had Thanksgiving and I also took the family to Florida for a five day vacation. Needless to say, it was a busy time for me. I had one small event after all of this before the holidays hit, so I pretty much skated through to the end of the year at the office. But all of these work projects delayed me from starting some of my personal projects.
One of the biggest projects I undertake for myself each year is an annual Mix CD of my favorite new music, or music that is new to me. This involves choosing songs, creating a seamless mix, and thus determining the order of the songs, then creating the artwork, duplicating & printing the CD’s, printing and cutting the jewel case inserts, and finally assembling each piece.
This year I decided to make two different compilation CD’s. Part of the reason being that I wanted to mark the fact that I’ve been doing this for 20 years, but also because of how busy I had been I wanted to keep it simple by not having to spend too much time picking music. Ha!
I finished the first CD relatively quickly, as it was just a compilation of the songs I used to generate the titles of the mixes over the years. I kept the artwork simple, and I kept the songs in the order of the mixes.
The other CD, however, was a greatest hits compilation based on my previous mixes. This took much more time to create as I had over 350 songs to sort through and narrow down. I realized quickly that I would need to make this into two discs, which ended up being an issue for me when it came time to create the artwork, as I wanted to convey certain information in as clear a method as possible, and it took a while to figure out what that was.
At the same time I was digging into my music project, I also decided it was time to change the way I host and manage my website. This didn’t take as much effort as the CD’s, but still took time and was a little more of a learning curve as I have my CD method pretty much down to a science. As you can see, this is an ongoing project, but I have pretty much gotten over the hump of getting the site set up.
Then there is one other, larger project I have been working on. This one has been in the works for almost a year now, and is not yet complete. But it is getting closer to wrapping up, and as I near the finish line on this one I need to invest more and more time on it working through some of the details and polish. I am truly excited about this last project as it is, for me, a major accomplishment. I have dabbled in this sort of stuff before, but this is definitely the most ambitious. I hope it is the most rewarding as well.
✧ ✧ MidWestMyers ✧ ✧ 
Craft
Last night on the Grammy’s Dave Grohl talked about how and why they made their current album the old fashioned way
I love that he used the word “craft” to describe making music. This is truly one of the last remaining widespread crafts that people do. Glassblowers, smithies, weavers – there are still people practicing these crafts, but they’re not nearly as widespread a practice as they used to be, because it isn’t as necessary with the technology that now exists.
Technology is now a huge part of the music industry, and it’s not all bad. The problem is when the technology becomes a crutch. As more music is created electronically, and more vocal performances are processed to the edge of recognition, the true musical performance becomes less important, and the spectacle takes over.
This is always brought starkly to the forefront when a band or performer is caught lip-syncing on SNL or some other show. I guarantee that Frank Zappa played everything live when he performed on SNL.
Not that I’m opposed to spectacle (Roger Waters’ The Wall is quite the spectacle, as are most U2 shows), but I expect some substance and craftsmanship when I see an “artist” perform.
Posted by larvamoose on February 13, 2012 in Comments, Music