Lighting Design for small stage jazz concert

[bolehnggak]

Hi,



I’m a musician, and within two weeks we are going to hold a jazz concert in a small sized auditorium. We can only use the auditorium’s lighting system, and we can’t afford to hire more lighting.


But even if we hire them, the result is usually unsatisfying. They played too much with the lights during the show, which distracts our playing, and made our show seem cheesy and too flashy. We prefer more ambience and lighting design that is more static but creates certain moods.



So we pretty much on our own, with a set of lightings, 6 PAR64s with color filters, and 2 unidentified static LAMPO lights, and a small lighting mixer.
We can operate them, but since we have no experience in lighting placement, we would like to ask for tips and suggestions.



Can I get information on how to design the stage lighting? (e.g. placing, colors, etc.) Maybe just the basic one that can be done with those lights that the venue provided. Or if you can help me out on this, I would be so grateful.


The concert is a jazz concert, with drums, upright bass, acoustic piano, guitar, sax, trumpet, and a vocalist. We are going to play traditional jazz stuff.



If needed, I can post the layout of the venue and the stage including our band equipments’ placement, and the size of the stage, which is 8 meters x 4 meters. The height is around 5-6meters. And there are 2 parallel bars on the stage ceiling to mount the fixtures. And there are 2 more parallel bars above the audience area.


The venue itself is 8m x 16,5m.



Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

[Esoteric]

Just do a lot of back lighting in deep colors and you will be fine.

Mike

[derekleffew]

Originally Posted by bolehnggak

...They played too much with the lights during the show, which distracts our playing, and made our show seem cheesy and too flashy. We prefer more ambience and lighting design that is more static but creates certain moods. ...

Was this experience at the same or a different venue? Assuming the upcoming auditorium has more or better lighting than what you own, I'd let them do it. Chances are they have more experience than you, in their space.

The key is to communicate your wishes to the house technicians. Allow time during the set-up to discuss lighting looks, tell them "only one look per song," "you can change colors on the background but keep the musicians lit," etc.

The ideal situation would be a Road Manager/Stage Manager/Lighting Designer--someone from your group who could sit with their technicians during the show, but few bands have this option. Audiences don't leave a jazz concert humming the lighting, and as long as it's not distracting, you'll be okay.

[JD]

The key information to communicate is that with Jazz, the music is the focus, not the show. One mood scene per number max. Deep colors towards the rear, any fronts should be neutral or flesh colored. People want to be able to see the interaction between the musician and their instrument, or, they want to kick back and listen. In other words, "not a rock show."

[bolehnggak]

Thanks for the answers everyone.

The situation is that we don't have the lighting system, the venue does. But the house technician is no longer working at the venue, he is retired. And the one that left is the janitor, he can help us put the lights up the ceiling, and make sure that they are working properly, but had no clue where to place and aim them.

I'm really new to lighting design, but I'm really interested in learning it. Not only for this gig, but also for future use.

Questions:
- When you said backlight with deep color, do you mean the lights aiming at the backdrop?
- What is deep color anyway?
- There are two ceiling bars to mount the front lights, one is still in the stage area at the front, and the other is outside the stage area, at the audience area, around 2 meters from the stage area. Which one should I use to mount the front lights?

Many thanks.

[shiben]

Use the pipe 2m from the stage as the pipe for frontlights. Try using R02, or R05 as colors from there. Backlight is a light pointed at the back of a performer, so if there is a pipe or a tree behind the band, hang a couple of lights from there. Deep colors mean saturated colors, like deep amber, a nice dark blue, Red, or purple. Just saturated colors that work with your show.

[bolehnggak]

Many thanks, I'll try that right away. We can try the lighting system a day before the show, I think it would be enough time. Meanwhile, is it okay if I post a stage plot for the show? Just to hear opinions.

Another question, for the backlights, there is a pipe/bar directly on top of the players, should I put the lights straight down pointing at the floor or should I angle them, like putting two lights at each end of the pipe, and then angle them toward the center of the stage?

BTW, this is a very nice forum, if it's possible, I wish that maybe the people or host of the forum would kindly post a sticky, which describe very basic lighting setup guidelines for beginners.
Actually I kinda embarrased since I don't understand most of the stuff you are talking about, like the backlights, sidelights, wash lights. I would love to see some explanation about, e.g. backlights, where to put them, the basic angles, etc. Maybe providing some pictures also would be great.

Cheers!

[SHARYNF]

typically what you are trying to achieve is a warm off white lighting on the front and faces of the musicians and then a deeper contrasting dark color on the backs and shoulders. depending on how wide a beam you have from the down lights it could work from directly above.

Here is a picture that might give you some idea

Sharyn

[mstaylor]

If you are limited on instruments, go with less colors, blue and purple for jazz. If you can add any more add as suggested above, reds and ambers.

[Pie4Weebl]

Originally Posted by bolehnggak

Another question, for the backlights, there is a pipe/bar directly on top of the players, should I put the lights straight down pointing at the floor or should I angle them, like putting two lights at each end of the pipe, and then angle them toward the center of the stage?

That is the best part of lighting, you can do either! Or try both ways and see you like more. There are no hard and fast rules to lighting design regardless of what any one tells you, experiment and find the color combination and angles you like the most and use those!