ILLUMINATING THE CORONATION CONCERT

Liteup

On 7 May 2023, a concert was held at Windsor Castle to celebrate the coronation of King Charles III. The event was produced, staged, and broadcast by the BBC to over 100 countries around the world. Liteup worked alongside Lighting Designer, Nigel Catmur and Broadcast Production Director, Steve Nolan to ensure that the evening was enjoyed by the 20,000 live audience on site and millions watching at home.

“T his project required collaboration and choosing people with the right skill sets and personalities for the job, and while there were many challenges, dealing with these and taking them in our stride was also very rewarding,” emphasised Liteup’s Marc Callaghan, reflecting on the feat.

St aged on the East Lawn of Windsor Castle, a Stufish-designed ‘open’ set and stage offered guests a view of the castle’s walls, which were illuminated by projections.

St ar Live built a 95m-wide stage inspired by the Union flag, complete with five runways with 300 sq m of LED ‘crown’ curving around the top. Two sets of upstage risers on stage were separated by a set of steps.

Two side elevated catwalks extended left and right along wings with the front two angled at 45° and a shorter central thrust at the front, enabling performers to get out into the crowds. The PA towers were lined up with the edges and perspective of the castle building.

Catmur’s overhead lighting design and trussing configuration was based on the idea of an abstract Union flag, which meant his fixtures of choice had to be “versatile, dynamic and impactful as well as weatherised,” using Syncronorm Depence R3 for previsualisation.

With six weeks to spare, Liteup was officially named as lighting technical supplier for the landmark event. “Luckily, we love a challenge!” Gaffer, Liteup Crew Chief and Project Manager, Dan Bunn remarked.

The castle walls, foliage, and trees were illuminated by some 900 lighting fixtures and solutions by Ayrton, Cameo lighting by Adam Hall Group, Martin Professional, Robe lighting and SGM Light.

Cobra units were positioned along the castle walls and used for beam and aerial effects that complemented the projections for the wide shots. Ayrton Domino long throw fixtures were positioned in the castle quadrangle to highlight its round tower feature.

SGM P-5 LED floods were deployed on top of the round tower to light a huge royal standard flag. Martin MAC Aura XIPs were rigged on each of the four stage roof legs in exposed positions, with some more on the deck of the stage with non-IP rated versions situated in the royal box for key lighting.

Robe FORTE HPs were installed in the roof trusses with some on the six delay towers, the latter complete with rain covers, while iFORTES were rigged on an exposed front. Spiider wash beams were dotted around the roof of the rig with the rest on the delay towers, while iSpiiders were rigged in the more open positions on the front and back trusses.

Combined, these provided all the main stage and wing washes. Completing the Robe count was MegaPointes – which were positioned upstage on the deck utilised for adding multi-layered aerial effects onstage.

An 11-way RoboSpot system ensured key lighting for the multi camera shoot directed by Julia Knowles. BMFL Blade follow spots were rigged on each of the six delay towers with FORTE HPs situated on the mid truss to back light the front sections of the stage. IP-rated iFORTEs follow spots were housed on the lower trimmed back truss.

Operation of the BaseStations, supplied by Pro Spot, took place underneath the dry