An opera fan from his childhood days, the Tuscan tenor has already performed across Europe in Puccini’s La Bohème and Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, but is also a confirmed U2 fan. With musician/composer Romano Musumarra, known for his work with Celine Dion, Safina has developed a new ‘pop-opera’ genre and the show, also featuring Mexico’s Patricia Manterola, captured the artist under the warm Sicilian stars in the breathtaking setting of Taormina’s ancient Greek amphitheatre.
The international team involved in the shoot before a live audience, included LD Patrick Woodroffe, production manager Robbie Williams and sound designer Daniele Tramontani. Woodroffe, commissioned by the PBS network in New York (for whom he’s lit other classical broadcasts), explained the brief: "PBS wanted something that was classical, but exciting, which took full advantage of the natural setting of the amphitheatre. We couldn’t put true backlighting in, because there were no positions on top of the old rear wall, so most of the lighting came from high three-quarter rear positions on platforms that already existed, and FOH towers constructed for the event. After that, we simply lit the ruins themselves - the key was to make constantly changing compositions that read well on camera."
In addition to almost 200 conventional fixtures, the automated units were all Coemar instruments (a combination of CF 1200 Spots, CF HE 1200s and CF7s) complemented by Coemar’s Panorama 1800W and 1200W MSR instruments, deployed behind the rear wall for silhouette work and as back spots respectively.
"The challenge in Taormina was to get enough lights in place without making the spectacular setting look too high-tech," adds Woodroffe. "Any television shoot is always the result of many different components - the venue, the artists, stage set, director - these things are never clear when you prep a show, so a lot comes together in situ. We had a very professional team on site from Rome-based lighting contractor Limelite. Project co-ordinator Eneas Mackintosh did an amazing job and Dave Hill programmed the show beautifully."
The main 72-channel Cadac R-type desk, receiving string and woodwind sub mixes from an Allen & Heath ML 5000, was manned by sound engineer Marco Lecci, also responsible for the recently finished stereo and 5.1 mix of the event for DVD release. Monitoring was a mixture of AKG IEM and Meyer UM1 wedges controlled by a DDA Q2 and a Yamaha 02R. Tramontani comments: "Because this was live sound on what was effectively a recording set with a 30-piece choir and group, we had to successfully address the problem of sound spill, and also find a compromise between the TV production’s need to keep camera sightlines as free as possible, and mine, which was to give the live audience as good a sound as possible. An element of the 20 V-dosc systems and eight subs supplied by audio contractor Agorà of L’Aquila were therefore at stage level - the rest were on towers well out on either side."
Live sound feeds were taken from the stage splitters, as were those for the Fleetwood 2 mobile, down from London to record the audio. Tim Summerhayes, engineer in charge, explained: "The decision was taken to record the orchestra both traditionally and close-mic, using DPA bug mics with a special mounting system devised by Greg Jackman. Choirs are notoriously difficult to record in an open-air situation - they’re never as loud as you think they are. You also have to be aware of the visuals, but it was necessary to put a mic on each member - so we had Sennheiser headsets with MK2 mics. As the choir moved on-stage, they had to be on radio, which was a bit of a worry, but it worked very well. We filled all the 96 tracks we had and, as well as the truck’s Euphonix CS 2000, w
