Along the production journey, as technology evolved into LED, so Cohen encountered the world of the GLP impression series - using both the original impression 90 and 120 RZ zoom as well as the Volkslichts. But it was the later introduction of the X4 that confirmed his love affair with the impression LED platform.
"I saw the X4 for the first time on the GLP stand at LDI when Mark Ravenhill showed them to me. The technology and colour were spectacular and I used them for the first time on Human Nature [at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas]."
This show, which celebrated the magic of Motown, ran in the city where his operation, Steven Cohen Productions, is based. "I have had a lot of success with that show and could see immediately that the X4 was a pretty efficient light. As an LED wash light I can set it at 50ft-60ft, as I do on the Billy Joel shows, and it's amazing to see such a pure collimated beam."
For this tour, lighting vendors, Atomic Lighting of Pennsylvania, have supplied 120 GLP X4's to help punctuate a concept which exploded from one original small show that Joel undertook in the UK. "I had some ideas with segmented video screens and I modified that for 360°, reconfiguring it and repositioning the video - and that drove the lighting plot."
Both the residency and touring set, plays in the round from the end of the arena, with Billy Joel's piano on a revolving turntable.
The New Yorker has a decades-long history with the Garden. Since 1978, he's played a record-breaking 47 shows, including a sold-out run of 12 consecutive nights in 2006, and a moving performance at the 12-12-12 concert benefiting victims of Sandy. Capacity audiences of 18,000 have been flocking to see the artist, many of them repeat visits.
(Jim Evans)
