Canada’s Sylvain Cossette Out Again Under MAC Rig

Multi-talented Canadian singer/songwriter Sylvain Cossette is out on the road again, this time in support of his latest CD Rendezvous. Lighting Designer Scott Phillips used a Martin rig of MAC 300, 500 and 600s along with RoboColor Pro 400 color changers on the show.
 
On this latest CD Sylvain decided to pay homage to great composers like Freddie Mercury, Lennon/McCartney and Murray Head, as well as composers closer to home like Claude Dubois, Serge Fiori and Jacques Michel. He also plays some of his own songs.
 
Looking for the right look
Beside the lighting design Scott is also responsible for programming and covers director and set designer duties as well. He has extensive experience having designed the lighting for the Backstreet Boys and Lara Fabian, as well as television, video and ice shows. He comments, “With all these composers the music on the album has much different colors and textures. We had to find a look for the show that would represent all of these moods and ambiences. It wasn’t necessary to bring in all sorts of props and sets to get the message across but we still needed some sort of backdrop or something to complete the stage look.
 
Simple but effective set
“I took six 12” x 12” square truss (three 12´ long and three 10´ long) and had them wrapped in a mat silver nycra material so that they would not look like the old vertical truss. I also had built six custom bases with six stainless steel polished mirrors on each base. For each of the towers there is a MAC 500 top mounted with a custom made bracket, a MAC 300 in front on the floor and a RoboColor Pro 400 hitting the mirror inside the truss from the back. Many looks were achieved with this simple but effective and inexpensive set.
 
MAC stage lighting
“For the stage I used six MAC 600 and four MAC 500 hanging at different levels to get more dimension out of the set. Added to this, for each musician, is a 575 Profile with a Lee Filters 281 c.t.b. as back light and 2 no-color each in the front of house.
 
“In the 500 to 1,200 seat venues that we tour in, the Martin lighting rig really puts out a lot of power and brightness. Programming the show with the Martin MACs was, as usual, easy, fast and efficient.”
 
The lighting package is supplied by Group Berger through Martin’s Canadian distributor Martin Canada. The nycra set pieces are supplied by Ex-Tension Design.
 
“Once again Martin lights makes the Sylvain Cossette show look great,” Scott continues. “That is why I really enjoy working with Martin products, and will so for years to come.  The tour started last September and will have been seen at least 130 times by April 2003. Crew wise I have the best team out there for this tour.”
 
Head Electrician: Eric Nault.
Stage Manager: Etienne Chaput
Technical Director: Jacques Durocher
Tour Manager: Annie Guillemette