Ellie Goulding

ELLIE GOULDING - BRIGHTEST BLUE TOUR | OCTOBER 2021

What Cate says:

Ellie Goulding kicked off her intimate ‘Brightest Blue Tour’ in October 2021. With a mission to promote her 2020 lockdown album, and keep environmental impact to a minimum, venues comprised a mixture of UK and Ireland clubs and theatres. The tour saw a completely new band setup for Ellie, who was primarily performing new material, augmented by some reworked songs from her back catalogue.

Ellie and I first discussed the creative concept during the summer of 2021. During our initial meetings she told me that she wanted the stage to feel minimal and that she liked the idea of performing in an empty white, art gallery-style, space.

Ellie had been inspired by the work of Danish Art Collective, Superflex, who have made a series of neon signs with specific environmental messages that appear in unlikely spaces. She was keen to reference this in her performance, as it ties into her ongoing work as a UN ambassador for Climate Change.

We started thinking about the various ways we could bring a piece of acclaimed art into the design. However, faced with various budget and logistical constraints, we decided to create a digital billboard, enabling us to display messages of our choosing, as and when we wanted.

The billboard had to work with the minimalist, art gallery, aesthetic, as it would be a focal point of the show. In order to meet our brief to reduce the use of “single tour use” materials and resources, a custom build was out of the question.

I am proud to say we created the entire stage design from rental and off-the-shelf material. We had a white cyclorama backdrop from Showtex, which was made from recycled fabric. To reduce truck space, we designed the show around compact and lightweight staging and lighting equipment. We also sourced all flown lighting and rigging local to each tour venue.

We hung a small banner of high-resolution LED tile behind the backdrop, which was invisible until lit, maintaining the stark, clean stage look for the rest of the show.

We framed the billboard with the GLP Creative 1+ lights, which added a really pleasing dynamic to the look. This was augmented by a simple lighting design, which framed the stage risers, creating the atmosphere and adding energy, while ensuring audience focus was always on Ellie and her band.

What the press says:

https://www.ravepubs.com/brightest-blue-ellie-goulding-glp-case-study/

Other useful links:
https://superflex.net/public_art
https://www.elliegoulding.com/

Credits:

Show Design Concept - Cate Carter
Lighting & Production Design - Cate Carter
Lighting & Video Programmer - Tim Fawkes
Visual Content Creation - Paul (Pablo) Beckett

Tour Manager - Jane Deady
Production Manager - Mark Jones
FOH Audio Engineer - Nick Ingram
Monitor Engineer - Laurie Binns
Playback - Ed White
Lighting Supplier - Lite Alternative
Video Supplier - Universal Pixels
Special Effects - ER Productions
Scenic - Showtex
Extra Support - German Light Products (Creative Light 1+)

Artist Management - TAP management