From 21 March to 1 April 2013, the world famous Cirque du Soleil entertainment company showcased their eastern-themed Dralion tour at the Coca Cola Dome. Performed in South Africa for the first time.
Indeed after its founding in 1984 by Guy Laliberte and Gilles Ste-Croix, Cirque du Soleil has established itself as one of, if not the, best circus acts in existence, starting with the original Cirque du Soleil and metamorphosing into its many off-shoots, such as Mystere, O, Corteo and of course Dralion.

Cirque du Soleil, translated to English, means Circus of the Sun. Originally named Les Echassiers el la Baie and formed in Canada in the early 1980’s, they were initially a troupe on stilts who performed in the streets of Baie-Saint-Paul in the province of Quebec. As a result of a contract from the Quebec Government in 1984, they were bolstered financially to present the first Le Grand Tour du Cirque du Soleil, enjoying a fantastically successful year. They received another government stipend in 1985 for the International Year of Youth and toured Canada. Cirque du Soleil’s creativity and daring soon earned it a place of distinction among Canada’s cultural enterprises.

Founded in 1998, Dralion is the brainchild of Guy Laliberte, Guy Caron and set designer Stephane Roy and as mentioned, is based upon an eastern theme. Dralion is a portmanteau of the words “dragon’, representing the east and “lion’ representing the west. The show plays with the symbolism of the pursuit of harmony between nature and mankind, each of the four elements are personified and represented by a different colour.

Indeed Dralion is Cirque du Soleil’s top-grossing show, which garnered a Primetime Emmy Award , and after touring for 13 very successful years it was briefly retired in January 2010 while being adapted to an arena format. It was then re-launched in October 2010, starting in Trenton, New Jersey and has been touring ever since.
Of course, a show on this scale requires a very professional, highly tuned technical crew. It is extremely energetic and that energy has to be conveyed in every way possible, including audio and lighting. The show simply would not project the way it does without sound and lights, because after all, they are half the experience.

Sound

The head of sound for Dralion is Glen Beckley, a well-seasoned UK-based engineer with 20 years’ experience in sound for theatre, rock n’ roll and comedy which is a nicely balanced mix of experience that suits the show well. Beckley says: “The system is very much an arena system, but the mix is kind of like a loud theatrical mix. We don’t run at rock “n roll levels but we certainly run quite a bit louder than you would in most musicals.’

Speaking of the system, every single piece of kit was shipped along with the show. The core mixing surface is a Soundcraft Vi6 running MADI link on fibre to a single Vi6 stage box, which Glen has not had extensive experience with, but has settled into for Dralion. In all there are 64 inputs, 62 of which he is using for a full six-piece live band, backing track feeds from Ableton Live run backstage and controlled with a MIDI keyboard, and around 10 channels of RF vocal microphones used throughout the show. Since the show is heavily percussion based, there are 32 channels of drums and percussion alone. There are 18 channels of playback and keys, two bass channels, two guitar channels, one acoustic guitar channel and four channels of violin. Including FX returns the total channel count approaches 86 channels. It was crucial, therefore, for the console to be the 96 channel version. Three Meyer Galileos are used for system processing.

The main PA rigged for the Dome is all Meyer; the main hangs consisting of 14 Mica boxes per side and the out-hangs consist of nine M’elodies per side with a 600HP subwoofer flown on top of each array. Additionally there are two MSL-4 clusters with three boxes per side to fill the floor and a stack of 700HP subwoofers per side behind the stage masking, arranged in cardioid configuration. Two CQ1 boxes are flown above FOH to fill the rear if need, but Beckley has not had to use them yet.

He explains: “This format of the system is sort of our “option two’ as it’s more of a traditional arena setup. What we would generally do is have a distributed system and 11 clusters altogether. So instead of having a big pile of PA we would break it down into smaller chunks so each bank of seats would have their own stereo system. There would also be three hangs of subs flown. That way everyone is in the near field. What we’ve got up here represents about 65% of what we have in total.’

The goal for Dralion at the Dome was to create an intimate environment for the audience. As a result, massive drapes spanning from the ceiling to the floor were hung to create a semi-circle around the audience and walls to the sides of the stage. This helped immensely in dampening the reverberant nature of the dome and aiding in clarity. When asked what the most difficult part of their involvement was, Beckley says: “In this arena the riggers had the biggest challenge. Obviously the show is always the size that it is and the trusses in relation to the set are always in the same place so when there’s a lot of space like this, it’s really cool for us because we have a few options as to how we want to do it. But the riggers did a great job. Here we have 19 rigging points.’

A multi-track recording is routinely taken by Beckley via the MADI feed from the Vi6. While it is somewhat easier these days than it used to be and therefore a widespread practice, Beckley’s reason for recording was quite surprising.
“I take a stem recording, basically, so each element of the band has its own sub-group, which is how it gets to the mix. I can set up different routing schemes so I can record those sub-groups as a 16 track multi-track. We use that to create backup tracks in case a member of the band is ill so we can put those tracks into the Ableton project and open up two spare channels.’

Walking over to monitor world, a Yamaha DSP5D (needed for the additional inputs) – operated by monitor engineer Massimo Tabai – is the monitoring console of choice, which takes a split from 64 channels of Radial active splitters. Phantom power is supplied from there. Since the band is stationary, everyone apart from the percussionist has got hard wired IEMs. The percussionist uses RF IEMs because he has to play the large Japanese drums onstage at the end of the show and needs to be mobile. A few outboard units including a Lexicon PCM96 are also employed because the vocalists don’t enjoy the reverbs on the DSP5D and for this I don’t blame them.

Lighting

Head of lighting for Dralion is Frederick, Maryland (USA) native Josh Mowczko, who has been touring with Cirque du Soleil for over five years. Graduating from Lingamore High School, he credits his career in lighting to a missed theatre audition where he was given the opportunity to fill a position no one else could or was willing to do. From then on he started his journey into lighting, now with more than 20 years’ experience behind him he tours the world with Dralion.

The centrepieces of Dralion’s lighting control are dual GrandMA2s, one running the show and another as a backup. The back-up mirrors the main surface so if there is a crash, Josh can immediately switch over to the backup without a hitch.
“Every show I’ve ever done I’ve run redundant. Luckily, nothing has ever gone drastically wrong. Once or twice I’ve had the [main] console crash so I’ve just switched to the backup. With shows like Dralion, you don’t want any kind of a show-stopper.’

Josh is also running the GrandMA 3D control software on a laptop for “quick visualisation’. He uses the GrandMA2 Remote app on an iPad running through an Apple router with a signal booster and monitors WiFi traffic to make sure there isn’t any interference with his network. To keep his WiFi signal clean to the console, he runs on the 5Ghz band, which is much less cluttered.
MAnet is the protocol used to link all of the MA Devices, including the visualizer and iPad remote. Streaming ACN is used as the transport protocol from front of house to backstage via fibre where it is translated by an ELC Node to DMX.

Josh elaborates: “Originally we used Art-Net as the DMX transport protocol. This required independent cabling from MAnet. We soon discovered if the MAnet connection between consoles was lost, both consoles would output Art-Net and confuse the node, flashing the system as it tried to read both streams. We circumvented this problem by switching to ACN, which is multiplexed with the MAnet signal on the same output.’

A custom emergency relay system that’s powered by three UPS’ is integrated in case of a power failure, and fitted in a custom ETC Sensor touring rack.
Dralion uses Clay Paky fixtures exclusively. All in all there are 151 fixtures, including 72 moving lights and the rest comprising traditional units. For hard-edge fixtures there are Alphaspot HPE700s 1200s, 1200 Profiles and 1500s. For washes there are Alphawash HPE700s, 1200s, and 1200 Halos. Additionally there are a few conventional fixtures – all ETC. There are six Source Four fixtures fitted with Seachanger CMYG dichroic colour mixing engines instead of traditional colour scrollers.

Josh elaborates:”The dichroic colour mixing engine is great because the added green increases the colour gamut in as far as how much it can produce. It extends how much you can actually get out of the fixture as far as colour goes.

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There are four 400W Wildfire black lights for what Josh calls the “Spirit Act’ where the costumes fluoresce. On the set wall there are 120 traditional MR16 lamps, which are consumer lights, 30 on each wall panel. They supply a star effect. Four Martin Atomic 3000 strobes are used for punch effects, which creates a flash of broken light through the gaps of the industrial construction of the set.
For low fog effects Josh is using three Gem Glaciator X-Streams – for very specific reasons.

He explains: “We’ve found it’s much easier not to use a CO2 or nitrogen system because in different countries it’s hard to find. All of our stuff is gasless just because it’s easier to travel with internationally.’

As far as hazers and foggers go, Josh is using Look Solutions Unique 2s for haze and a Look Solution Viper NT for a fog effect in the centre of the stage.
Backstage lighting, something not often discussed in articles such as these, is handled by ETC Selador LED fixtures.
“We’ve found that we can light the entire backstage area off of one 20 Amp circuit. We use them for two things: backstage lighting or for places where there is no exterior lighting during loadout.’

The wrap

Never mind the show itself, the sound and lighting systems for Cirque du Soleil Dralion alone is enough to make one’s head spin. The sheer size and perfectly executed efficiency of the production is something that not just we in South Africa can learn from, but the world at large, and clearly demonstrates why it is Cirque du Soleil’s top grossing show. The fact that they ship their entire production worldwide is testament to the immense backing of the show and no doubt it’s ever increasing notoriety and popularity. I’m sure if they keep it up, they’ll be pleasing crowds for decades to come.