Production Plus made four spinning mirror ball chandeliers for the Faith Hill and Tim McGraw Soul2Soul Tour 2007.  The 600 pound scenic pieces dangled over the heads of the country superstar couple and their audience as they performed for sellout crowds across North America and Canada.   Production Plus mastermind Greg Kieta developed these larger than life pieces imagined by Faith and Tim’s show designer  and brought them to light for the tour. Watch them in action here

Massive stage shows are challenging–to set up, to take down and to move.  All operations must happen at lightning speed.  The crew typically has four to six hours to load the show into an arena.  Every aspect of the show needs to be streamlined to achieve this.  “Typically on big music tours,” said Greg, one of Production Plus’ founding partners, “ if something takes longer than fifteen minutes to set up, it’s never going to get set up.”

Faith Hill in action under the mirrorballs.

Scenery takes a beating on the road.  “Trucks are notorious for destroying gear,” noted Greg.  “Not through negligence,  just road vibration, shaking, bumps, etc.”  Anything delicate must be carefully packed or risk being destroyed.  Each of these chandeliers contained twenty mirrorballs, ranging from 12” in diameter to  a whopping 36” across–each one susceptible to being smashed.  “The last thing you want is to open the truck and find the bottom of it covered in tiny mirrors,” laughed Greg.  “That would not be good.”

The challenges continue: Bulky gear can be prohibitively expensive to ship, or it may simply not fit on any truck.  In their final form, the mirrorball pieces were 8 feet wide on each side and over 12 feet high.   At over 750 cubic feet per unit,  these pieces were in danger of not making it on the tour.  “The production company in charge of the tour was not sure how to make  them, “ said Greg, “so they sent their designer to Production Plus.  They said, ‘to make this work, you'll want to talk to these guys.’”

Greg sprung into action. He designed “meatracks “to hold the mirrorballs on their spindles and occupy less than a quarter of their final cubic size for shipping.  The meatracks also kept them safe during cross-country travel.  He also–miraculously– made the chandeliers child’s play to set up.  “I dropped the racks off with the production company,” Greg recalls, “and went to get a cup of coffee.  By the time I got back, without any instruction at all, the crew had the chandelier set up.”  Total setup time for one of these massive pieces was about five minutes.  “An experienced crew could put one together in three minutes,” Greg calculated.

Part of Greg's mirrorball diagrams.

Any problems on tour?  “I think we received one call from the producer telling us that they loved them, the audience loved them, everybody loved them,” Greg  recalled.  “Other than that, nothing.”  In an industry known for its last minutes crises, “no news,” says Greg with a grin, “is good news.”