"OK Mark, it's like this... in the absence of anappropriate celeb host, we're all pretty unanimous thatthe best person for the job is... you!” Those words ofwisdom from the mouth of TAO Productions' AndyCotton, whose head clearly needed testing afteraccepting the production manager's job for the secondconsecutive year, filled me with utter dread.

Me? The host? I don't think so. “Listen mate,there's probably no one else who knows more aboutwhat should be going on up on the stage, and thatqualifies you, OK?" My reaction was to look up thedefinition of the term 'multi-tasking', and then laugh athim. He won the argument and the rest is mystery.

Fortunately I was to be aided and abetted on stageby our hostess, PR angel Anna Morgan, an idiot-proofscript, a powerful fan to keep me cool and our DinnerMonitor, Andy Lenthall, who helped me through thecrucial first 10 minutes.

The Awards were once again held in the MonarchSuite at the Hilton Metropole in London’s EdgwareRoad. With load-in and set-up consuming most of ourstage nerves, Andy and I, along with our Mondialecolleagues, were in a celebratory mood by the start ofthe ceremony. It was the magazine's fifth anniversaryand with nearly 700 people at the tables we wereriding on the crest of a significant increase in

attendance.The big surprise for us, and pretty much everyone

in the Monarch Suite, was being able to secure theappearance of heavy metal god Lemmy of Motorheadas guest presenter for the first three awards — thanksto Steve Sunderland's intervention. “I'm on the lookoutfor a new monitor engineer,” Lemmy joked with Andyand I before the ceremony. “So I'd better check outthis year’s winner!”. Sure enough, that's what he toldGraham Blake as he stepped up to accept the BestMonitor Engineer award. But is Mr. Blake ready for thecultural leap from S-Club to Motorhead, we wonder?

Well over 1,200 voting forms from TP readersdetermined the results of 16 of the 20 awards, whichwere variously sponsored by Rock-It Cargo, Midas,Klark Teknik, Star Hire, Martin Professional, Clay Paky,Barco, High End Systems, Shure, EFM and ChapmanFreeborn.

We were lucky that only three winners wereabsent — newly-wed Hattie Spice, Willie Williams andSean Fitzpatrick were all taking time out in sunnierclimes and could not be lured back in time. Particularlyjubilant were Bandit Lites and XL Video who won theirrespective rental company awards for the second yearrunning.

“Being voted as the best by your peers is a truly

wonderful accomplishment. If anything, this awardmakes us work harder,” commented Mark Powell,General Manager of Bandit's UK office. LSD's MickeyCurbishley cheekily arriving on stage with PhayMacMahon to collect Bandit's award promptedrumours of a defection!

Pab pleased his dad with his FOH SoundEngineer's accolade and, clearly an acknowledgementof his work on KylieFever2002, the Live Production ofthe Year, Chris Keating picked up the Video Directoraward. As for sound rental, it was a jaw-droppingmoment when the comparatively small Tiger Hire beatoff Goliath-like competition from SSE, Brit Row,Ampco Pro Rent and Chicago's dB Sound to walk awaywith the prize.

One of the most bizarre moments of the nightcame when I introduced cult rocker John Otway asanother of our guest presenters. Otway celebrated his50th birthday last year by shamelessly campaigning forthe public to buy his single 'Bunsen Burner' in orderthat he achieve his second hit — 25 years after his first,‘Cor Baby That's Really Free'. With some time to fill, Ifound myself in the unusual position of conducting anunscheduled TV-style interview with him about thecampaign on stage, and probably failed miserably!

Damon Albarn, the Blur and Gorillaz frontman

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total production 2003 awardsLIVE AND DIRECT FROM HANGOVER CENTRAL, MARK CUNNINGHAM BRINGS YOU THE HIGHLIGHTSAND PRODUCTION DESIGN STORY BEHIND THIS YEAR'S BIG INDUSTRY EVENT.

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whose face adorned the cover of the very first issue ofTotal Production back in February 1998, made a specialappearance at the lectern to pay a heartfelt tribute totour manager Terry Coyle, who tragically died whilst onthe road last November. “I'll always be looking for Terryfor his support and guidance,” said Albarn. “He was agood friend to me and to many people in this roomtonight, and I owe so much to him.”

Over £3,000 was raised on the night for the TerryCoyle Fund (which was set up to aid his family) with

many guests pledging to make sizeable donations directto the Fund after the event.

A warm glow circled the room when it wasannounced that the winner of this year's Unsung HeroAward was Penny Mellor, the unswerving festivalwelfare campaigner and activist. And there was nobetter person in the house to present the award to herthan Michael Eavis, the founder of the GlastonburyFestival, whose tribute was met with a huge wave ofapplause.

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AND THE WINNERS WERE...live production of the year

sponsored by Clay PakyKylieFever2002

best front of house engineersponsored by Midas

Paul ‘Pab’ Boothroyd

best monitor engineersponsored by Shure

Graham Blake

best lighting designersponsored by Martin Professional

Willie Williams

best set designersponsored by Star Hire

Hattie Spice

best video directorsponsored by High End Systems

Chris Keating

the art of rigging awardChris Higgs

best production managersponsored by Rock-It Cargo

Chris Vaughan

best tour managersponsored by EFM & Chapman Freeborn

Sean Fitzpatrick

unsung hero awardPenny Mellor

best sound rental companysponsored by Klark Teknik

Tiger Hire

best lighting rental companysponsored by Clay Paky

Bandit Lites

best set/staging companyBrilliant Stages

best video rental companysponsored by Barco

XL Video UK

best trucking companyRedburn Transfer

best tour bus companyDSB Coaches

best security/crowd management companyShow & Event Security

caterer of the yearEat To The Beat

the editor’s awardPaul McCartney 2002 Production Crew

lifetime contribution awardHarold & Barbara Pendleton

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This year's Editor's Award went to the production crew of Sir Paul McCartney'sDriving tour which visits some very interesting European venues this spring andsummer. Knowing that Macca wouldn't be around for our big night, it was arrangedfor me to present the award to him, production manager Mark Spring and the team,backstage in Las Vegas before his show at the MGM Grand.

The presentation was filmed by Macca's on-the-road documentary video crewand show on the screens during the ceremony. Although this was really anacknowledgement of his crew's professionalism, it was a proud moment to be ablegive something back to a man who has given us so much over 40 years.

The ceremony reached its climax with the Lifetime Contribution Award whichwas presented to Harold and Barbara Pendleton, the husband and wife founders ofthe Marquee Group of Companies, which launched the truly legendary Londonlandmark, the Marquee Club, as well as the Reading Festival and top rental firm EntecSound & Light. The Pendletons' co-founding colleague, jazz icon Chris Barber OBE,had already made an appearance on stage earlier in the evening to present one of theawards.

Keeping the Lifetime award a secret from the Pendletons before the event was amajor challenge, and it's thanks to Entec's Noreen O'Riordan, Barbara's sister Laurieand their son Nick that an operation of near military precision was pulled off! Withassistance from a video sequence of archive stills, we received a comprehensivehistory lesson from Paul Jones and Tom McGuinness who, as original members ofManfred Mann, were regular performers at the Marquee during its '60s heyday... andthe surprise on the Pendletons' faces was worth all the effort!

Other guest presenters were PSA Treasurer John Jones who handed the Art OfRigging Award to Chris Higgs in recognition of his achievements in rigging training,plus Andrew Zweck of Sensible Events, and Damian Walsh, Managing Director of ourparent company Mondiale Publishing.

Before the ceremony came to a close and the various parties all over the Hiltongot underway, there was room for two additional surprises. Andy Lenthall very kindlypresented me with a cake for my 40th birthday, and I countered by handing him 'The

Editor's Other Award' for "five years in the bunker" —well, it was the least I could do for the guy who'seffectively been paying my wages for the last half adecade! As for the rest of the night... mmm... it's nowconveniently blurred.

DESIGN & SET-UPThe production team was headed by Andy Cotton ofTAO Productions, who 24 hours beforehand won theEvent Organiser of the Year Award at the TESAAwards in London. Assisted by his ever-present

sidekick Jo Thompson, Cotton's major challenge was todefy late load-in access (seven hours later than lastyear!) to the Monarch Suite and smooth the path for aspeedy set-up.

Pulsar Light of Cambridge and Richard Martin

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Proud winners of the 2003 Total Production ‘Caterer of the Year’ award Thank you for your votes and continued support

Now in our 20th year of trading and looking forward to the opening of ouroffices in America later on this year

Studio 4 & 5, Garnett Close, Watford, WD24 7GNTel: 01923 211702 Fax: 01923 211704 email: catering@eattothebeat.com web: www.eattothebeat.com

eattothebeatworldwide production and location catering

feeding your imagination….

Lighting combined forces to provide a truly excellentClay Paky-driven lighting design for the event. Twowalls of 24 Pulsar LED ChromaPanels, separated byXL's central screen, formed a glamorous backdrop toStar Hire's 32 x 12 foot Steeldeck stage which hadsteps to the front and stage left.

Whilst the stage was washed with two Clay PakyStage Color 1200s, four Stage Color 575 and 10 StageColor 300s, other effects included two Stage Light

300s, eight Miniscan HPEs, seven LED ChromaBanks,12 LED ChromaPar36 cans, and two Clay PakyGoldenFog 2000 DMXs.

The audience was lit by 24 LED ChromaBanksand 16 StageZoom 1200s, and the whole rig wascontrolled by four linked Pulsar Masterpiece 216 desksrunning in unison as a master and three slaves.

For the second year, XL Video UK supplied livevideo production services. Prior to the event, Richard

Burford had assisted the project by editing five videosequences at the firm’s St. Albans HQ for screening onthe night. One of these was the 10 minute 'gallery' ofall 50 of TP's front covers, which was accompanied byan original 'Celtic rock' soundtrack specially prepared byyour truly and long-term collaborator Dean Hobbs. (Tomy delight, I did notice a few heads nodding and feettapping!)

There were originally much bigger plans for this

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introduction piece, including the use of the High EndCatalyst system to project the cover images around theaudience in mid-air. However, as time became togetherand the window for programming became narrower,certain elements of the production started to getsimpler!

However, Catalyst certainly did make its mark.Two systems with used with two Barco ELM G5projectors, and controlled by a Wholehog III lighting

desk programmed and operated by Hugh Davies-Webb from Flying Pig. The systems spent a lot of thetime performing stunning aerial effects created by HighEnd's Tom Grimes and Scene Change's Nigel Sadler.Said Davies-Webb: “The aerial aspect of Catalyst is notsomething that many people would have seen before.It's a uniquely Catalyst effect, and not something thatmoving lights or lasers can do.”

XL's on-site system consisted of a Grass Valley

GVG1200 PPU system and three Sony D35 cameras,one at the rear of the room and two at the sides. XLdesigned the screen system to include six 50 inchplasma screens around the sides of the room, ensuringthat everyone enjoyed a good view of on-stage action,wherever they happened to be sitting around theroom. This was in addition to the on-stage projectionscreen, fed by a Barco G10 projector.

The presentation was mixed by Gary Tepper,while Mondiale's Amy Wright cued the awardnomination and winner 'slides' via her Powerpointprogram. Sitting next to her, behind the stage invideoland, was Paul Taylor, our 'Voice of God'announcer.

Responding to the very loose request to do“something a little Moulin Rougey”, drapes and riggingspecialist Blackout’s project managers, Chris Brain andKevin Monks, collaborated with the Total Productionteam from the early planning stages. Blackout designedand supplied a staggering quantity of white filled clothcync walls, which were suspended by the team on-siteto mask the entire perimeter of the room, providing aninteresting textured surface for the Catalyst projections.

To add a luxurious and opulent touch, Blackoutalso supplied a massive amount of rich red velour.Skilfully draped in heavy swags over the white filled

cloth, each swag was tied with heavy cream tassles fora dramatic effect.

Sound at the TP Awards was provided by MajorTom, with Chris Marsh at the controls of a DiGiCo D5Live digital mixing system. In contrast to last year'sevent, the Awards audience was covered by adistributed PA using L-Acoustics cabinets, Crownamplification and BSS controllers. Sound sources werethree handheld Shure Beta 87 mics and a pair of Shurelectern mics, accompanied by CD playback.

“It was an easy room, acoustically,” commentedMarsh, “and our job was aided by having designed adistributed speaker system. The D5 Live console,although it might seem a bit of a luxury for an awardsceremony, was actually a genuine bonus because of theextremely limited space between the tables at the backof the room. The onboard effects, EQ and dynamicsmeant that, apart from the desk and the CD player, wedidn’t need any outboard by the desk at all, whichmade the FOH footprint and the impact on the tablelayout very small.

“We used the D5’s built-in compression on all themics, because it’s the sort of event where anyonecould get up and speak into any microphone, and evenpeople who have microphone technique had to leanover to read their notes and ended up shouting into

the mics. So it made it all much easier and faster to set-up than would otherwise have been the case.”

Other suppliers who deserve a mention areStardes, which trucked equipment from (and to)Maidstone, west London and Hertfordshire, andBallista, the company which supplied the telephonecommunications between tables at the dinner. John-Henri Mills at Krooz graciously supplied a number ofcrew for the set-up and de-rig, and all rigging andtrussing was undertaken by Summit Steel.

Security for the night was provided by a numberof Show & Event personnel. Perhaps the only momentthey dropped their guard was when they won the BestSecurity/Crowd Management Company award, ascollected on stage by Bob Maxey, Chris Hollands,Wesley Pierce and John Phillips.

Overall, the feedback to our second Awards eventwas extremely positive. One tends to always learnfrom previous efforts, and I'm pleased that manyaspects of the production and the smoothness of thestage 'choreography' were greatly improved. We'renow in training for 2004!

Photography byJim Ellam & Louise Stickland

A BIG totalproduction ‘THANKYOU’ TO ALL OF OURAWARDS SPONSORSAND PRODUCTIONSUPPLIERS FOR THEIRHELP AND SUPPORTWITH ANOTHER HIGHLYSUCCESSFUL EVENT!

TOTAL PRODUCTION 2003 AWARDS - KEYPERSONNEL&SUPPLIERS:creative director: Mark Cunningham • executive producer: Andy Lenthall • head of mondiale events: Andy Bishop • commercial director: Justin Gawne •graphics: Jez Poole • powerpoint designer: Amy Wright • the voice of god: Paul Taylor • production manager: Andy Cotton/TAO Productions • productionassistant: Jo Thompson • stage assistant: Anna Morgan • vip liaison: Peter Bundock • video production: XL Video UK • xl video project manager: Lee Spencer• video editor: Richard Burford • video director: Gary Tepper • video engineer: Myway • cameras: Larn Poland, Gary Beirne, Stuart Merser • VT Op/Projectionist:Stuart Heaney • lighting fixtures, control & programming: Pulsar Light of Cambridge/Clay Paky • lighting fixtures supply: Richard Martin Lighting • lighting crew:Snowy Johnson, Simon Cox, Trevor Jackson, Chris Shead, Brian Baker, Alan Stanley, Derek Chalmers, Paul Simmonds • trussing & rigging: Summit Steel •catalyst projections: High End Systems Europe/Flying Pig Systems • sound control supplier: DiGiCo • sound services: Major Tom • sound crew: Chris Marsh,Paul Johnson, Sam Krugar • staging: Star Hire (Event Services) Ltd. • crewing: Kroos • head of crew: John-Henri Mills • set/room fabrication: Blackout (SteveTuck, Kevin Monks) • transport: Stardes • table communications: Ballista • communications manager: Richard Young • security: Show & Event

major tom

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