Clay Paky Sharpys and grandMA2 Console Unite for Black Sabbath's Reunion Tour

	Black Sabbath's Reunion tour with Clay Paky and MA Lighting. Photo: Sarah Mallos

Heavy metal icon Black Sabbath continues its Reunion tour in Latin America, Europe, and the UK with a large complement of Clay Paky Sharpy fixtures, Sharpy Wash lights, and a MA Lighting grandMA2 light console. Both Clay Paky and MA Lighting are exclusively distributed in North America by A.C.T Lighting Inc.

The tour celebrates the band's reunion last year and supports their album 13, the first with Ozzy Osbourne since 1978.

"Sharpys are the ultimate eye candy," declares Michael Keller, lighting programmer for Baz Halpin, the tour's lighting designer. "They create such a visual display that they combat most videowalls. They're one of the few instruments that can cut right past them."

Halpin is utilizing 42 Sharpys on the Reunion tour with two pods of 4x4s and ten fixtures on the ground, says Keller. "They're very sturdy and rugged and have never had a failure. They're bulletproof lights with very powerful lamps. The prism is great and the gobos are amazing. Anything you want to do with them is never an issue."

Forty Sharpy Wash lights were deployed in Australia as fill for a video shoot, he notes, and "they were awesome as well."

Keller selected the grandMA2 for the tour since he's most comfortable programming that platform. "We're carrying the grandMA2 light with us now, but you can find grandMA2 in most places. grandMA2 does everything I need."

Keller initially migrated to grandMA2 "for its networking" capabilities, he says. Since then he's discovered that "it's a very friendly board. Once you get your profile set up it's easy and powerful. There's nothing you can't do on it."

Upstaging provided the lighting for the tour.

See A.C.T Lighting, Clay Paky, and MA Lighting at PLASA Focus: Nashville, February 18 - 19, 2014.