You could slice the excitement with a knife at Milano's Fila Forum for maverick Italian megastar Eros Ramazzotti's hometown performances. He could sell out many multiple nights, but decided to ration himself to his hugely diverse fan base - encompassing all ages, sexes and pan-dimensional beings - on the latest Euro leg of his 9 tour (which embraces the poetic algorithm of promoting the ninth album).

Italians aren't known for doing anything by half, and the 9 tour, apart from being one of the longest, largest and most successful of 2003/04, puts production values firmly at its heart.

All the supply companies are Italian. The creative team is peppered with a refreshing international and multi-cultural flavour, increasingly characteristic of European productions. UK and Irish-based Jon Lemon is mixing the FOH sound, there's a strong Canadian influence in the lighting set and video designs and two of the nine-piece band are American.

Ebullient and affable production director Giorgio Ioan has toured with Ramazzotti since 1984, and this time he is dealing day-to-day with eight trucks, four buses and a total production entourage of around 80 people.

For 9, he explained, the pre-production started in May 2003, with the evolution of the set design, based on an original idea from the artist which was developed by Canadian scenic artist Serge Denoncourt. A departure from the previous poppy incarnations, Ramazzotti wanted a more theatrical and serious feel to the show to match his own personal and reflective but forward-looking mood and music of the moment.

The set resembles a broken, mangled highway, riddled gaping cracks and treacherous potholes - symbolising the inner turmoil of Ramazzotti's recent personal life. 9 was produced following the death of his mother and split from his wife. Psychologically, the tour is like his catharsis - getting back on track via the therapeutic environment he loves after some rocky times.

The stage visual aesthetic is completed with the large, listing video screen, like a giant dilapidated billboard, collapsed and neglected. The set was constructed by the Delfini Group in Rome, who build a lot of opera sets. A major challenge was getting the asphalt effect looking authentic and lightweight - achieved after much research with glue, different stones and colours. The stage has a six metre wide revolve, and also an upstage/downstage conveyor belt, used to move the various props that fly in during the show - bed, piano, silks - to the rear of the stage. The computer-controlled automation for these was designed and built by Rome-based ABM, and includes specially built vari-speed motors which are extremely fast and utilise thin, virtually invisible wire.

LEMON SOUND
Front of house sound engineer Jon Lemon enjoys working with Ramazzotti enormously, both in terms of the sonic demands of the show and the fact that the atmosphere is fun, they're treated very well, and visit some interesting places. They were impressed with Lemon's resume which includes some of the most respected rock'n'roll gurus on the planet, and he came onboard in September last year, starting with a 10-day production rehearsal period at Ancona Arena.

There was no specific creative audio brief apart from to 'rock it up' - an area in which Lemon excels! They wanted the live audio to exude a CD-like quality in terms of definition, and with many of the rhythm patterns running on 16 tracks of Pro Tools, this all came quite naturally.

Ramazzotti's album producer Claudio Guidetti is also very hands on with the sound, and has written many of the songs. He's been very easy to work with, said Lemon, adding that Guidetti also played in the band on the previous tour, so has a good practical understanding of the intricacies of live sound.

With nine in the band plus Ramazzotti, and over 80 inputs into Lemon's DiGiCo D5 Live console, it's a complex and busy show. One initial surprise was that Ramazzotti's voice is quieter than Lemon expected. However, the intelligent application of the Manley VOXBOX's valve compression, pre-amp and de-esser facilities boosts the gain nicely and naturally.

Lemon and his FOH babysitter Antonio Paoluzi notch the system using one of the new Apex Intelli-Q digital EQs. This is great for contouring the sound with a natural warmth (for a digital device) explained Lemon, and it's also great for feedback elimination. All sound equipment is supplied by Agora Lighting & Sound. It's an L-Acoustics V-DOSC system - 48 boxes and 32 subs - with 36 dV-DOSC, all run with Lab.gruppen amps. The V-DOSC suits Ramazzotti's vocals perfectly as it's possible to get plenty of gain out of the array. Lemon has used all the current different systems, and believes that as line arrays go, V-DOSC was the original and is still the best. The system management is all XTA (crossovers) and Soundweb (EQ and routing).

It's the first time Lemon has worked in Italy with any Italian production companies, and it's been a great experience. "Agora are brilliant," he stated categorically. "Organised, efficient, highly knowledgeable and really great people to work alongside. The whole PA crew, equipment and attitude is truly world class in quality." He added that he's observed a major change over the last decade in the levels of service now offered by European service companies. No longer do production managers have to look to the UK for the best results.

Monitor engineer Stevan Martinovich uses another D5 Live console, and his set up includes five V-DOSC cabinets a side for fills, with dV-DOSC boxes for front-of-stage monitoring, while the nine band members all on Shure PSM 600 and 700 IEM systems.

Using dV-DOSC for wedge monitors was at Ramazzotti's behest: when they changed to V-DOSC side fills on the last tour, he liked them so much he wanted the same enclosures for wedges!

Martinovich makes use of the D5's in-built processing, and uses BSS 901 and dbx 160SL compressors on the vocals, and a Lexicon PCM 91 reverb on vocals and drums. He uses Soundwebs for EQ and routing to the headphones, IEMs, side fills and front monitors.

Ramazotti's mic is a Shure SM58 wireless hand-held. He generally knows what he wants in terms of sound and takes an active and keen interest in technicals. Paoluzi and his crew are familiar with most of the European arenas that they're playing. He sais the main issue each show is getting the bottom end radiating out to fill the sides of the space, and he uses a Smaart system to aid the EQ process to perfection. The overall sound is big, ballsy and clear, plenty of separation and some Latin sophistication to incorporate Ramazzotti's dynamic repertoire.

THEATRICAL
Continuing the theatrical theme, Montreal-based Alain Lortie was asked to create a lighting design for 9. Ioan and Lortie first met during Peter Gabriel's 1993 Us tour. Lortie has been Lighting Designer of the Year seven times at the Quebec music industry's Fˇlix Awards, and is also well known both as a theatre designer in Canada, and for his innovative use of colour.

Nancy Mongrain is tour lighting director/operator and uses a Compulite Sabre console. She has worked with Lortie for the past 12 years on a wide variety of music, theatre and performance art shows.

9 is essentially a theatrical light show, which is what the artist wanted, interspersed with some classic rock'n'roll and anthemic Eros moments, Mongrain elucidated. Initially, the brief was not to see any lights move at all, but this was modified before the end of production rehearsals to bring a more even balance between the two different lighting oeuvres.

All lighting equipment is again supplied by Agora - from a production angle, it made complete sense for Ioan to deal with the one company for lighting and sound requirements. The main lighting fixtures on the rig are 30 Martin MAC 600s and 29 High End X-Spots, with five MAC 2000 profiles used for gobo work on the set. There are also 12 MAC 2000 washes to add power and punch, and 12 Coemar Panoramas lighting the cyc. Eighteen MAC 300s and Molefeys are scattered around the floor, plus four Coemar NATs at front and back of stage. The cracks in the set tarmac are under-lit with Sound Four Pars and colour changers.

Mongrain said it's both interesting and challenging working with the hybrid mix of styles - a practice that she and Lortie have successfully done before. The demanding side of the equation is trying to balance and integrate two very creatively diverse approaches into one show.

Lortie designed and produced his own gobos for the MACs and the X-Spots, utilising foliage patterns and natural elements like clouds, but with a difference - trying to get away from the standard gobos. Lortie has also made use of his trademark selection of 'dirty' custom colours.

The show is run on two levels: theatrically with a strict cue structure form its base, and then Mongrain operates 'live' and manually over the top to add edge and spontaneity.

MOVING IMAGERY
Video is highly innovative - in fact, it's the most strikingly different visual element of the show for me. Fast moving, emotionally interwoven and skilfully directed by Emigliano Napoli for maximum live impact, there's look after look of non-conventional I-Mag spliced seamlessly with abstract and evocative playback material. The video and the live performance dialogues, with the characters there on-stage, melt seamlessly into one another.

The pre-recorded video content was produced by video artist Francis Laporte, also based in Canada, and a frequent collaborator with Serge Denoncourt. Video hardware is supplied by STS from Milan. The 10 x 4 metre 'collapsing' LED screen is Barco DLite 7, configured in 8:3 super-wide format. I-Mag feeds are from nine Sony digital cameras, all remotely controlled because Ramazzotti doesn't like to see operators on-stage or anywhere else in the arena.

The camera remote control system was supplied by Movie Engineering from Milan. It includes a track that bends around the front stage apron in the same curved shape as the stage, on which is a remote camera whizzing back and forth. This removes the need for the standard operated pit cameras on track and dolly. There's also a PoleCam onstage for the upstage shots.

By far the coolest piece of video kit on the tour is an Andy's Skycam, a three metre remote controlled helium balloon, with a gyro-stabilised harness that straps the camera to its underside. Manufactured by Andy's Technologies in Milan, the camera head can smoothly pan, tilt and roll 360 degrees.

Powered by four electric mini motors, the Skycam was built initially for the broadcast industry, it's also very quiet - although noise is not a factor here! A three person crew is needed to operate the Skycam, one controlling the balloon movement, one looking after the camera and one keeping an alert eye on the remote transmission control.

The Skycam holds the production's ninth camera. It's used to capture fantastic audience and unorthodox over-stage shots, plus dramatic panoramic sweeps of the venue.

Napoli mixes using a Xanabi mixer/switcher. A colleague of Laporte's built a special custom high speed computer (no one is revealing any details) which he uses to apply filters, masks and effects to both playback and I-Mag footage.

Eros Ramazzotti's was one of the best organised and most fun shows I've covered so far this year. It has all the right elements - a relaxed, friendly and welcoming atmosphere, and an epic performance supported by a superlative and imaginative top calibre production. The show is currently touring South America before returning to Europe, where it storms through the summer with 26 outdoor shows and festivals, finally finishing in August.

Photography by Louise Stickland