When I was invited to join the production of this year's Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) in Helsinki, I wasn't quite sure what that experience would bring. Upon arrival, I was in awe of the sheer amount of gear hanging from and tipping the scales of the load capacity of the Hartwall Arena roof. Picture a miniature metallic city growing out of the ceiling and encompassing the entire expanse of the 15,000-seat venue. The final load weighed in at just less than 100 tons, including lighting, video, set, and sound.

Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) in Helsinki had a load of just under 100 tons for lighting, video, set, and sound.

That's Eurovision. With a crew of 76 for lighting, rigging, and video and more than 29,000 channels controlling the lighting and video alone, you can imagine the scope of the production. The team of LD Mikki Kunttu, production designer Rikka Kytönen, venue sound designer Reima “Reiska” Saarinen, and production manager Ola Melzig (who has managed Eurovision five times in the past) led the way in bringing this unprecedented ESC — with more than 100 million international viewers — to life.

A Brief History Of ESC

Many Americans are unfamiliar with the Eurovision Song Contest, but its origins date back to 1955, when it was conceived by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) as a sort of “Olympics of song,” with the first ESC held in 1956. Each year, countries hold local contests for original songs, and each winner moves forward to semifinals and (for the lucky few) finals, both of which are televised internationally via the EBU and respective local broadcasters. The country boasting the winning song hosts the ESC the following year.

You've at least heard of many past winners, even if you didn't know it: ABBA (1974), Celine Dion (1988), and Katrina and The Waves (1997) were all Eurovision champs.

Viewers actually vote for the winners, much like with American Idol, except that the votes are tallied and winners announced in the 15 minutes directly after the show. The voting and points system alone would make your head spin. Certain countries with tenured history in the contest automatically move to the finals without participation in the semifinals, so this year there were actually 28 semifinalists, 10 of which made it through to join the 14 predetermined shoo-ins for the final.

Putting On The Show

Here is a timeline of the production: Thursday night, May 10, semifinals featuring 28 acts for three minutes apiece, with a one-minute changeover; Saturday night, May 12, finals with the last 24 acts, also three minutes each (whew!). Something of this scope and speed required one thing above all else: loads of preparation.

“The pre-production of this show started in the beginning of January, when Mikki and I started to go over the requirements,” says Melzig, contracted by Spectra Stage & Event Technologies AB of Sweden, who worked with Finnish supplier Eastway Sound & Lighting to come up with a lighting and video package. “This was a process that took two months, and it went hand-in-hand with the development of the stage design, managed by [local Finnish broadcaster] YLE and carried out by Stage One.”

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The design started with the set, which was actually the result of yet another contest held by YLE, inviting local designers to give input and resulting in four design students — Kalle Ahonen, Samuli Laine, Kristian Schmidt, and Jenni Viitanen — winning the right to work on the stage design with Kytönen. The theme, to reflect Finland's heritage and mythology, was based on a pike's jaw. (The jawbone of the fish was historically used to make an ancient Finnish musical instrument called a kantele.)

The final product was a bonelike construction, a stylized fish mouth that arched over the stage, complete with three layers of backdrops: hanging “fish scales” in front of a Barco MiTrix screen with another stardrop behind. The stage included a central area and protruding runway, both filled with Barco OLites for video. The runway was for imagery only and not used for the competing songs but for the special performances before and after. A central curved OLite tower ran up to the roof at the back of the stage, dividing the MiTrix in half.

Most acts worked with local designers prior to the final competitions to incorporate their own looks, bringing in props and other set pieces. What really gave each a distinctive look, however, was the intense level of video and lighting design — the brainchild of Kunttu — that went into each performance.