Behind the scenes at the Festival Fireworks

Michael Ferguson, score-reader for the Bank of Scotland Fireworks Concert and SCO Librarian, blogs from his Edinburgh Castle bunker before the spectacular event.

As the largest synchronised music and fireworks display of its kind in Europe, the Bank of Scotland Fireworks Concert offers some unique musical challenges. As the soundtrack to the event is completely live, it is impractical to use a computer to synchronise the pyrotechnics with the music, so instead all 4 tonnes of explosives that make up the choreographed display must be fired manually. As Score Reader for this year’s performance, it was my job to call the ignition cues for the team of firers in Edinburgh Castle, to enable them to set off each of the firework effects at exactly the right time along the musical journey.

My main preparation for the role began a couple of weeks ago, when Keith Webb of Pyrovision forwarded me the final draft of his show plan. Keith designs the display in advance to recordings of the pieces in the show, and notates the firing times of each of his pyrotechnic effects using CD timings as reference. On receiving a copy of the master plan, my first task was to listen to identical recordings, and determine where in the notated music each of Keith’s timed firing points were to occur, so that I could mark them into my score.

Keith’s show plan indicates timings, together with pictoral symbols which represent
the various combinations of fireworks.

During the week running up to the show, Keith and I met several times to run through the cues with the recording, tweaking and refining the timings as we went, in order to make sure that the live effects would match his original plan as closely as possible.  Meeting with him early in the week was also my first proper chance to practise verbally calling the cues in time with the music – something that definitely takes a bit of practice, especially for very rapid calls, or cues that need to be “back-timed” in order to allow time for shells to rise into the air.

By the time of the first live rehearsal with the orchestra on Saturday morning, I had become quite familiar with the cues, but calling out the sequences to the live orchestra playing added a new challenge.   One of conductor Clark Rundell’s important jobs was to match the tempi of the recorded tracks as closely as possible, which he managed with skill, but in any live performance there are differences and variations.  Saturday was a good chance to talk over the finer points of timing with Keith and Clark, such as how long Clark would hold certain musical “pauses”, and how subtle differences between the orchestra’s parts and the recordings could be ironed out (which eventually involved crossing out the odd bar or two).

The rehearsal and sound check on Sunday morning in Princes Street Gardens was the final chance to go through the cues before the actual event, and by this stage my adrenaline levels were starting to rise with a mixture of anticipation and excitement!  The most challenging part of the day was probably the agonising wait between the end of the rehearsal in the afternoon, and the beginning of the concert that evening.  After all the anticipation, I was definitely ready to get the show underway and start calling those cues by the time the concert finally arrived!

 
The final rehearsal and sound check

During the performance, all the pyrotechnics and lighting effects are controlled from within the Castle grounds.  The main command and firing position is known as “the Bunker”, which is essentially an underground passage with a heavy wooden door at one end, and a stairway at the other end, which is covered by boards during the performance.  Having been Score Reader for last year’s concert, I was confident that I would be safe from the exploding pyrotechnics above as I took up my position beside the main show firer, but I was still filled with a sense of nervous anticipation.

Making myself comfortable in the Bunker before the concert begins

Pyrovision’s firing setup in the Bunker

During the show, all communication takes place through a network of headsets, and the Bunker, Pyrovision, stage, sound, and front of house crew are constantly connected.  Although Pyrovision have a network of CCTV cameras around the Castle that Keith and his team use to monitor the fireworks, there is no camera link between the Bunker and the conductor.  This makes anticipating the beginning of each piece especially tricky.  During the show this problem was solved by SCO Stage Manager Ronnie Herd, who watched Clark Rundell from the side of the stage, and verbally indicated to me when he was about to give the first downbeat.

Calling the cues for real was a very different experience from all the rehearsal runs.  Being so close to the igniting fireworks, things got very loud right from the first cue, and there were plenty of distractions along the way.  It is not uncommon for little pieces of glowing cardboard debris to make their way through the gaps in the boards covering the entrance to the Bunker, for example, and at quieter points in the show Keith and his team sometimes opened the wooden doors to check the progress of certain effects. 

Nothing quite prepares you for the effect of 100,000 fireworks going off just outside the door; you can actually feel the air in the Bunker move as the banks of shells blast out of the mortar tubes, and you feel the larger explosions as vibrations in your chest.   With all the bangs going on, it was sometimes a challenge to hear the sound of the Orchestra at all during the performance.  The live sound is piped to the Bunker via a physical audio line that runs up the cliff face from the audio desk at Princes Street Gardens to the Castle.  In order to maximise my ability to hear, the music was audible through both my headset, and through an amplifier with two large speakers that I could adjust during the performance.  At some of the most dramatic and climatic points in the show, the volume level of this amp was set to maximum!

After each of the pieces, Keith and the team spent time checking that everything was safe before proceeding to the next section of the show.  This process can often involve putting out small grass and vegetation fires that can break out around the Castle site, which while not dangerous in themselves, can cause severe problems by burning through the electronic firing cables.  During this year’s show, a fire broke out just outside the Bunker, which was quickly extinguished by one of the Pyrovision team, but added to the drama by filling the space with smoke for a time. 

Everyone at the Castle maintained high levels of concentration and focus throughout the performance, and there was a notable sense of relief and satisfaction amongst the team in the Bunker when the show finally reached its dramatic close.  We emerged from the firing position to a scene littered with smouldering fireworks debris, and glowing pieces of tin foil blowing around in the wind.  The Pyrovision safety team inspected the site for unexploded fireworks, and as soon the “all clear” was given, the team sprang into action to de-rig the setup.  Impressively, in a matter of hours the Castle site was completely clean and clear, and ready to hand back to Historic Scotland.