Aktuelle News & Schlagzeilen

Dayne deHaven and Tyler Shapard bring classic vibe to Ben Rector tour with Chauvet

Prior to kicking off Ben Rector’s current “Richest Man In The World” arena tour on November 13, 2025, in Fort Worth, Texas, Dayne deHaven and Tyler Shapard, the creatives behind the District 5 design studio, were lighting Rector’s sold-out shows at theatres and college campuses.

Rather than changing their theater show design concept for the arena tour, deHaven and Shapard - supported by 4Wall project manager and lighting crew chief Jason Blasing, John Taylor (dimmer tech), Trenton Varnell (FOH, light tech), David Ardale Jr (rigger), and Thomas Dulin (audio) - remained true to their client’s core and continued with the previous tour’s old school sensibilities, but in a dramatically beefed up way.

“The Idea around this design, as well as the design for the floor package we used earlier this year, centered around an old school, simplistic feel”, says deHaven. “Because of this we chose to make clean lines of fixtures rather than spread them out in busy patterns. We just want to light Ben and the band in a way that helps highlight and direct your focus to what they are doing, not make you feel like you are just listening to radio and watching a light show.”

“In the process, we try to find a good balance between adding energy to big moments, and sitting back on small ones”, he continues. “Ben and his entire team, including tour manager Steve Bryan, were enthusiastic about this plan. At the end of the day, for this show, a beautiful static look plus Ben Rector on an acoustic guitar has much more impact than a crazy strobing moment.”

Fitting into this design vision are the twenty Chauvet Professional Strike 1 fixtures in the touring rig, which are arranged in “a clean straight line”, on the downstage truss. “Since our design for most of the year centered around a par can look for our floor package, when it was time to design the arena shows we chose the Strike 1s”, explains deHaven. “The Strike fixtures also have the advantage of being excellent audience lights. Lighting the fans was a huge part of this design, because Ben wants to interact with his audience and see their faces when he talks to them, as well as their reactions to the moments in the show.”

The Strike 1 fixtures were supplied by 4Wall Entertainment, as was the rest of the touring rig, including 76 Rogue R2X Washes, twelve Maverick MK3 Spots, and twelve Color Strike M motorized strobe-washes. Speaking of the latter, deHaven notes that they work in conjunction with the rig’s Strike 1 units to provide the audience lighting. “We have the Color Strikes in a clean straight line on our mid-stage truss”, he says, adding: “A huge part of this show involves using our centered video wall (from PRG) for IMAG, so we need to show the audience reactions in the camera shots. The Strike fixtures also light up the crowd with colors and strobing for high energy moments.” Joining the Color Strike M units on the mid-stage truss are some of the rig’s Maverick MK3 Spot fixtures (the others are arranged on the deck). When not backlighting the band, these fixtures are used to give the stage a more expansive look.

A notable change in the design as Ben Rector’s shows moved from theatres to arenas involves the Rogue R2X Washes. The District 5 partners had sixteen of the washes in their floor package for the theatre shows, arranging them in a downward curve with the center upstage fixtures. For the arena shows, they added a chandelier grid of fifty washes upstage in a 5-by-10 grid hung from 10-foot sticks of truss, which are positioned at a 60-degree upward angle that extends the lighting from the video wall upward and outward towards the audience.

“The inspiration for this came from looking at ‘old school’ par can rigs where bars were hung vertically behind the band”, says deHaven. “We wanted to honor that iconic look while also adding the movement and color we get from the features of the R2X fixtures. We used them in their basic mode to get the full face look from a par can instead of the newer pixel look.”

(Photos: Chauvet Professional)

www.chauvetprofessional.com

© 1999 - 2026 Entertainment Technology Press Limited News Stories