Of Riggers and Roadies

I recall a fun story about interactions of the road crew when DeGarmo & Key were out for sixty cities, opening for Petra.  The show was big enough that we carried our own union rigger to help with getting the 26 rigging motors attached to the coliseum superstructure.  

A quick tutorial on rigging follows: a rigging motor is a type of motorized hoist, that hangs from the bottom of a long, high-strength chain.  Our rigging motors could lift up to 2 tons of weight per motor.  Lights, speakers, rigging and other implements were 'flown' with these motors.  Each rigging motor came with its own seventy-foot chain, which had to be attached to the steel infrastructure of the ceiling of a venue.  A rigger would make his way up to the high steel structure of the auditorium and might even proceed to use trigonometry so as to triangulate and position the motor over a point marked on the stage  The challenge was to use one, two or even three cables of varying lengths and loop them over the steel I-beams, attaching them to a shackle at top of the rigging chain such that the motor would hang directly above its prescribed location on the stage.  The large, heavy motor would then be cabled to power (from the stage side), and when turned on with a remote, would climb the chain toward the roof.  A large hook on the bottom of the motor was attached to the equipment to be hauled up.  With a large lighting show, it’s even possible to build the lighting trusses in a manner such that they were articulating and could be manipulated during the show by raising or lowering the rigging motors (the astute reader might note this effect at the beginning my lightshow during "Rock Solid" in the D&K Rockumentary).

In good jest, our rigger was one of the most hated members of our crew!  Despite the dangerous job he had to perform, he had one of the easiest and best-paying positions on the road; although he was one of the first on the stage, he was already done by the time we were still in the morning of setup.  Our rigger was also the first off the stage and into his bunk at night.  It was nice to have him along on the tour, but we harbored a fair amount of resentment toward him for his “easy” job.  One day, the Petra stage manager decided to take out his hidden aggression on the poor rigger.  Grabbing onto a large curtain clamp (normally used to keep rolled-up stage curtains in the air and thus prevent damage to them), he began his diabolical plot.  It so happened that the joyful rigger was on his way offstage to a day of leisure when the rest of us were just getting started on our day’s work.  As he passed by the stage manager, the curtain clamp, which so happened to be right in hand, was quickly attached to the back side of the rigger.  Although outraged, the good rigger just threw the clamp on the stage and left.  We all looked at each other and marveled at his non-vindictive self-control.

By the end of the day, we had all forgotten about the incident.  The rigger did the disconnect and headed off to the bus, early to bed, as usual.  When we walked onto the bus at 1AM, we discovered him cheerfully sitting up in the lounge, still watching a movie.  Once we were on the road again, the stage manager headed off to his bunk to retire for the night.  The rigger waited a few minutes, then arose, and grabbed a case of the best gaffer’s tape available from a storage compartment.  He grinned ear-to-ear and headed back to the bunk area.  After discerning no movement from the stage manager, he began to basket-weave the tape across the opening to the bunk, effectively taping the poor man into his bunk like a coffin.  The velvet curtain over the bunk was securely held in between the tape and the stage manager.  Our fearless rigger then walked up to the thermostat and cranked it up to high.  We all stood watching and laughing, while the stage manager woke up and began to pound on the drapes to open them.  As we roared in laughter, the point of a knife stuck through the curtain and tape and sawed a hole.  Out popped a hand.  As the hand grabbed furtively at the tape, it was greeted by … a friendly curtain clamp!  The stage manager howled, shaking off the clamp and a large body burst through both curtain and tape, tumbling out onto the floor.  When the fireworks died down, we ended another fine day on the road; business as usual.