A night at the Opera
Easily legible digital LED display to accompany the Italian performance of Madame Butterfly
The Challenge
In 2013, the world famous, Moscow State Opera, took over the boards at The Board Gais Energy Theatre, to present a traditional production of Madam Butterfly. The production featured Ireland’s best known international soprano, Celine Byrne and a star soloist from The Bolshoi Opera, Anna Nechaeva.
The production manager needed an easily legible digital LED display to accompany the Italian performance—that wouldn’t distract from the performance—and turned to Spectra for help.
The Solution
Spectra supplied a selection of full colour surtitle scrolling LED signs comprising three high brightness scrolling LED displays and Spectra’s own custom written surtitle software.
Specification
One display, 10mm pixel pitch, 48 pixels high x 288 pixels wide, 0.5m high x 3m wide
Two displays, 10mm pixel pitch, 48 pixels high x 144 pixels wide, 0.5m high x 1.5m wide
The Result
The screens worked a treat – just what we wanted. We had five very successful performances and - most importantly - not one comment about the surtitles! It may surprise you but surtitle displays for opera can often cause a large number of complaints because they can be intrusive and detract from the presentation. The fact we didn't get one adverse comment (from 10,000 audience members) pays tribute to the installation—and shows we got it right.
Kim Robinson, Production Manager
