CONCERT WORKS

Take a handful of people, leave 'em on a deserted tropical island, and guess what happens? If this was a reality TV show, they'd make alliances, backstab each other and fight it out for a million bucks. But since it was reality, period, what happened next was a surprise Beach Boys concert. Well, of course.

Concert Works is a regional sound reinforcement company in an unusual region, the Virgin Islands; although it is based in St. Croix, a U.S. Virgin Island, the company handles concerts and events throughout the Caribbean. Offering sound, lights, staging, roof and backline, the four-year-old company averages two full productions a month, with the rest of its time spent handling club, theater, dance and corporate work.

And as it turns out, it was the corporate side of things that brought all of Concert Works' offerings into play when it provided nearly everything for the deserted island show. "I got a call about doing a show for the Beach Boys on an uninhabited island called Prickly Pear," said Frank Czarnecki, owner. "It is about a mile off Virgin Gorda, which is a British Virgin Island. It was a corporate private party, where they had rented a small cruise ship and sailed around the islands for a week. On the last day of the cruise, they pulled up to the island and had a surprise concert."

Despite being a sound company off the beaten path, Concert Works had gotten the call due to a referral from Grip Flicks, a local film and grip company out of St. Thomas for whom the SR Company had worked with before. As it turned out, Grip Flicks provided the stage and generator for the event, while Concert Works handled the sound, backline and roof. While the duties were split up, there were more than enough details to keep everyone involved busy, Czarnecki recalled: "Besides getting all the equipment there, we also had a lot of paperwork to do for customs and immigration. We even had to get special permission for one of our crew, who is a rasta, to enter the BVI-- they do not allow any rastas or hippies; this is actually on the work permit form!

Gear was brought to the island in a shipping container, which was then placed by a crane onto a barge; the barge then went to the island and beached itself in front of the stage. There, the gear was off-loaded using a Bobcat-type forklift. In order to keep the concert a surprise for the audience, the barge pulled around to a small cove out of sight, where a generator on board powered the show from a distance."

While Concert Works is equipped to handle a variety of gigs, the Beach Boys' equipment rider included a few specific processing units that the company didn't carry. As a result, Czarnecki called Boulevard Productions (New Milford, NJ), which had worked with Concert Works in the past; Boulevard owner James Coiffi flew down to the event with what was basically the FOH rack, bringing along an Eventide H3000; Lexicon PCM80 and MPX1; Drawmer gates; and dbx compressors.

Upon arrival, Coiffi was appointed assistant FOG engineer for the show, helping Beach Boys FOH engineer Joe Ostrin man a 40-channel Allen & Heath GL4000 console. Meanwhile, Concert Works' own Phil Merchant (the aforementioned rasta) took on monitor engineer duties, providing mixes through proprietary 15" wedges powered by Crown amps. Mixing was performed of a 40-channel Allen & Heath GL4 with dbx EQs on the side. The company also supplied a PA comprised of Community loudspeakers, powered by QSC PLX-3002 Amplifiers, as well as the show's backline, complete with a Hammond B3 organ and a Leslie.

"The gig went off without a hitch," Czarnecki reported. "We got the container loaded out by dusk and came back to break down the roof the following morning. Then away we went on a six-hour barge ride through the BVI to St. Thomas, where we had a gig the next day."

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