March 1, 2009 – Opening for Ne-Yo on the Year of the Gentleman Tour, R&B singer Musiq Soulchild lit up the Fabulous Fox in a tight, crowd-pleasing performance that had the fans on their feet and in the aisles.
Shooting Notes:
While songs flew by, this was a fun performance to shoot. I'd photographed Musiq Soulchild on his headlining tour last year, so I knew the singer was going to bring a lively show to the Fox Theatre.
The lighting for the first three songs was relatively spare, but there were some great effects with blue-green lights from the back of the stage during one part of the show, which combined very nicely with a little yellow rim lighting. Of course, the white light from the spotlights provided abundant lighting, albeit very high contrast, throughout the night.
I used a combination of the Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 and Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 as my main lenses for this performance. The telephoto zoom was great for slightly tighter shots of the singer and for shooting down-stage, while the midrange zoom was nice for the wider, slightly more dramatic perspectives and half-length shots. If I had to use just one lens for this performance, I think the 70-200mm would have done well by itself.
Thanks to the bright spotlights, I shot this set at a very comfortable 1/500 and f/3.2 at ISO 1600.
