The Blumey Awards are a regional high school theater awards presentation in Charlotte, NC. A board of judges travel to 56 local area High Schools and judge each school’s performance on a variety of categories. Currently, the only three award categories for tech are Stage Management, Costume Design, and Set Design.  This year they added apprenticeships for lighting, sound, and video design. I was given the opportunity to apply for the Lighting Design apprenticeship by submitting a resume and a personal statement. I had the pleasure of being accepted as the only lighting apprentice for the 2024 Blumey Awards.

I started the Tuesday before the Sunday show, which was the load in for the show. I had a brief meeting with the Lighting Designer and the Master Electrician at the Belk theater and then got to work addressing all of the fixtures on the electrics as the stage hands hung them. I was then tasked to fly the rails out to a predetermined height and create dozens of focus palettes for each group of movers. I then stayed and watched rehearsal for all of the Blumey performances and took lighting notes from the stage manager, along with my own design notes. Throughout the week, I was trusted with more and more responsibility, whether it be focusing some lights on my own or being the only designer in house for a morning Union work call.

Towards the end of the week, I was asked if I wanted to work on other shows that were being loaded in and hung in other theaters on the Blumenthal Campus.  I gladly jumped in and hung lights, worked on troubleshooting house fixtures that were not responding (dmx issues, which I was able to fix),  and assisted with more programming on a different ETC Console.  

During the main awards presentation for the Blumeys, my role was to write and call follow spot cues.  Many of these cues had to be written the day of because the first time we saw some of the numbers was a few hours before opening. The follow spot operators at the Belk Theatre were truly great at their job and a pleasure to work with.  

Working at the Belk for a week was the most educational and eye opening experience for me in my career because I was given the opportunity to see how professional theater is done. I got to work with a group of people just as passionate as I am and watch how they, the professionals, did their job. I learned to work under pressure and I got to see what I was capable of when given the right resources. 

The show went wonderfully.  It was truly an honor to not only provide lighting for all of the nominated shows, but to see my lighting contribute to the performance of “Gaston” by my friends and classmates at North Lincoln High School.  North Lincoln was nominated for Best Musical for the 3rd year in a row.