Montréal International Fireworks Competition Reports

After a two year hiatus due to the pandemic, the 36th edition of the Montreal International Fireworks Competition, due to have been held in 2020, makes its return with two opening shows – one on June 25th and a second on July 2nd 2022.

GFA Pyro was originally scheduled to put on a “tribute to our essential workers” display for Labour Day weekend 2021, but this was cancelled due to the ongoing pandemic. The show on June 25th, entitled “Je me Souviens” is essentially this show reworked a little bit to coincide with the Québec Fête National celebrations.

I interviewed Eric Cardinal, chief designer for GFA Pyro, for both of these opening shows. GFA Pyro was an amalgamation of Concept FiatLux (a company founded over 20 years ago by some of the original crew of the first season of the fireworks competition in Montreal and was headed by Michel Rioux)  and Ampleman, founded by Eric’s father, Maurice Cardinal. Just recently Michel Rioux announced that Bob Deng of Lidu and owner of Canada’s oldest fireworks company, Hands, would be taking over as CEO of GFA Pyro. With Michel Rioux retiring from day to day operations, this leaves Eric as the chief designer and Maude Furtado as General Manager.

Eric told me that the pandemic had been difficult and that 2022 is the first year the market for grand entertainment spectacles has finally come back to life. He said that the company will be busy this upcoming St Jean-Baptiste and Canada Day season. For the Je me Souviens show, the soundtrack for this had been assembled by competition technical director Paul Csukassy at Studio Piccolo at the end of last summer.

Both shows will utilize all five firing ramps, including the floating pontoons (known as ramp 5). Eric said he particularly likes using ramp 5 as this gives some interesting depth to the display that would be impossible otherwise. Products will be largely Chinese, featuring supplies such as Lidu and Mystical, together with GFA Pyro’s usual Spanish supplier Igual as well as some Panzera products from Italy. Shells of all sizes will be used, including some 300mm (12″). Eric uses Finale 3D to help visualize the design of the shows and he said it was a bit more difficult for the first show as there are seventeen pieces of music, so this is more a challenge from the point of view of avoiding repetition.

The second show features an all-Prince soundtrack that Eric created and has fourteen pieces. In terms of complexity, the second show is the larger of the two with the equivalent of 88 32-cure firing modules versus 75 for the first – but both shows will be a mix of FireOne and Pyrodigital firing systems – largely due to this being the busiest time of the year for the company. The second show will also feature some “letter mines” for special effects during “Raspberry Beret”.

The weather forecast is promising perfect conditions for the debut of the 36th season!

I met with Michael Lutz of Rozzi’s Famous fireworks and Maria Grazia Gerbaudo of Panzera whose companies are collaborating to put on the closing show of the 35th edition of the Montreal International Fireworks Competition.

Rozzi and Panzera have a close working relationship and so this year’s closing show will feature almost 100% Panzera products, save for a few nautical and slice cakes. Many shells were specially produced for this closing display – Maria Grazia joked that the factory were frustrated by orders or “5 shells with pink stars and 10 shells with magenta” – though, in reality, many of the effects were custom-designed for this show.

Michael noted that this year’s closing show will feature more cues than last year’s, but this was dictated by the soundtrack largely. Fired using 185 32-cue modules, the cue count will be in the 6000 range and the item count in the high 6000 range.

Design time was short because the soundtrack wasn’t received by the Rozzi team until April – the songs having been selected by famed Quebec chanteur Gregory Charles and refined by the competition technical director Paul Csukassy and then mixed in Studio Piccolo as usual. Michael said he had a solid week to complete the design so the Panzera factory would have time to complete the production of the special shells. Michael noted that his design style has the music leading but having the fireworks draw the audience to the next level without being too mechanical with note synchronization.

July is a busy time for Rozzi – over 120 shows around July 4th plus nightly shows at various theme parks take their toll so Michael said it was fun to be in Montreal for some team-building with his crew. Fans of large calibre shells will be pleased to note there are 7 12″ Italian shells in the display as well as many cylinder shells – over 200 in the finale alone! The weather promises to be perfect, too!

I met with Christian Howard, who, with his brother Andrew, were the guided the design and production of this show which was supposed to have competed in Montreal in 2018. Due to some unfortunate problems with the logistics of shipping explosives, one of their containers could not arrive in Montreal in time and so they had to withdraw from the competition, despite another container (from Italy) arriving in time. Fast forward to to 2019 and the container which didn’t leave Australia did leave in time to arrive for their performance this year. Stuart Bensley, who was the main designer of their shows in 2011 (Bronze Jupiter) and 2008 (Silver Jupiter) designed this show, their fourth participation, but is not in Montreal this time.

Christian said that all of the pyrotechnics are unchanged from last year, but they did take some time to refine the script with the latest version of Finale 3D, adjusting timings and angles. As this is very complex display, the Howards provided me some background information to save time in the interview:

ShareShifter Pyrotechnic Stats

• 3 x FireOne Systems
• 230 modules
• 6708 effects
• 6017 individual cues
• 166 Firing Positions
• 40’ container of specialist pyrotechnic set up equipment alone.
• 30% Parente Italy product material
• 70% Yung Feng , Vulcan and our other factory suppliers in China.

For the concept of the design, it was inspired by their previous visits to Montreal as well as work they do for arenas and stadia. The Chinese products are specially selected from criteria developed by the Howards in terms of colour, brightness and low-smoke as well as the effects themselves. Christian said they’d always wanted to do this type of design in Montreal but there is some secrecy around the concept. This is the press release they gave me:

ShapeShifter Creative Concept

Inspired by some of the obscure angles and sequences we fired from Ramp 4 in our 2011 Montreal display, we have expanded this thought process to create a unique combination of pyrotechnic symmetry, lines and movement around Lac des Dauphins. ShapeShifter was born from a remix of 360º concepts and firing techniques we have developed on projects with audience in the round over the past few years and adapted especially for the Le Rhonde site and audience.

Although Montreal is not in the round, the site does have a depth that has not really been explored previously as a firing Ramp. To stage this experiment, we are installing a new ramp of 24 positions that links Ramp 2, 3, 4 and 5 together to form a 364m circular ramp.

The music is collection of cinematic and contemporary artists we have previously worked with and arranged to provide both power and poise and allow the display to flow seamlessly around the site from scene to scene.

Our previous experience had given use us a fairly good idea of what works in the round on a site this scale and the initial design was scripted on paper as the soundtrack was mixed. Finale 3D software was then used to visualise, refine and address the effects in a manner to make installation fast and efficient before the final scripts were exported into FireOne FOUF.

Designed in late 2017 for opening in 2018 then bottled and then re-cellared^* like a good Barossa Valley Australian Red wine….finally its time to pray for a slight breeze and enjoy in the ShapeShifter Show 2019.

^*(due to dangerous goods freight company logistics issues preventing container being sent to Montreal)

The oneshot mounting system was developed with Vulcan and the foil on the tubes is specially designed so as to remain in place – reducing the cleanup post-show and making the products much more environmentally friendly for marine and aquatic environments. Together with the special firing site design, this will allow the team a new dimension in the ability to product shapes (with special modifications to slice cakes etc.). Christian noted no southern hemisphere occidental company has won the Gold Jupiter (Howard and Sons have won both bronze and silver) and so it’s clear they’re going all-out to bring the top prize home to Australia this time.

Christian said, at the end of the interview, as an invitation to the audience to attend at La Ronde “Come and see the shapes be shifted”. The weather forecast is good for this final competitor of 2019!

I met with Marc Masson, designer for BEM, who will be celebrating their 50th anniversary in 2020. This is BEM’s fourth time competing (2000, 2005 garnering the Bronze Jupiter for their display entitled Au Pied du Courant, and 2011). They were invited to perform the opening show in 2015.

Marc was very motivated by the 50th anniversary of the first footsteps on the moon, which took place at 10:51pm EDT on July 20th 1969 – which less than 30 minutes after the end of the show on Saturday! He said he was inspired by the 1960s feelings of optimism, ambition and the drive to achieve the moon landing, something that was accomplished for all of humanity. The choice of music in the soundtrack is design to reflect these higher ideals rather than politics. There was a lot of choice for music to use and he said he hoped the pieces chosen would reflect this over ideal.

The display will “start hard”, following the usual dramatic countdown performed by the inestimable Michel Lacroix. The soundtrack and design were performed in close collaboration with his brother, Paul and their uncle, Gilles, was responsible, together with the company patriarch, Bernard, with procuring products and all of the logistics. Marc said they have a very close team who are excited to work hard on this display which they hope will provide they company exposure on a broader stage. Marc noted they don’t usually compete in other competitions but were honoured to have been invited to the Montreal competition.

In terms of technical design, the display will not feature and special structures nor ramps 4 nor 5 as Marc said he wanted to focus the budget and effort on producing an excellent and entertaining display without “reinventing the wheel”. Products are sourced from several manufactures including Igual (Spain), Panzera (Italy), Luso (Portugal) and BEM’s only line of Chinese products (including some that are yet to be homologated in Canada). Fans of large calibre shells will be happy to learn the display will have plenty of 8″, 10″ and 12″ shells. The display will be fired from 122 FireOne 32-cue modules for a cue count of around 4000.

Marc said he’s hoping to win a Jupiter and wants to create emotion and frisson in the audience to celebrate humanity’s achievement of landing on the moon 50 years ago. I could certainly feel the passion Marc had for the theme driven by a lifelong love of space exploration.

I met with Stephen Pelkey, CEO of Atlas Pyrovision Productions (his daughter, Sarah, is the President), competing in Montreal for their fourth time, having won the Gold Jupiter in 2012 (ironically the same year that Grupo Luso competed last in Montreal).

Atlas is a real family company, with Stephen’s wife Barbara on the team, together with their daughter Katherine Potts. Family is key to the display, as Stephen said the theme was inspired by their five grandchildren (who call him PyroPapa) ages 10, 7, 4, 2 and 2 months and  with the eldest Lola and Carter, present in Montreal for the show.

The Spirit of the Jungle theme came together to entertain the audience, without being just a “Disney” soundtrack, though Don Dorsey, who edited the soundtrack, has done much work for Disney. Stephen said there was a lot of back-and-forth between him and Don and it took a few weeks to hone the final version of the soundtrack. For the pyrotechnical design, Matthew Shea (who had worked with Stephen on their previous two shows in Montreal) collaborated with Stephen with the aid of VisualShowDirector. Stephen said the number of cues was “correct for the display”. By using visualization software, they removed cues where they were not needed and added ones where they were, for a final count of around 6500, which is fewer than 2012, but adapted perfectly for the music.

The display will feature 21 positions on ramp 3, plus use of the access ramps, nothing on ramp 4 and five pontoons on ramp 5 (it was Atlas that initially donated these to La Ronde back in 2003). Instead of ramp 4, Atlas are using a 100′ “Maltese tower” (there have been many videos on FaceBook recently of such structures) and this will have feature around 2000 cues along (with around 1200 in “wheels”).

Products come from many suppliers including Guilliani (Italy) for 8″, 10″ and 12″ shells (as well as others) – there will be 24 300mm shells in the display. Vulcan and Sunny (Hong Kong / China) will be present for some special shells and many of the one-shots are from Igual and Panzera, but some are mounted on a special plug-n-play system from Monnetti as well as a quick-fix system from Igual. There will be candles from Panzera (Italy), close-proximity material from NextFX (USA) as well as Lidu (China) nautical cakes. Stephen said his company is moving away from Chinese products, due to tariff fears, plus some of the European products, whilst more expensive, are much faster to install (saving setup and tear-down time). Stephen said he had been very impressed with the Monnetti system on a visit to Rome and so bought many racks. Some of these racks will be fired using the Cobra system and everything else will use 500 Pyrodigital FM-16 modules.

There will be many interesting sequences in the display, with Stephen noting there will be “an ugly amount of whistles”, to the delight of my interview compatriot, Mylène Salvas. The weather forecast looks hopeful for what promises to be a complex display!

I met with Vitor Machado (conceptual design) and Pedro Gonçalves (display and logistical design) of Groupo Luso – competing for the fifth time in Montreal. Everyone still remembers their audacious debut in 2002, with a very creative display featuring a suspended ring, so there is a lot of anticipation for their participation this year. Once again, they are competing against a strong line-up and going head-to-head with both Howard (who beat them in 2008 with a Silver Jupiter) and Sons and Atlas Pyrovision Productions (who beat them to a Silver in 2012 with a Gold Jupiter).

Vitor said ideally he would have liked to compete next year, but an invitation to participate in Montreal cannot be refused. He had had several themes in mind before settling on the current theme based on TV theme music which is divided into several thematic elements and was mixed by local Montreal DJ Hools, who will be performing live in front of the audience during the display.

Technical design is interesting on several levels. Vitor explained they wanted to minimize the amount of overhead in producing the display so they design mounting systems for one-shots that are fast to assemble and have predefined angles, thus saving time. All of the products used are sourced from Groupo Luso – with 80% coming from their Portuguese producers and 20% (mainly for the finale) from their Chinese partners. There are no cakes at all used.

Ramp 2 features seven positions and ramp 3 has more than 30, though organized into two main types. There are positions also on ramp 4 and I saw some steyrFire letter racks in place too. Ramp two also features setups which contain traditional Portuguese rockets – something we haven’t seen in Montreal for a few years.

Of special interest is a large 20m diameter floating circular truss that features 24 positions with more shots than the unforgettable ring used in 2002 (see ring and dome). This will sit in the centre of the lake as close to the audience as the safety distance for the products allow and is the first time they have used such a structure in competition.

The display will be fired using 190 FireOne UltraFire modules and uses around 5500 cues, the highest count of the season so far.

Pedro told me he had used Final Fireworks 3D to take Vitor’s concept and turn it into a show design and the two clearly worked closely together with Vitor commenting that this is show designed specially for the audience (all the products used are manufactured for this display) but is also a pure Luso show.
The weather conditions promise to be perfect for their display.

I met with Andrea Parente, son of the patriarch of the family, Claudio (who is also in Montreal). Andrea’s uncle, Antonio Parente, the designer of the show (both soundtrack and pyromusical design) was in Zurich, working on a festival show spread over 58 barges. Andrea told me the Zurich show was about three times the size of Montreal in volume, but was a different type of show altogether.

Since Parente last competed in Montreal in 2003, they have been involved in some of the world’s largest displays – breaking the Guinness World Record (in association with Grucci) in Kuwait. They have also recently performed massive shows in other parts of the Arabic peninsular. Andrea said Montreal is one of their largest shows of the year, though, especially in terms of complexity.

100% of the material that will be fired on Saturday comes from Parente’s manufacturing arm. They specialize in traditional Italian cylindrical shells and have a line of renowned single-shot devices too. It was difficult to get too many statistics from Andrea, as he’s not the designer, but he did confirm there will be some 300mm shells in the show and it will be fired with a mix of the new FireMaster V and older FireMaster III wireless firing system with a total of 163 24-cue modules, for a total shot count of around 3900. The used their own software together with Finale Fireworks to design and visualize their display.

On the technical side, ramp 3 will have 13 positions and 9 pontoons, forming ramp 5, will be formed into a V with the apex towards the audience. Ramp 4 will not be used. Andrea noted that they are known for their traditional style of show design, but the new FireMaster V modules allow for more complex choreography than was previously possible. That said, there will be no special structures used. In terms of the soundtrack, he said he’s a big rock-n-roll fan and is particularly looking forward to the Led Zeppelin Stairway to Heaven track, but noted there is an interesting mix of styles in the display with some surprises for the audience!