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!
