I met with Johan Holländer who is representing Finland for the first time with his company Joho Pyro. Johan said he had founded the company around 2003, selling consumer fireworks (like many pyros, he had had a fascination with all things pyrotechnic since childhood) and then obtained his professional licence around the same time so he could also do displays. His company is based in the region of Åland, which is an island in archipelago between Finland and Sweden.
Since then, his company has competed in many different competitions in Europe, garnering the Bronze and Silver prize at Pyronale in Berlin, as well as the public prize plus competing in Cannes and winning the Vestale d’Argent as well as the Prix du Public. After this, Johan was contacted and told he would be ready to compete in Montreal. He said he has read every report and article on this website and used this information as a reference for what works or doesn’t work in the competition, referring to your author as The Maestro! He further commented that this website serves as an invaluable reference for everyone in the industry who wants to compete at the greatest fireworks competition there is. Previous competition shows in Cannes and DaNang were not as complex as this show, the most complex he’s ever worked on. Johan said he was humble but would also be going for Gold. With such a complex show, he brought a large crew in order to be able to complete the setup in time and said he had avoided design elements that would be too time-consuming (so the display is eschewing ramp 4, for example).
With Montreal in mind for many many years, Johan has been stockpiling interesting products, ready for this display – he said some shells were up to 20 years old. These include products from Yung Feng and Zaragozana that are simply not available anymore. The display will use an absolute panoply of products from all over the world, including Europla and Ricasa (Spain), Panzera, Parente, Vaccalluzzo, Santa Chiara (Italy), Hamex (Slovenia), San Tai (Taiwan), Zink (Germany), Yung Feng (Taiwan) as well as JoHo’s own label Chinese products! Johan said he will be using many different special effects, including all kinds of whistles, howlers, screamers and hummers. Even more impressive, Johan said he will not use the same shell effect in more than one segment of the show. Ramp 5 will be used and this is not preventing the use of nautical shells and effects.
He said his design style is on the traditional side, trying to avoid appearing too robotic with too many one-shots (of which there are around 1700) and he avoids any cake larger than a single slice, saying their intensity is too unpredictable. Johan said the theme was tough and took months of work to whittle down around 50 tracks to the approximately 9 they are using. The soundtrack was mixed by Swedish crew-member Martin Igelström, who is a music producer for the The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. The theme is a twist on a rock-n-roll soundtrack with every song being a cover version. The theme is divided into three thematic parts with special effects in between each … and a few surprises along the way. Johan said it’s important for him to do a theme which will wow the audience as well as produce some tears along the way!
A final note on the technical side, the show will feature 5600 cues, fired using FireOne and for large shell aficionados will be a delight, with fifty large-calibre shells and a tally of 9 300mm shells – the largest such inventory in the competition this year. Johan said this is a “Can’t miss” show for the audience to come to La Ronde and I could feel the passion in his every word. Let’s hope the weather cooperates!