Trickbox records spectacular Eden Sessions concerts for BBC Four and BBC iPlayer

Last summer, Eden Sessions selected Trickbox TV to provide a range of outside broadcast services for its spectacular live music events. Based at the famous Eden Project site in Cornwall, UK, the series of one-day concerts, which take place in June and July, feature world-class artists.

Eden Sessions was the brain child of John Empson, who is Eden’s Musical Director. He first came to the site in early 2000, when working for his own record label, and quickly realised that it would be an incredible place for live music. The first concert took place in the summer of 2002, and over the last 16 years, Eden has played host to huge names including: Pulp, Kasabian, Oasis, Muse, Calvin Harris, Basement Jaxx, Elton John, Lionel Richie, Blondie, Rufus Wainwright, Jack Johnson, Lily Allen, Jessie J, Amy Winehouse, Dizzy Rascal and Plan B and across multiple genres such as rock, pop, grime, blues, dance and electronic.

Eden Sessions Film Producer, Anna Meneer says, “Having a wide variety of genres has huge influence on the audience because the fans are completely different for every type of artist. We love the fact that we can bring renowned artists to Cornwall and give people from every demographic the opportunity to see bands covering multiple styles.”

Eden’s stunning and unique Sessions make these events very different from a lot of classic music venues. Anna explains, “This variety is the premise of Eden Sessions, but it’s also great that visitors pick up on Eden Project’s conservational message because they have the opportunity to walk around the site and go into all of the biomes. The Eden mission is to connect people with each other and the natural world whilst looking at ways we can work together for a better future. It’s almost impossible to come to Eden without picking that up.”

2017 was the first year that Trickbox had been involved with the outside broadcast of Eden Sessions, recording the Van Morrison, Madness and Bastille gigs. The partnership came about after Trickbox worked with Eden Sessions Director, Morgan Lowndes on Channel Four’s Deal or No Deal show. Trickbox provided a multi-camera setup, including live vision mixing with talkback, tally lights and a 32-foot track, which ran across the front of the stage. The Trickbox kit was installed onsite and remained at the location for the four-week duration of live shows.

Concerts of this scale call for a huge amount of pre-planning. Anna says, “Last year we had six camera positions, which we discussed with the band manager on the day. Obviously different artists have different requests so that can change a bit but generally we have cameras in the pit, stage right, stage left, front-of-house, top-shot and up-stage. This last position is a lovely shot for us, it’s behind the band and shows them set against the audience. The top-shot is also spectacular, it’s the wide shot that shows the whole setting of the stage and the beautifully lit up biomes.”

Eden Sessions began recording the shows in 2009, starting with a couple of broadcasts on MTV. Then in 2012, they started their own YouTube channel, Eden Sessions TV, which has had over 10 million views. Anna says, “Six thousand people get to come and see the shows live at Eden, but we wanted to take that to a much bigger audience. In 2015 we developed a relationship with the BBC beginning with an Elton John show for BBC iPlayer and in 2016, we continued this partnership by recording Lionel Richie and Tom Jones for BBC iPlayer. Those three shows are among the highest viewed music programmes on BBC iPlayer ever.”

Last year, Eden Sessions’ relationship with the BBC developed further. They now have a collaboration with BBC Music, which has seen epic performances by Madness, Van Morrison and Bastille recorded by Trickbox at last year’s Eden Sessions, shown under the BBC Music “Live at Eden” banner on both BBC4 and BBC iPlayer.

Anna concludes, “We really enjoyed working with Trickbox. Their professionalism and expertise helped us to deliver three great shows.”

Eden Sessions will kick off again in June 2018 with major artists already confirmed including: Gary Barlow, Massive Attack, Jack Johnson and Bjork.