Joes
Lights were resident light show at the now liquidated Rainbow Theatre
in London. Before that they were resident light show at the Fillmore East
during the three years that
Bill Graham ran it as a rock music centre on
New Yorks Lower East Side.
They were called
The Joshua Light Show until Joshua White , one of
the originators, left them two years ago. The group, despite the name change,
were present form the opening to the closing of the Fillmore and worked
with most of the top English and American Bands , special favourites being
the Allman Brothers, Leon Russell and
The Grateful Dead.
In 1967 Joshua
White, Thomas Shoesmith and
Bill Schwarzbach started a light company
called Sensefex. At the end of the year it lost money and collapsed, but
the three stayed together to create a new light show. In February
1968 , when the Fillmore opened the three were joined by Cecily
Hoyt ,an art student and sculptress and a couple called Jane and
Kenny , who left to settle down and raise children. Their place was filled
by Alan Arkush , who now directs the overall
lighting production. Alan graduated form the New York Film school and won
second prize at an international student film festival with the movie he
made at the Fillmore.
The present company consists of
Cecily Hoyt ,Thomas Shoesmith and Alan Arkush, of the original Fillmore
team . Kim Legge, who is English and joined
them at the Rainbow and Ben Haller , blacksmith
, and lighting wizard who joined the company in March last year .
He is now on tour with the Grateful Dead as accomplice to
Candace Brightman, their own lighting expert.
