ABBA VOYAGE
Ludvig Andersson, Producer
Baillie Walsh, Director
Svana Gisla, Producer
“Jaw-dropping,” (The Guardian), “Out of this world” (The Times), “Epic” (NME), “Needs to be seen to be believed” (BBC). That’s a selection of English press reviews of ABBA Voyage, the groundbreaking hologram show taking place inside a purpose-built, 3,000-capacity venue in London.
The Evening Standard went as far as calling it “the future of live music” and even legendary UK agent John Giddings, who swears the live experience with real people on stage isn’t replaceable, was impressed. “I thought it was a real bloke on stage at one point, until I realized how young he looked,” Giddings said.
The team around producers Ludvig Andersson, Svana Gisla and director Baillie Walsh used cutting-edge technology to display photorealistic avatars of ABBA of yesteryear on stage, backed by a live band for a live audience. The producers emphasize it’s not about the tech. “It’s all about music and emotion and love and soul. It’s about the experience, not the vehicle to deliver that experience. This show was never about technology, even though we’re using it to an extent that no one ever has before. But the truth is, the better we use that technology, the less that technology matters,” Andersson said.
“No one’s gonna stand there for an hour and a half and say, ‘Oh, my God, these avatars are amazing,’ right?. What they want is a great show. It’s irrelevant whether they’re avatars or humans, we must facilitate the same thing, which is a very emotional show that people are going to dance, sing and cry to.
“They’re going to forget about the avatars. When I watch ‘Star Wars,’ or any film that’s got a lot of post-production, I’m not interested in the post-production, I’m interested in the story and the characters.”
Andersson said, “This is what ABBA wants to do, they are completely involved in the production. This is ABBA’s concert in 2022. This is ABBA now. It’s not a time capsule, it’s not a karaoke show. This is what happens when you ask ABBA what they want to do. They said, ‘We want to do this, we want to do the most unheard-of, most enormous production in the history of music performance.’”
