John Sheeran
Here Ed is doing a sound check in the Royal Albert Hall in 2014, a couple of hours before performing in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust. Alongside him is his highly experienced guitar tech, Trevor Dawkins, who, like many of Ed’s crew, has been with him for many years. Ed has his guitars specially tuned for each song, so Trev has a rack of them tuned and ready immediately behind stage. For every gig there is a non-stop Ed–Trev relay of guitars, and there is often the need to replace a guitar with broken strings, which is done so smoothly by Trev that Ed never has to interrupt his flow.
— ROYAL ALBERT HALL, LONDON, 24 MARCH 2014 —
Whenever people hear that I work with Ed Sheeran, there is always that split second when they stop breathing, their eyes widen and occasionally the jaw drops. And I don’t really get it. I’m like a primate in that weird celebrity culture world I’m often dropped in. I’m just completely oblivious to it all, so getting such a reaction from people is always a strange experience. On top of that, I find the fascination people have with celebrities troubling.
I remember a scary experience during a shoot with One Direction in Dallas. During their gig the boys had stopped their show in front of 20,000 people and introduced me onstage so I could get a posed group shot mid-concert. Later in the show the boys appeared on a smaller stage in the middle of the venue. They were transported there via a secret tunnel, but I had to make my way through the crowd. So, quite innocently, I started walking into the crowd and one girl screamed, “You’re One Direction’s photographer!” And literally in a matter of seconds there were hundreds of girls on top of me all trying to get a selfie with me, and I have never felt so scared in my life. If it hadn’t been for Harry’s security guy who came to my rescue, I probably would have suffocated right there that day. What a selfie that would have made, huh?
What people tend to forget is that this is my job and, for what it is worth, it’s just a regular job to me. I have a job to do and I will always try to do it to the best of my abilities, whether it’s a portrait of the guy next door or shooting the world’s biggest chart-topping sensations. Same difference to me. But the general public is blinded by the magical bubble musicians and bands are shrouded in.
Don’t get me wrong, I am appreciative for the opportunities I get and one of my favourite parts to my job is being one of the in-house photographers at the Royal Albert Hall. This concert hall was opened by Queen Victoria in 1871 and it’s probably one of the most famous venues in the world. If you wander around the corridors, you’ll see framed prints of photos taken at the hall of the world’s biggest all-time legends. Royalty witnessed shows there . . . Nelson Mandela . . . Princess Diana as well. Frank Sinatra sang there. Muhammad Ali boxed there. You get the idea. The Albert Hall has a huge archive documenting as much of its history as possible, and that’s why I regularly get hired to shoot their shows. It is probably my favourite venue in the whole wide world to shoot at.
John Sheeran
Ed bought his first electric guitar wah-wah pedal with the proceeds from busking for a day in Galway, Ireland, aged 13. He later progressed to a Boss loop station, which, in the absence of a band, he used to record and layer multiple sounds live on stage. The more complex his layering became, the greater the need for something more multifaceted. This photograph shows Ed’s use of the Chewie Monsta, a unique loop station that was custom-built for his sound. It enables him to create a sophisticated layered mix of guitar, vocal and percussive sounds.
One of the Albert Hall’s recurring major events is the annual Teenage Cancer Trust charity concert series. On 24 March 2014 I was asked to cover Ed’s debut show there. Debuts are something the Albert Hall is always eager to document, so I was happy to oblige. As I arrived at the stage door, it was immediately obvious that Ed was in the building. There was a long string of girls huddled on the pavement all around the building, hours before the doors were to open. Quite an unusual sight there in my experience.
The people running the Royal Albert Hall always like to get as much as they can get from the event, and thanks to my relationship with Ed and his entourage I had access to shoot the sound check, some behind-the-scenes stuff, and the meet and greet. Mark Friend, Ed’s tour manager, had also arranged with Ed that I could have a quick casual session in his dressing room after the meet and greet. It was bound to be an exciting day for me and my little ol’ camera.
Downstairs in the backstage area, I could hear Ed playing. I walked onstage and saw Ed and his loyal guitar tech, Trevor, sound-checking. It’s usually quite dark during the sound check. Everybody is doing their own thing; it usually isn’t anything like what you see later in the evening. Quite often the light engineer is still testing and fine-tuning the lights, and not necessarily shining them on Ed. A couple of modest lights were lit to enable Ed to find his way to his gear, and I made full use of them. As I said before, work with what you get, right?
Backstage, the Teenage Cancer Trust team was busy escorting young people who were fighting cancer into the green room where the meet and greet would take place. There were snacks and beverages spread out on the tables. At the back of the room there was a branding board where Ed would be meeting his fans. The Teenage Cancer Trust’s patron, Roger Daltrey of classic rock band The Who, walked in to check on the fans. Daltrey is the driving force at the annual Royal Albert Hall shows, bringing together top artists and comedians from around the world and raising millions to help support young people with cancer. Since 2000, and at the time of printing, the concerts at the Royal Albert Hall have raised over £24 million ($34 million).
The young people were all eagerly awaiting Ed’s arrival. As soon as he walked in, they flocked around him and he patiently took the time to meet each one of them and happily posed for the obligatory selfies. His friend Passenger, who was the support act that night, also joined the meet and greet. After the meet and greet the fans were escorted out of the green room and Ed turned his attention to the journalists for the interviews.
Shortly after, I popped into Ed’s dressing room with my camera. He looked up and said, “All right, where do you want me?” I told Ed to make himself comfortable. He looked up at me and said, “I feel most comfortable when I’m holding my guitar.” “Then you must hold your guitar,” I replied. It felt quaintly familiar how just by holding his guitar he would feel so much more comfortable, because I too only feel comfortable when I am hiding behind my camera. I pointed out to Ed that we were odd, both feeling so much more comfortable hiding behind our instruments, and he smiled and replied, “We understand each other.” There’s a mutual respect for each other’s boundaries, and that will always deliver the best results. A photographer doesn’t really belong in the artist’s space, whether that be in their dressing room or onstage. But sometimes the job requires you to pop into their space to get the shot, and I always try to do this with humility and without disturbing or changing that space too much. I try to be mindful of the privilege I have and not to overstep boundaries.
There’s always a certain easiness shooting Ed. We don’t talk much. I let him get on with what he’s doing and he lets me get on with what I am doing. I like it just like that. It took me no more than ten minutes in his dressing room to get exactly what I needed. Just me and Ed, just shooting him in his natural surroundings, with the ambient light available. When I had finished shooting we hugged, I thanked him, and I left.
As I walked out of the dressing room I bumped into Ed’s parents, John and Imogen. It had been six or so years since we last met, back when Ed was working hard in small clubs. It was really nice to reconnect with them. We had a little chat and reminisced about where we had first met and how things had evolved since then. We actually talked about jewellery, too, as I just love Imogen’s designs. We hugged and promised to stay in touch.
Christie Goodwin
During a sound check there usually isn’t a lot of light available, but that never stops me from capturing those moments. This picture taken at the Royal Albert Hall shows exactly how dark it can be. You can see the light source, which reflects a modest amount of light onto Ed and his guitar. Especially in this shot you can feel the intense relationship between Ed and his instrument. I love these kinds of moments, as they reflect perfectly what a sound check is all about.
Christie Goodwin
This is one of those moments that I call “lucky shots”. This was at the end of Ed’s sound check at the Royal Albert Hall and people were packing things up. I was behind the screens walking off stage when I noticed a very poised Ed standing there looking into the darkness and I knew I had no time to waste. It’s one of those moments that probably lasts two seconds and then the moment is gone. I had no time to run in front of the screen, so I chose to capture it through the screens. You will notice the lines from the screen throughout the picture. Still, I got the moment and that is all that matters.
John Sheeran
This is a great shot of two close friends, Passenger (Michael Rosenberg) and Ed. They first met playing a tiny gig for 20 people in the basement of the CB2 Bistro in Cambridge, UK, when no one in the music industry was showing any interest in their work. You can see the delight on their faces as, just a few years later, they are about to go on stage at the Royal Albert Hall, London. Passenger and Ed started out as buskers and have both since toured the world and won Ivor Novello Awards for their songwriting.
Ed’s debut performance at the Albert Hall that night was electric. Shooting Ed at “my” hall was all the more special. Ed just raised the royal roof that night, so to speak. He had the crowd eating out of his hand. I snapped myself silly and raced all over the place, from the organ to the circle level, all the way to the top of the hall and back.
Just as I discreetly crept on the stage and navigated myself behind the stage decor, Ed launched into one of his biggest hits, “The A Team”, his final song of the night. He encouraged his crowd to use their phone lights to create a magical atmosphere in the hall.
I couldn’t believe my luck. I was in the right place at the right time. I placed myself between two light towers and waited for my moment. Ed got up on a stage monitor and commanded the crowd like a maestro directing a symphony. When the chorus kicked in, the crowd sang along, almost like it was a hymn, while thousands of tiny stars waved to the rhythm of the music. That was the moment I had been waiting for. I clicked a couple of frames and hoped for the best, because as soon as he jumped off the monitor the moment was gone. It can be tricky to capture the difference between the subject bathing in strong stage light up front, against a darkened hall in the background with only twinkling phone lights as a light source. It’s one of those shots where you don’t really get a second chance, and your camera settings have to be perfectly set in advance of what you hope will happen. But somehow, I knew I got it. After two exhilarating fun-filled hours I walked into the soft spring evening with way too many pictures on my memory cards, as per usual. Shooting Ed’s debut at the Albert Hall was a moment where the stars aligned for me, the perfect act in the perfect house with the perfect crowd. It just doesn’t get any better than that. A couple of days later I got a lovely email from Ed’s parents, which said: “Thank you for capturing Edward just like we know him.” And that was just the cherry on top.
John Sheeran
Ed has given hundreds of interviews throughout his career. Here he is at the Royal Albert Hall, before his performance for the Teenage Cancer Trust in 2014. He has always been at ease in front of the camera, being open, honest and positive, and caring little about the way he looks.
John Sheeran
Ed is putting his forefinger to his lips, hushing the audience at the Royal Albert Hall in preparation for singing a cappella (without any amplification, or instrumental or vocal support). I have even experienced him doing this at Madison Square Garden, in New York City, which has something like three or four times the capacity of the Albert Hall. It takes a lot of courage to attempt such a feat, but Ed thrives on challenges. In the following photo, Ed gives it his all. It shows the physical strain: stripped of its context, it could be read as a primal scream of pain.
John Sheeran
This is another of my favourite photos of Ed. Like so many of Christie’s photos, it looks as though it must have been posed in a photographic studio, and yet it is a moment onstage captured in the heat of a performance that she makes arrestingly permanent. Christie knows instinctively where to place herself and what angles and compositions will work best. Here the spotlight that is trained on Ed throughout the performance is like a ghostly presence. It’s as if its light draws the outline of Ed’s figure and moulds his form.
John Sheeran
Here Ed is caught in a moment of musical ecstasy. This is a superb photo – a classic.
Christie Goodwin
This Royal Albert Hall shot is one of those moments which can often be a gamble to get it right. You have to find the right settings so the subject up front is not over-lit and the crowd in the background isn’t too dark. You don’t have control over the lights held up by the crowd either. I’ve shot shows when the lights were not equally balanced, or a large part of the crowd didn’t put on their lights, and that just ruins the effect. In this shot, the lights are evenly balanced and I had my settings just right, which makes this shot a success.
John Sheeran
I first took Ed to the Royal Albert Hall in 2004 when he was 13 to see Eric Clapton. We managed to get seats close to the stage and Ed was completely mesmerized by the performance, staring intently at Clapton’s acoustic and electric guitar playing to learn as much as he could. It was a hugely influential experience for him. Ed supports various children’s and teenage cancer and hospice charities, so when the Teenage Cancer Trust asked him to perform for them at the Albert Hall in 2014, he jumped at the opportunity. My wife Imogen and I went to the gig, visiting him in his dressing room a couple of hours before he went onstage. But we didn’t stay long as there was a queue outside his door of teenagers with cancer, some in wheelchairs, accompanied by close family members and friends. Ed had agreed to see all the families one by one for a chat and photos. Then with only a brief break to get ready, he appeared onstage to an incredible roar from the audience. It was deeply moving. These photos perfectly capture the contrast that night between his explosive, raw energy and his hushed, more contemplative side. The whole event was like some sort of triumph or celebration of the human spirit in the face of adversity. It was unforgettable.