BÜTZ & BEATS 2026 Langenfeld – Stage, Lighting, Sound & Video Technology

01. The Challenge

On 18 July 2026, the Freizeitpark in Langenfeld turned into the region's biggest Kölsch party: at the BÜTZ & BEATS Festival of the Festkomitee Langenfelder Karneval e.V., around 3,000 visitors celebrated eleven hours of carnival in high summer – with Miljö, Räuber, Planschemalöör, Marita Köllner, King Loui, Lupo, Funky Marys and Eldorado on stage.

Despite its name, the Freizeitpark is a city park: lots of green, lots of space – and no event infrastructure at all. For an open air of this size everything had to be built from scratch, and across long distances: the sound system had to carry all the way to the rear lawn, while stage, front-of-house and the additional speaker positions were far apart – with correspondingly long cable runs across the audience areas.

The schedule was tight: two build days on Thursday and Friday, the show on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., dismantling on Sunday.

02. Our Solution

photon took on the complete technical production of the festival – from planning to logistics, everything from a single source.

At its core was a stage of around 15 × 12 metres with a height of 9 metres. Into its rigging we hung an 8 × 4.5 metre LED wall – deliberately set forward so that a backstage area for the artists was created behind it.

The lighting was designed for the transition from a bright summer afternoon into the evening: it had to work in daylight and carry the show late at night. The sound system covered not only the area in front of the stage but, via additional speaker positions, also the rear areas and the lawn – so the programme reached every corner of the grounds.

The distances on site meant long runs for power and signal. We provided the cable routes and secured them with around 100 cable bridges, so the paths remained clear and safe for the audience throughout. The power supply for the stalls was handled by the local electrician. A separate sub-project was the platform for spectators with disabilities, for which we built a raised platform with an unobstructed view of the stage.

03. The Result

After two build days, the complete festival production was in place on time – the show ran for over eleven hours until 10 p.m., and on Sunday the grounds were clear again.

For one day, a city park without any fixed infrastructure became a fully fledged festival site for around 3,000 guests, accessible all the way to its own platform. The fact that BÜTZ & BEATS returns to Langenfeld on 17 July 2027 is the best confirmation of that.