I'm currently sitting in the final day of tech rehearsals for Richard III. I must say it 's really nice to work in a theater with Wi-Fi. It's a HUGE asset when you're asked to hurry up and wait, which is something us music/sound folks do a lot during tech. Like now...
This gives me a chance to blog a bit about approaching Richard III from a sound/music perspective. This production is different than a "classic" mounting in many, many ways. No horses in this one. Tanks yes. Horses no. I've taken to calling this one Richard III: Beyond Thunderdome. It's a very contemporary, Burton-esque, Halloweeney setting for this play and thus, from a sound/music perspective, it becomes a challenge to keep melody AWAY from the palette.
At first, our director imagined more soundscape than score for this piece. Being as I'm new to this company/director, I decided to give the director what he wished with only minimal alteration. This is always the best strategy when starting a possible new long term collaboration with a director. Give them what they ask for, even though you imagine it could be much more, and then slowly build on it until it becomes their idea to trust your instincts and let you take it where you want it. It sounds very manipulative, and I suppose it is, but if you look at it another way, I am just trying to relate wholeheartedly to the antagonist in our production!
Anyhow, sitting here, watching this production for the 15th time or so, I think I'm finally starting to understand this play. By far, the hardest thing Shakespeare has done here is introduce SO many characters, all tangled in a web of relationships that are sometimes so confusing, that my sound engineer Amanda and I oftentimes stop our technical work for short asides when either of us realize how these relationships have worked to serve the dramatic function. Who is who's son, cousin, grandmother, aunt, wife or niece ESPECIALLY when we have a smaller cast and almost every actor is doubling roles can get very confusing, and I've seen this show 15 times. Our opening night audience has their work cut out for them.
The more I live with it though, and this is true for almost every show, the more I understand it and grow to love what the author has done. My last two shows, Streetcar and this, have both been road-tested classic shows of which I'm so happy to have a working knowledge.
I approached this soundscape/score in the same way I would if we were doing this production in the classic style. Characters have their own instruments... Here's a run down
Once I had these textures matched up, it became more a matter of either musically following or foreshadowing the scenes. We also have created our own musical term for this production called a punch of evil, or a POE. These come at opportune times throughout the show as accents or at times when a characters well laid plans take a detrimental blow.
GA Shakespeare does not have a whole lot of money for sound equipment and has not been able to upgrade it's system in many years, so for this production we rented a sub (a large speaker for LOW frequencies) which we placed directly upstage center, under the set, as well as four extra speakers, two for the localized onstage effects (upstage right/left) and two for fills on the proscenium.
Diagram:
This is also the first show I used QLab for. We had one huge hiccup with the program that almost brought the design to a screeching halt, but once we updated the software and kept numerous backups we ended up being alright, and tracing the problem to a corrupted plug-in.
I've worked professionally with three sound design programs at this point. SFX, QManager, and now QLab. Each of these programs is better and more managable than the last.
I'm now a firm believer in the magic and wonder of QLab. Maybe it's because it runs on a Mac, but more so because of it's drag and drop capabilities and it's ease of use. I'm hoping, at some point, to buy a mac mini and put together a dedicated Qlab system of my own that I can use in future productions.
One last thing that I'll detail here and then I'd better get back to finessing my cues.
I've found a few strategies have emerged in the creation of a sound design that have stayed pretty rock solid for me over the years, the first of which is the creation of a demo. Here's my demo for Richard III.
This demo is based on the ideas of our director for sound/style he'd like to achieve. I added to this my own take on rhythms and melodic instrumentation. Once he okayed this demo I was off to the races. There are so many layers in this piece that I can use for other parts of the show. Some transitions are very short, so only the oboe line will suffice. Likewise, the waterphone that I use throughout the demo ended up being used very heavily in the production.
What happens to the demo after it is composed and approved? It becomes our Curtain Call cue!
In this case, it also become our end of Act music as well.
Here's one last piece, just for kicks. It's the 2.5 minute piece I wrote for the coronation sequence at the beginning of act 4.
I should have a dedicated page for this production up in the next week, until then I'll be using this blog to catalog some sonic ideas.
Here's the first one. It's an amalgamation of sounds/music that will probably end up as a curtain call cue, but for now might show some direction of how I'm approaching this design.
We've been receiving some great reviews for our work on this production as of late. A few of them even mention the music and sound design, which, IMHO doesn't happen nearly enough :)
Just so I can stay organized when I'm able at the end of next month to turn the music I wrote for this show into a package to license to other theater companies, here are a few links and quotes
9/18/07 "It's all the more remarkable, then, that the New Repertory Theatre's Rick Lombardo has staged a "Streetcar" that feels deeply true to the spirit of Tennessee Williams and at the same time true to itself. Working on a set by Janie E. Howland that's just what a Williams set should be - dingily realistic in its details, dreamily abstract in its structure - and underscored by Haddon Kime's mournful streetcar moans and saxophone wails, Lombardo's four main actors and their supporting players draw us irresistibly into Williams's shattered, shattering world." READ THE ENTIRE REVIEW HERE
9/18/07 "The New Rep revival of Streetcar is really very good, with a period feel, able acting, and the right sense of enervation punctuated by explosion. Set designer Janie E. Howland's squalid two-room apartment sandwiched into a nest of neon signs, a John Malinowski lighting design that splashes the characters' interaction with rhythmic blinks of red, and Haddon Kime's sound design of raw jazz mixed into city noise all add to a sense of carnal, quarrelsome private lives lived in public. Costume designer Frances Nelson McSherry has come up with some jaunty-looking open shirts over underwear for the men; the women have a mix of outfits that run from period chic to Amanda Wingfield's antiquated finery. And as Blanche enacts her passion, the supporting cast promenades and scuffles before and over the proceedings, hawking roasted corn, or rolling a john, as if performing a dance to Kime's music". READ THE ENTIRE REVIEW HERE
I've been back in Atlanta only a few days now after spending the better portion of this month in Boston working with Rick Lombardo and New Rep on "A Streetcar Named Desire."
This is the first show I've ever designed using Q Manager software. It took some getting used to. Let there be no doubt about it, Tennessee knew what he wanted and wrote almost every sound cue into the script. It's a very large sounding production when done correctly.
Luckily when I got the call to design this show I already had plans to go through NOLA on the way back from Texas (see previous VIDEO post.) Thus, I was able with the help of my AMAZING little H4 Zoom Digital Recorder to capture a plethora of actual New Orleans streetcars jangling up and down Canal and St. Charles Streets.
Here's one now:
Upon my return to Atlanta I set about writing some sultry brass music and some dixieland jazz. I hired the amazing talents of Sam Skelton and Mike Barry to play for me here's a little sample of what I came up with for the show:
I'll be writing more about this on a future webpage in the theater section, but for now if you're in Boston or will be there int he next month or so, checkout this amazing production at New Rep!
In a week I'll be heading on back to Boston to help design the 9th Annual Boston Theater Marathon. Again 50 10 minute shows in one 10 hour stretch!
This is my favorite reoccurring theatrical event! I really hope everyone reading this can come out and have a great time with us. You'll also be supporting a charity or two!
While in NYC this past week I had the chance to see a few shows. My favorite of these is "Spring Awakening." I've been listening to the CD non-stop ever since. Thanks to my buddy Jason Grossman for his enthusiastic review!
Spring Awakening is set in 19th century Germany, but the only design element to reflect that is the costumes the actors wear. Everything else, lighting design, scenic design, choreography, and original music are decidely contemporary. The plot concerns the sexual awakening of a handful of white boarding school classmates, which I suppose is also decidely contemporary and probably will be for many years to come. The songs in this show are never sung from one character to another, but rather exist only in a characters head. This convention is one of the most fascinating to me in the show as it opens up so many possibilities for the composer.
The creators deal with sex in a very frank and open way. So much so that it even made me feel a bit awkward. They run the whole gamut. Teenage pregnancy, masturbation, homosexuality, sexual abuse, dominance and subserviance and seemingly everything in between... So if you go see it, and hopefully you will, be ready for it. They pull no punches. Spring Awakening is my favorite Broadway musical experience since Rent. It's innovative, empowering, and takes risks. The first act is some of the best musical theater I've ever seen. The second act, though well wrought is also forced at points into a plot structure that has to get from point A to point B in X amount of time...Unless you cut out a character or a major plot point it's hard to imagine doing anything different, but still it's a bit dissapointing after the stellar first act.
Still, this show is WELL WORTH THE TICKET PRICE! Here's a music video of one of my favorite songs from the show, "The Bitch of Living."
I've just returned to Atlanta from my whirlwind trip to Boston and NYC. I had an amazing time, and I'll review a few of the productions I saw on this blog later this week, but right now I'd love to sum up the experience of Theresa at Home!
The music I wrote for this show is your basic run of the mill doo-wop. Since Theresa is an ex novice nun who, in the script, has a propensity for playing Schubert's Ave Maria when she gets blue, I decided to take Mr. Schuberts harmonic structure and change the lyrics a bit. Here's an example: Theresa at Home - Ave Theresa
I think it's safe to say that we had a great time over tech week for this show. Under the amazing direction of Vinnie Murphy we all put our heads and hearts together and came up with a good, if not completely finished, show. The character of Theresa reminds me a bit of my wife Katie, a loving soul with a talent for listening. I haven't fallen this hard for a fictional character in quite some time. Jessica Rabbit might have been the last one... Stacy Fisher, the actress who portrays Theresa is doing an amazing job in the role as well, which made my work that much easier!
Here's another cue from the show. The end of Act One. It's a scene in which Theresa finds herself unable to pray the way she used to in the convent even though she puts up a good fight to do so. Stacy is brillant in this scene I wish I had some video to show, but the actors union nixed that one right quick. Still, here's the cue, and below it, some stills from the show with an interview from Janet Kenney our playwright... Theresa at Home - End of Act One
Theresa at Home - Interview with Janet Kenney
The craziest thing I've had to deal with soundwise in a long time happened during this show. I had originally designed the show for two Minidisc decks... Old school, if there ever was such a thing. Anyhow, these decks were on their last legs. One ended up ERASING 20 or so cues one morning. So BPT ended up purchasing a new laptop with SFX on it. I hate SFX, but it gets the job done. Completely NON intuitive software. Ugly UI and an all around crappy Windoze program, except that it really does control theater sound pretty well... So I ended up having to rebuild the entire show. 4 solid days of work, in less than 3 hours during the night of our final dress. Good times! Luckily our lighting designer had a friend who came in and helped me out. Thanks Matt!
Anyhow, I'm hoping to put together a podcast episode this week about Theresa. Should be fun. I promise lots of stuff though, so we'll just have to see if I come through or not. I had a GREAT time on this show and I also learned about some new show control software for the MAC!!!! It's called QLab. Check it out, it might be just what I've always wanted!
I'm currently sitting in the final day of tech rehearsals for Richard III. I must say it 's really nice to work in a theater with Wi-Fi. It's a HUGE asset when you're asked to hurry up and wait, which is something us music/sound folks do a lot during tech. Like now...
