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Mixing: Band Next

In my last blog, I started talking about how you can approach mixing when you’re just getting started. If you haven’t read it, here’s the cliff notes version: vocals are your first priority. Make sure you get the lines out (especially in tech), no matter how many faders you need up at the beginning. Then you can work towards line-by-line mixing from there.

Once you’re comfortable enough with the vocals and can start paying attention to other things, what’s next? If it’s a musical, the answer’s easy: the music.

The band is more self-sufficient than the vocals. They’ll do some dynamics on their own, so they can take care of themselves to a point while you’re settling in with the vocals. For the things they don’t do on their own, you’ll tend to notice and take care of them naturally. If the music is too loud and it’s hard to hear what the actors are saying, you pull it back. If we’re heading into a song, bring them back up to support the singing. All of that is a good start, but at this point, those moves are reactive as you notice something and adjust to compensate. Once you can give more attention to what’s really happening in the music, you can anticipate and be proactive.

There’s some work you can do even before you get into the theatre. If I’m working on a show that already has a cast album I’ll do what I call a Music Map. I’ll go through each song and write down which section or instrument has the melody or is featured. Even if the recording isn’t the exact version I’m going to do, it gets me in the ballpark. It could be just the sections (brass, strings, percussion, etc), or even a best guess. So what if I mark down that it’s a trumpet that has a solo and it ends up being a French horn? It’s paperwork that’s only for me, so it doesn’t have to be perfect. More than anything it gets me to put a critical ear to the show a few times so I’m more familiar with the music and feel more prepared going into tech.

This was one that I did for Les Mis: it’s a quick jot of “Valjean’s Soliloquy” with the part of the song (usually by the lyric), which section has the focus if I picked out a specific instrument and anything else I noticed like supporting instruments. You can see that it’s a rough sketch, not the end product. There are things like the note of “Keys?” towards the end, which meant I wasn’t sure if it was an acoustic instrument or a keyboard patch. Again, you’ll find out for sure once you get the musicians in the space, but this gives you a reference if you feel like you’re missing something.

Every song has a shape to it. Some get progressively louder, building to a big musical moment at the end, other times it’s a quiet ballad that has some builds but may stay pretty quiet. Others might be a mix or jump from singing into dialogue and back again, going up and down fairly drastically in volume. As the mixer, you help maintain that shape to get the right emotional build. This typically happens in one of two ways: supporting or managing.

When you’re supporting the band your faders move the same way as the dynamics. So you’re riding the fader up with the big crescendo to give the moment a little more punch, or as the music fades you’re bringing it back at the board so they settle where you need it in time to make a pocket for the vocals. This is how you usually treat slow songs (love ballads, dramatic solos) and shows that have a larger, traditional orchestra. Acoustic instruments tend to use more dynamic control, so you’re helping them along.

On the flip side, when you’re managing, that means you’re moving in the opposite direction of what the dynamics are doing. Say there’s a moment where it feels like it should get bigger musically, but logistically what’s happening is only part of the pit was playing at the beginning and when the music feels like it’s going to bump up a notch, the rest of the band comes in. Everything gets louder naturally with the additional musicians, so you don’t need to push to get the dynamic increase you want. You might even have to pull them back to make sure everything doesn’t get too big too early or overpower the singers.

Managing happens more often with electronic instruments, which might not have as much fine control over their dynamics with pedals and presets. In some cases, they don’t have any, like if a keyboard patch is a trigger. That means it doesn’t matter how hard or soft the keyboard player hits the key (velocity), the sound it triggers will always be at the same volume.

Once you have an idea of the musical shape of the show, start noting band moves in your script. These will become a part of your choreography. I’ll use numbers if I know where the band faders usually end up, or markings like crescendo, decrescendo, or circles for quick bumps if the moves are more general.

Along with overall dynamic moments, you’ll also begin to pick out individual solos or features where you may have to give additional support or managing, just on a smaller scale. For example, if a flute and a trumpet each have a moment in a song, they’ll likely have to be treated differently. The flute is naturally quieter, so you’ll likely have to push their mic to get them out over the mix. However, the trumpet may not need any help (or you might have to pull it back) depending on the player’s lung capacity and sense of subtlety.

Try to remember that no rule is absolute. Although trumpet players are very good at being loud, that doesn’t mean you’ll always pull them back. In Mean Girls, there were a couple of moments where the trumpet had a James Bond-style riff and I’d have to push it quite a bit to get them out over the rest of the band. So treat each moment as its own entity. In sound it’s easy to get caught in traps of comfort and appearance: an eq doesn’t look quite right, and you never usually have to push the drums, so why would you need to now? Try to listen first and make adjustments accordingly. Does the eq sound right? Can you not hear cymbals in this section? When in doubt, ask for a second opinion. Sometimes you just need a set of fresh ears when you’ve been listening to the same show for weeks or months.

Once you learn where the band moves are, you can focus on the details. Different songs will want different approaches: sweeping orchestras lend themselves to fluid, continuous movements while quick, pop songs tend to have quicker bumps or more dramatic pulls.

 

Here’s a video of “Why God Why?” from Miss Saigon. It’s mostly one person singing, so the attention is on the band’s moves. My main focus is to make sure the vocals (faders 1-8) are always supported—not overpowered—by the orchestra (11 and 12), but I can still fill in the music around the lyrics so the overall level stays consistent. There are pushes with the orchestra in the emotional builds which are followed by quick pulls to get the band back and make a pocket for the vocals again. Around the 3:35 mark, there’s a pull where I tuck fader 11 back a little bit more than the rest of the band to compensate for a louder key patch: an example of the managing I talked about before in action. Overall, the song starts out quiet and has slow builds, each getting a bit bigger than the one before. There’s a quick pullback when we go into the faster section, the emotional build with Chris and the Vietnamese, and then the big finish at the end with a bump.

Music is an essential part of a musical, but it can do so much to enhance the story on an emotional level. As a mixer, you get the chance to put an extra flourish on some of those moments to drive them home. One of my previous blogs covered some of those times in-depth and how good it feels when everything comes together. Because the next level of working with the band is learning to adjust it live to the actors so you get that emotional impact. When they’re able to go for it, you have more leeway to make the moments bigger, or if they’re under the weather or having an off day, you adapt and pull the music back so they still land in the right place relatively. Like in “Why God,” you can literally hear Chris’s frustration building as the orchestra gets bigger, but how big the orchestra can get depends on how big Chris is going to go.

It’s these details with the music that make a lot of shows more fun to mix. There’s a feeling you get when you hit a bump at just the right moment and just the right level that keeps you coming back to see if you can do it again and again. I’ve been incredibly lucky that I’ve worked with some people who are both amazing musicians and lovely humans, and you always want to let that talent shine. I can’t count the number of times one of them has come up to me, so excited because a friend came to see the show and told them they sounded good. If they know that you’re taking care of them, you build trust, which ultimately leads to a better show for everyone. So take the time and make the effort to learn the music. Some people will actually notice and appreciate it, others will just know that the show hit a little deeper this time. Either way, it can make a world of difference.

Time to Train

 

At the beginning of this year, I made a major life change

I left a tour to see what life would be like living off the road, specifically in New York City. Touring folk tend to fall into two camps: those who are planning to eventually go to NYC to live and work full time, and those who enjoy visiting, will go there for shop prep, but never want to live there. They’re either happy to head back to their home locals when they get off tour or plan to spend the majority of their career on the road. I’ve always been of the mind that touring was a phase of my career, not the endgame. I know I’ll miss it, I look forward to visiting for vacation coverage or tech periods, but I’m ready to try something new.

It’s rare that you’ll move to the city and immediately get a full-time show tossed in your lap (although there are people that move here because they have a job already lined up), so I came here with the intention to find work subbing on the mix for Broadway shows (which would provide income, but also counts towards qualifying days to help me keep my health insurance, plus getting to mix!) as well as working in the shops (for income and the ability to meet more people in the industry, so part socializing, part networking).

Thanks to my time on the road, I have some contacts here, so I came to the city with a rough semblance of a plan. Part of which was subbing on Funny Girl. The same sound design team I worked with on Mean Girls also did Funny Girl, so when I let them know I was planning to leave the tour and move to the city, they put me on their list of people they could call. It worked out that they needed to get someone up on the mix around the time I settled in, so  I was able to get approved by management and start the training process fairly quickly.

When you’re learning to mix an existing show

You usually have between two and three weeks (16-24 shows) to get from watching the show to mixing it and your training is live, during performances with a paying audience. I got approved about a week before I actually started (it took time to finalize a schedule), so I was able to get the script and an audio archive recording of the show to start. It’s a much shorter process than I’ve talked about in a previous blog, but I still retyped the script, added in my own annotations (all the while listening to the recording of the show so I could get familiar with it), and practiced mixing it all the way through at least once a day, going through my script, adjusting or adding notes or figuring out how to make page turns easier.

Once I was in the theatre I set a rough schedule of goals. I try to break it down so I watch the show at least once, only to watch so I can start to connect what’s happening onstage to what I’ve been hearing in the recording. Then I’ll use a couple of shows to watch the mixer with my script in front of me and make notes or mark questions. Next, I’ll ghost mix for a few shows, which is basically the same thing I did with my practice board the previous week, just in the theatre, during the show where I can see how my timing lines up with the mixers. Usually, you can make a side fader bank on the console blank, so I can mix at the console, next to the mixer, without actually controlling anything. After that, I’ll start mixing the show, a few scenes at a time, adding on more each show, and ghost-mixing the rest. Finally, once I’ve mixed through the full show, I’ll plan it out so I have a few shows left in the training period where I’m just mixing the show, getting repetitions so I can settle in.

It’s worth noting that as a sub, my script has far more markings than when I’m the primary where I learn the show in tech and consistently mix it afterward. A sub is someone they’ll call for sick days, vacations, or possibly for a brush-up if it’s been a while. All of this means that I might go weeks or even months between mixing (hopefully if it’s months, that’s where the brush-up show would come in), so I need to have more detailed notes instead of assuming that I’ll remember some timing or nuance.

When you’re breaking down the show into sections

There are a couple of ways to do it, based on how you learn best:

Personally, I prefer to learn a show first to last, and this seems to be the case with most mixers. After consistently mixing shows for a long period of time, I have a system for my script and notations to make busier, more complicated scenes easier to navigate. That way, jumping straight into a difficult scene isn’t as daunting. Plus, I found I don’t have to look down at my hands as often anymore. In my last blog, I talked about how I anchor the heel of my hands on the console and that muscle memory reference helps me know how far I’m throwing the fader. That means I can keep my attention on the script and what’s coming next instead of having to always check where my levels are.

However, when I’m the one responsible for training someone (usually when an A2 is learning the mix) I like to use the least to most complicated method. It tends to be a good way for people who are either new to mixing or don’t do it on a regular basis to ease into the show.

No matter how many shows you’ve learned or how comfortable you feel mixing, it’s a daunting task

The first show I started pushing faders for real on Funny Girl (I mixed almost the first 30 minutes of the show), I was so nervous: my palms were sweating, my shoulders were tense, and I was on edge the entire time. I try to keep in mind that everyone makes mistakes, especially when they’re learning, but that only does so much to ease your mind in a high-stress environment. However, as you start mixing chunks of the lives shows, the mixer is always standing by, ready to step in if you lose your place in the chaos of a busy scene or fumble a section and need a moment to regroup. They’ll gradually give you more space as you settle in because it’s also important for you to learn how to recover if you miss a pickup, but they’re still there to support you and get you back on track.

There’s a period after you’ve mixed a few shows and you’re getting comfortable: this is a danger zone.  This is where you’re prone to make more mistakes than at the beginning.

The first few times you mix a show you’re laser-focused and have plenty of adrenaline pumping through your system. As you mix scenes over and over again, that adrenaline starts to fade and you end up thinking about notes you got from the last show or a mistake you made before that you need to avoid. This is when the easy things that you thought you knew to start to slip and you make more mistakes.

I call them regression shows. In high school, we called it the “second show slump” when our first show would be great and full of energy, in the second show almost everything would go wrong, and then the third would finally be solid. Regression shows happen at different points on different shows and for different mixers, but there will likely be a point where you’ve mixed something enough times to feel confident and then out of the blue you’ll make a dumb mistake. When I was training on Mean Girls, I did well as I was learning the mix and flubbed a few smaller things like band moves or cues that were just a touch late. Then, when I was mixing the full show for the first time, I ended up missing two pickups that I’d never missed before, neither of which were in the scenes I was mixing for the first time. Same on Funny Girl: the first pick-up I missed was the fifth show I mixed, and it came with the third page (so a section I’d mixed all five times) as I was focusing on a band move.

Every time, you just have to get back up and keep going. The more mistakes you make, the better you become at recovering and sometimes you’ll even be able to catch them before you miss a line or stop yourself before you take a cue at the wrong time. The more shows you do, the more you discover better ways to help yourself learn which speeds up the process. Always ask for help when you need it: if someone’s training you to mix, they already know you can do it and they want to help you succeed.

Mechanics of Mixing

Mixing is an active experience

Anyone who’s watched me mix a show knows that I’m never standing still. I’m usually tapping my toes or bopping my head to the music while timing my fader throws. I’m constantly shifting my focus as I look up at the stage, down at my hands, or at the monitors on either side of me. I’m listening so my fingers can respond to the actors or musicians while keeping a thought on what’s coming up next. The actual mixing might happen in a small footprint, but there’s a lot going on. It helps to have a solid physical foundation to make your day-to-day life easier especially as so much of our job requires repetitive motion, which can take a toll on our bodies.

The first thing to look at is how you stand or sit at the console

If you’re sitting, it makes it easier because you can adjust your chair to the right height every time and call it good. Personally, I prefer to stand: it keeps me more alert and focused, especially when I’m on a show for months or years. Also, I’m short, so it’s easier for me to reach the top of the other fader banks of the console if I’m standing rather than having to get out of my chair or slide it any time I want to make an adjustment. If you prefer to stand as well, do yourself a favor and get an anti-fatigue mat. The floors at FOH can be anywhere from concrete to carpet to plywood, and it pays down the road to be nice to your knees now.

However, standing at the console can present a challenge if people mixing the same show are at different heights. If you’re short, you can stand on a case lid or apple box. If you’re tall, you can lift the console up with wooden blocks, or (if you already know when you’re in the shop) get racks that are taller and can make the board higher. Personally, I know that 16 space racks put the console at a good height for me to mix while standing.

In some cases, you might not able to find a good solution, or the console is already set to someone else’s height (if you’re a sub or A2 and the console is already set at a good height for the A1). In these cases, I end up using a chair, even though I’d rather stand. It’s far better to have a proper position and the minor inconvenience of having to get up if you need to make an adjustment than force yourself to mix in an uncomfortable position.

For me, a comfortable position means

That I aim for a console or chair height where my elbows are bent at a relaxed, roughly 90˚ angle so there’s an almost straight line from my elbow through my wrist when my hands are resting on the console, fingers on faders. If you’re too far above the console, your elbow ends up higher than your wrist and you put extra pressure on your joints as you naturally press through your palm with the way the wrist bends. On the other hand, if you’re too far below, your shoulders have to rotate outward to get your hands on top of the console and that puts pressure on your shoulders as well as the wrists.

Any rotation of a joint, even a small amount, can create problems over time. On Les Mis, I used my index and middle fingers to move the two orchestra faders, which is fairly common for most people. However, that rotated my wrist to an awkward angle which put stress on it. Eventually, my forearm muscles started to tighten up from that strain, which made it uncomfortable to mix. Even in the mix videos for that show (recorded after maybe 50-60 shows into the run), there are a couple of times where I have to find breaks to stretch out my hand or roll my wrist to relieve some of the tension. I went to physical therapy and got stretches and exercises to help (if something hurts, always go see a professional in a timely manner), but what actually fixed it was when I realized that I could use my middle and ring fingers for the band faders instead and that would shift my wrist to a better position. This eliminated the cause of the problem itself, and as a side benefit, I had my index finger free to make verb adjustments without having to move my hand off the band faders!

No one mixes the exact same way

So what works for me might not work for you, and that’s okay. I prefer to use my middle fingers as the primary for mixing dialogue, but some people use their index. It takes time and a willingness to experiment to develop what your mixing style looks like.

Here are a few things I’ve found that have helped me as a mixer

 

I use the heel of my hand as an anchor point while I’m mixing: as my hands have to move back and forth to different faders, that bone at the base of my palm always ends up resting on the same area of the console, just below the faders. From there, I have a general reference for where the fader is without having to look at my hands: I know based on how far my fingers are extended because my hand is always the same distance from the base of the fader. (With any rule, there are always exceptions: sometimes I’ll have to throw further than usual, so I’ll lift up the heel of my hand and use my pinky for additional stability, or a scene might have me jumping around more than usual so I’m not in one place long enough to truly anchor my hand. When it works, use it. If it doesn’t, find something that does.)

If my left hand (usually dialogue) is free, but my right hand (usually band, some vocals, and the button for sound effects, next scene, etc) is in the middle of a band move when I need to take a cue, I’ll cross my left hand over my right to hit the GO button, similar to playing a piano. I’ve gotten skeptical looks from mixers when doing it while I’m training on shows, but it’s something that works for me. It takes a little trial and error to make sure it’s the right choice and I’m not taking my hand off a fader when I really shouldn’t or my right hand actually does have a moment to talk the cue, but when it works, it helps to simplify my mix choreography.

I’ve spent a lot of time tweaking how my script works. While the script itself isn’t a mechanical part of mixing, how you integrate page turns definitely is. As I developed my system for marking and formatting, I made it my mission to condense the script to as few pages as possible and minimize how many times I had to reach up to flip a page. While that is a legitimate strategy, I found that it put my page turns at awkward points in the mix and had me scrambling at times. Over the course of several productions, I found that it worked far better for me to make sure that each page of the script ended on an easy (or as easy as possible) turn, whether that was a pause in the action or splitting a long line up over the end of one page and the beginning of another. This added a few page turns overall but put them at much easier places in my mix.

Something I need to continue to work on is my focus. Once I’ve been on a show for a while and I have the mix down, my mind will want to wander. Another mixer told me she uses yoga and meditation to help improve her concentration and her ability to bring herself back to the present and to the show. I’m slowly improving, but it’s another skill I need to hone, especially after I lost some of that ability while I didn’t have the chance to mix on a regular basis during the Covid hiatus.

However, consistency will help you as you develop better focus. While I obviously encourage being flexible, once you find what works, set a routine. That’s taking a cue on the same beat of a song, or presetting the band on the same word, even when you could do it anywhere in that sentence, or even taking a water break during the same line every show. Just like standing helps keep me focused when my show count-ticks into triple digits, consistency builds a muscle memory that has saved me more than a few times if my concentration slips.

The most important thing is to listen to your body and your instincts. If something hurts or feels uncomfortable, find a way to change your process so you don’t have to do that. If you have an idea for something that might streamline things, try it. The worst thing that happens is you go back to what was working just fine before and try the next idea when it comes along.

New Venues

 

We all like the allure of a shiny new thing. On tour, there’s something initially exciting about being the first theatrical show in a theatre, but then you get there and realize you’re not getting to test drive a slick new theatre with all the bells and whistles. Instead, you’ve become a beta tester for a building and you’re going to find all the kinks the venue staff will have to eventually work out.

Walking into that load-in asks you for patience and to accept that things will not be happening according to the usual plan. On Phantom, we opened a venue in Orlando and it took four, maybe five, times longer than usual to do our FOH runs (cable bundles that go from the racks onstage to the console in the house), simply because the local crew didn’t know the path yet. Thankfully, we scheduled extra time for load-in because the building was brand new, so a 45-minute project turning into 4 hours didn’t completely derail things like it would have if we’d been on a normal time frame for load-in.

New construction is particularly difficult for theatrical shows because Broadway shows will test the limits of any theatre, new or old. A 30-40 person show with 2-ton scenic pieces, an 80’ wide show deck, 16 box center cluster, video walls, and mother truss structures (these are made to hold up heavy or oddly shaped pieces that need extra support, like the curved section of our video wall on Mean Girls), multiple electric trusses, automation, etc. will ask more of a local crew and space than a talking head, a stand-up comedian, a graduation ceremony, or a symphony. When you start loading into a brand new space you’re going to learn the limits of the building and the crew very quickly.

The building usually presents the largest challenge. Constructing a new venue is a huge undertaking that takes years to complete and the project may pass to multiple contractors during its progress. This can easily create a lack of cohesion across the space, especially if one contractor started a project, but another one had to jump in mid-way through to complete it or didn’t even realize it wasn’t finished when they joined the job. Maybe the first person on the project in Orlando had a plan for that FOH cable path, but someone else took over who didn’t finish that project. Either because they didn’t know what touring shows entail, or didn’t even realize that people would be running cables other than the permanent conduit.

As shows load in and out of a venue, the staff learns what the problems are and can start to solve them. The core holes in the walls so the cable doesn’t have to block open doorways, or they install motors to get cases up several levels where there’s no elevator access. When we opened the venue in Orlando, we had to carry cases up a half flight of stairs to get to FOH, but when I returned a few years later, they’d thankfully found they could use the handicapped accessible chair lift to do that heavy lifting instead. Mean Girls was in Greensboro at a fairly new venue and we were the first show that got the benefit of a removable railing and a ramp to get racks and cases down to the FOH position. Previously, shows had to lift everything over a short wall (including consoles that can easily weigh 400lbs) and the house head told his management repeatedly that it was not ideal and borderline dangerous. Even in that case, it took management coming by to watch what the local crew had to do to move the cases for them to decide that they did indeed need to make that change.

If the building isn’t enough of a challenge, personnel can also add to the complications of your load. As the road crew, you rely on the house staff to know where things go. I frame it as “I’ll tell you what needs to happen, you tell me how you do it in your theatre,” so when I say we need to get cables from one side of the stage to the other, the house head will tell me that they either run them around the pit rail, drop down through holes to run across the basement, or some other path they have to work out. When the house head is almost as new to the building as you are, they’re learning right alongside you and don’t have all those answers yet.

In some cases, the entire crew is brand new to everything: to the venue, to the job, and sometimes even to the theatre itself. When Dirty Dancing opened a venue in Sugarland, the majority of the local crew had never done a load in for a Broadway tour and didn’t know how to set up com in the spot booth. I went up, found the patch bay, and walked them through setting up headsets and belt packs and how things plugged in. Also during that load-in, I asked the crew to drop in a rope to make a cable pick for our center cluster cable (this pulls it up and out of the way so it’s out of the frame of the proscenium. One of the locals tied it off to the fly rail backstage and I had to explain that they couldn’t do that because that pulled the cable across the fire pocket, which would impede the fire curtain if it had to come in. (Fire Marshals will sometimes do walkthroughs of venues and look for things like that which violate fire code and have to be redone. So running the cable correctly at the beginning of the day means we won’t have to change it later.) Later on, during that same day, our road head electrician had to help teach the building staff how to program their house light system.

It’s worth noting that you’ll have green crew members even in older, established venues. However, on those crews, there might be one or two people who are new with the other four or so who are more experienced stagehands and can help show them the ropes. In a new theatre, especially in smaller towns, it’s more likely that a larger percentage of the crew will also be new or less knowledgeable.

So, in addition to doing your normal load in, you’re having to learn the architecture of a new building and oftentimes teaching a crew what future Broadway tours are going to expect from them. It is exciting to be the first show in a new theatre, but it also requires understanding and a willingness to teach where you can and help solve problems when you’re able. You’ll get the show in, it always happens, you just end up learning even more about what makes venues efficient (or not) in the process.

Troubleshooting 101

Troubleshooting is an essential skill in any part of the sound world and especially on tour. On tour, you’re often on a tight schedule, in an unfamiliar city, and outside a quick delivery distance of the shop. Learning to diagnose and fix (or work around) problems on your own is the only way to keep a show running.

Of course, it’s also one of the hardest things to learn because there are an infinite number of problems that can pop up and most of the time you figure them out as they come your way, building a database of issues and fixes for your future self.

However, if you develop a system of how to approach problems, even unfamiliar gear or new gremlins become progressively easier to solve.

First, never discount these basics. Turning it off and turning it back on is sometimes the power cycle that’s needed if things didn’t start up in the right sequence or it’s simply checking that the piece of gear is actually plugged in. I once spent 15 minutes trying to figure out why a keyboard wasn’t transmitting MIDI (reseated and swapped out cables, got a new MLA (MIDI Line Amplifier), and more) only to realize that the keyboard itself had been off the entire time.

After the basics, you follow the signal flow. Learning how a system goes together is key to fixing a problem. How does signal get from Point A to Point Z and what are the patch points, cables, adapters, and everything in between? Connection points at adapters or racks are typically the weakest points in any chain, whether something didn’t get plugged in (jokingly referred to as a “high impedance air gap”) or strain on a connector that results in a band connection.

 

For example, some of our cameras on tour are built into the lighting trusses that hang over the stage. From the camera, there’s a cable that goes to a rack that lives with the dimmer racks (we call it “Dimmer Distro” on our tour) which is a distribution point for all the cameras and speakers that live on truss or lighting ladders that Electrics sets up during load in. At the Dimmer Distro rack, the cable patches into a panel which barrels through to a repeater inside the rack. The outputs of the repeater connect to another panel where our Crossover (XO) bundles plugin to get the camera signal from the Dimmer Distro rack across the stage to Ampland. In Ampland, there’s another panel that connects the XO run to the input of a video matrix.

As you can see, there are a lot of sections to troubleshoot if something goes wrong. And that’s just getting the camera to the central hub. There’s a whole other set of cables and connection points to get the video from the matrix out to the SM call desk or Automation or FOH or any number of other places. Learning the signal path of each of the systems in your production (audio, video, com, etc) will make it much easier to eliminate possible causes as you work through troubleshooting logic.

Ask yourself, what is the problem? Be as specific as possible. “Video is flickering” and “the FOH color shot at the automation rack is intermittently going out” are two completely different problems.

Next, ask questions to narrow down the problem. Learning the right things to ask can significantly narrow down what you have to troubleshoot.

Continuing on the video theme (com and video will be the things you have to troubleshoot most often), let’s run with the problem of the FOH color shot going in and out at automation. First question: Is the FOH shot doing the same thing everywhere? Usually, there will be multiple places that have the same video. If the FOH shot is stable in other locations (Fly Rail, SM desk, etc) that means the video input itself is okay, there’s just some problem getting to Automation. If it’s flickering everywhere, the issue is more likely on the input end, somewhere getting from the camera to the video matrix. But, by answering that one question, we’ve eliminated about half of the system (either the output side, if it’s just automation, or the input side if the problem is in multiple places) that we need to look at.

This is also something you ask when there is a main and backup (or spare) in the system. Does one work but not the other, or is the issue the same for both?

Our keyboards have a main and backup system, so when there was signal loss on one of the channels, we tested the backup as well. When that also had a problem that told me that the issue was somewhere after the two inputs merged. It ended up being a bad line coming from the pit rack up to our DigiRack in Ampland and checking the backup helped quickly eliminate a section of the system so we could move on to more likely culprits.

In this case, again, I looked at signal flow. The keyboard is sending MIDI messages to two computers: one Main and one Back Up. Those computers each send three stereo pairs to an interface, and that interface sends to a switcher that takes the two inputs and (via a pedal at the keyboards) can switch between the two signals to send a single set of three stereo pairs of audio from the pit up to the DigiRack in Ampland (with panel inputs at each rack). Then the DigiRack connects to the console via a fiber loop.

So, first, we identified the problem: “The Left channel of Key 2A (again 3 stereo pairs: A, B, and C) is coming into the board at a significantly lower level than the Right.”

Next, narrow it down:

“If we swap to the Backup, does that fix it?” Answer: No. The problem is somewhere after the interfaces connect to the switcher.

“Is it happening anywhere else?” Answer: No. Likely it’s not the fiber link or there would be other channels having the same issue.

This eliminates the first couple of links in the chain and the last one. The problem is likely either the run between Ampland and the Pit, the tails on either end or the card in the DigiRack.

Now you can start to change things. (As a note, it’s best to change one thing at a time, check if that helped, restore, then change something else. If you change a whole bunch of things and it starts working, you won’t actually know what was the problem.) In this case, I swapped the line for Key 2’s A-Left channel to a spare line in the run to Ampland and that got the channel back to a good level.

Conclusion: Bad line on that mult or one of the tails. (On tour, fix the problem, then you can do more specific tests when you have a work call or more time.)

Consistent problems like this are usually easier to identify and solve: you know when you’ve fixed the problem because the problem goes away. With intermittent issues, it’s the opposite: you can identify what the problem is only when you can recreate it, or you have to wait and watch for a while to verify that it’s not coming back.

For these problems, still, try to eliminate as much of the system as you can so you can focus on the most likely fixes. Then, find out how to recreate the problem. Pre-Covid, I had a bad fiber line that was causing pops in the system: it would be consistent popping when the system was first up, but after about 30 minutes the pops would be intermittent or stop altogether. At the console, I could see that it was happening over multiple channels, all of which were from one of the DigiRacks in Ampland. That told me that it was likely an issue with the fiber loop that connects the racks to the console. We have seven fiber links that create our loop (the console, three DigiRacks, one Mini Rack, and an SDRE), so we spent a work call powering up the system, unpatching one link at a time, and waiting to see if there would be another pop. If there was, we’d re-patch and unpatch the next link in the loop. Sometimes the pops would go away on their own and we’d have to power down and power back up to see if we’d actually solved the problem, or if it had just shifted from consistent to intermittent popping. It probably took at least three or four rounds through to finally identify the bad line. Once we were fairly certain we had the right link, we ran a spare and sent the bad fiber reel back to the shop for repair. However, after several shows with pops at random intervals, it was a few more days before I was able to relax from being on high alert and trust that we’d actually fixed the problem.

 

Sometimes you don’t have time to solve the problem, just put on a band-aid until you can get a work call or a point in the show where you can actually take a look at what’s happening. This is why you have backups and spares. On Les Mis, the backup engine on the console crashed mid-show and we ran without it for a couple of shows until the shop could send out another engine. If someone has a midshow mic pop, sometimes it’s easier to toss a new rig on them and take a look at the old mic back in Ampland instead of trying to diagnose an issue during a 30-second quick change. Recently on Mean Girls, we had one of our RF antennas disconnect sometime between preset and the show starting. Since we couldn’t get out to the towers where the antennas were mounted during the show, my A2 set up the spare antenna backstage so we had something to work with until we could check it out at intermission.

Always remember that you can ask for help. You’re only as good as your tools and your network. When my console crashed, I called a DiGiCo tech and then the shop to help me work through the problem. When our keyboards have problems, I ask our keyboard tech if he notices anything I might have missed. When video is being a pain, my A2 and I will tag team on monitors: someone can swap cables while the other one watches the monitor so we know right when a problem acts up again or if it’s fixed.

Testers are also your friend. Signal generators like QBox or CabDriver help you move step by step through the signal chain to check things. Personally, I use my CabDriver to send pink noise down the NL8 lines to my cluster as I’m building it and it’s still within easy reach. Once I’ve heard a signal through the speakers, I know for sure when I fly it out 30+ feet that everything’s functioning from the Ampland end of the bundle to the speakers. Multimeters can help you with electrical connections and cable testers (especially one that supports multiple connectors) are indispensable. Personally, I have an SM Pro CT-3 which has two separate parts so you can split it to take it to two different places (troubleshooting usually means that you don’t have both ends of the cable in the same place) and has indicator lights to tell if something is cross-wired.

Troubleshooting is a skill that takes time and practical application to build. The more problems you see and solve, the better you’ll get. It starts as a slow process, so give yourself some patience and try to work through problems as logically as possible.

Let’s Load in!

 

One of the biggest components of a stagehand’s job on tour is load in. We often joke that we’re not paid to run the show, we’re paid to load it in and out and fix problems. (As an A1, your job is also about mixing the show, but the sentiment still holds true.) For me, I start prep work for load in even before we get to the venue: I chat with the house head and make up an advance for each city we go to. There will almost always be something that changes, but it’s easier to tweak a few things onsite than have to figure everything out from scratch.

(As a note, this is for larger tours that move once a week or less. It isn’t really sustainable to advance a tour that moves multiple times a week. Those smaller tours are the ones where your system is smaller so it’s more feasible to walk in and figure things out at the venue. That’s where you learn a lot of your problem-solving skills, which you’ll continue to use when you are on larger tours with more moving pieces that have to fit together. Tours rarely get easier; they just get bigger.)

One part of my advance is an excel document that’s an overview of the venue and how we fit into it: what the dimensions of the stage are, where the amp racks will go (this is called Ampland), and how high the theatre ceiling is over the pit so I know how far I can trim the cluster out (which also tells me how many boxes I can use), etc. The other part is a summary from speaker prediction software: on Les Mis and Saigon, I used Meyer’s MAPP and on Mean Girls, I use L’Acoustic’s Soundvision. This tells me what angle I should use for point source boxes or what I’ll need to set the splays to for the arrays.

Once we get to the venue, the first step is to take a look around and talk to the audio house head. I’ve been on the road for a decade at this point and have been to all but maybe 8 of the 68 cities that we hit on Mean Girls. So for most of the venues, I have archival photos and paperwork and know roughly what I’m walking into, but things always change. New management, new crew, post-Covid renovations, at this point I can’t assume that it’s the exact same space I came to two or three years ago.

So you get the lay of the land and try to identify any problems with the plan. If the venue left the house cluster up, now is the time to take it down or fly it further out so I can hang mine. Are the holes to run cable under the stage too small for all the cable we have? Let’s talk to the house head about running it around the pit rail.

I’ll use a disto with an inclinometer (so it can give me both distance and angle) to double-check the accuracy of the room for Soundvision and the measurements for how high the cluster will actually be able to trim out. Going back to Soundvision, I put in the new info and see if I have to make adjustments or if I have to cut (or maybe can add!) boxes on the cluster.

 

A normal load-in on Mean Girls has a spotting call an hour before load-in starts. This is when the Carpenters measure out where motors will go on the floor and I have some time to take the measurements of the house. Load in itself starts with a 5-hour call on Monday evening. Then we break for the night and come back at 8 am Tuesday morning where we’ll work through the day (with a lunch and dinner break) until the end of the show around 10:30 pm.

So at the end of the spotting call, load-in begins and the trucks start unloading. Most of the trucks will be packed by department: Audio has a truck for most of our gear, Electrics (LX) has one for theirs, Carpentry has one for the deck, another (or maybe two) for set pieces, Props has another, Wardrobe and Hair one more. However, the first truck is usually mixed to give every department something to get started. (On smaller shows it’s more likely that most of the trucks are mixed.) Carpentry will get drops to hang and motors to rig so LX can hang truss, Audio can hang towers, and Carpentry can build scenic pieces. Audio and LX usually get cables we can run. On the first truck, we get our FOH (Front of House) runs that will connect Ampland that’s backstage to the console out in the house. These are usually the longest and most complicated cable runs, so it’s better to throw the entire local audio crew on the project and get it done and out of the way.

When our truck is ready to unload, we’ll dump all the cases, carts, and racks and find a place to put them in the theatre, usually denoted by a color code on the case label. Some, like spares (YELLOW), just go somewhere out of the way like down the side of a hallway or a rehearsal hall we’re using for storage. Others have consistent places: FOH (PINK) will always go to the theatre lobby, and Pit cases (PURPLE) will go down in an elevator to the basement level or off to the side to eventually ride down on the pit. Cases like Ampland (GREEN) change depending on the venue and where we end up putting our amp racks.

Once everything is off the truck, it’s time to work on projects. Most of the time the A1 will take care of getting the system set up: tip the console at FOH, build the towers and the cluster. The A2 will cover everything upstage of the proscenium: running all the cable (cross-stage, towers, cluster, pit, remote musicians, etc) and setting up com stations and onstage monitors. Some things, like the pit, can fall to either one. I’ve set it up as an A2, but on this tour, it worked better with the flow of load in that I, as the A1, set it up. This is where people and time management skills come into play. On most tours, I have 6 locals on the load in crew for audio, so my A2, Sherie, and I trade off crew so each of us has enough people to complete each job.

So, with all the cases off the truck, I’ll take the majority of the crew to FOH to tip the console: taking racks out of their cases to form a table and setting the console on top. It sounds easy until you remember that the SD7 (with part of the flight case) weighs around 400lbs. So I need at least 4 people to help me set that up safely. While I have the crew, Sherie has some time backstage to get the racks set where she wants them and start patching the FOH bundles we ran when they came off Truck 1. Then we split the crew and I take three people to build the towers (stacking three sections one on top of the other and bolting them together) and cluster (taking two carts, re-splaying the speakers, and connecting them all together to fly out), while Sherie gets the other three to start working on smaller projects like tying in feeder into power the racks or starting on com runs.

Load-in for Les Miserables tour (2017-2020) in Nashville, TN. (You can see the towers being built at the 0:22-0:27 mark)

After I’m done with the towers and cluster (and get rid of the large carts that the towers and cluster travel into clear space for others to work), I can send my crew to Sherie so she has everyone and can start on the longer cables runs that go across the stage, or into the pit, or to the Dimmer Racks (for cameras and stage monitors we have built into their truss).

While they’re working on those, I’ll make sure that we are clear of the pit (it’s usually an elevator that can come up to stage level to give us more space to build large pieces like truss or the towers) so Props can take the pit down and get ready to set up chairs and stands for the musicians.

Next, I can start on smaller, solo projects while Sherie continues with the crew. I prefer to be the one who patches things into racks. I’ve had enough well-meaning local crews that have accidentally plugged in something upside down, into the wrong place, or managed to slam an NL4 into a Powercon socket, that it’s easier and faster if I do it myself. So I finish setting up my console, patch everything in (with the help of more color coding), and power up.

Then, I’ll head to the band rehearsal and work on that. This is something we only use during load-in so our show band (3 keyboards, drums, and a guitar) has a few hours to rehearse with the local musicians (2 reed players, trumpet, trombone, bass, another guitar, and a percussionist). This system consists of two speakers on stands (I get help for those, they’re heavy), and cables to run from a rackmount console to the various stations for all the electronic instruments.

This marks the end of Monday. My usual goal is to have the towers and cluster up so the pit can go down (or be ready at the top of the day on Tuesday) and most, if not all of the cross-stage runs are done. If we hit that point, we’re on track for the next day.

Tuesday morning we start our 4-hour call, power everything up, and continue working. I’ll take some time to make sure the towers sections are set at the correct angles (that disto comes in handy again) and I have sound coming out of all the right places, including any house system that we tie into to help supplement the touring system (under-balcony speakers or delays up in the balcony).

Once Props is done setting up chairs and stands in the pit, I’ll head down with a few locals to set up mics, conductor monitors, Avioms, and make sure everything is patched correctly for the musicians. While I’m in the pit, Sherie will work on deck with the rest of the crew to lag Front Fills in and continue setting up com stations as automation, the fly rail, and stage management gets set onstage.

Before we break for lunch, I’ll make sure that all my outputs are functioning and that SMAART and my wireless mic are set up for Quiet Time. (This is ideally when the Carpenters, Props, and LX are on their lunch break. I have an hour without people making noise on stage and they don’t have to listen to pink noise and loud music, so win-win.)

For Quiet Time, there are two general approaches: by ear with music and a disto, or using SMAART and an SPL meter. You use whichever your designer prefers, which on Mean Girls is the SMAART method. First I walk around with the SPL meter while a local is at the console to adjust levels and mute and unmute outputs as I tell them so I can set a consistent volume level across the house. Next, I’ll trade off with them, and give them the wireless mic to set at seats I’ve taped off so I can use SMAART to set the delay times for the matrix outputs. Finally, I’ll play music and walk the house to make sure that the delay and levels I set sound correct, making adjustments as needed.

After Quiet Time we have about 2 hours to finish everything up before the dinner break. That involves sending the local crew to strike the band rehearsal I set up the day before, getting percussion set up in the pit and our drummer set up in his booth, and checking that everything is coming into the console at the right places.

At the same time, Sherie is working on tuning RF, focusing the onstage cameras that Stage Management and Automation use during the show, making sure all the onstage monitors are set up and having the local crew neaten up or tape down cable and sending cases to get backloaded on trucks or tucked away in storage.

When we’re show ready, we break for dinner, then come back for soundcheck. Sherie will battery up and get the mics ready for the actors while I’m in the pit adjusting mic positions for the musicians as they settle in. Then we’ll do half an hour with just the band, setting levels for the local players and adjusting the mix in the house. The last half hour adds the actors onstage and Sherie will come out front to mix the songs while I walk around the house to make sure there’s a good balance between the band and vocals and it sounds consistent in all the areas of the theatre.

Once sound check is done, I’ll make sure we’re set to start the show (MIDI checks, the console is in the right snapshot, etc) and Sherie will set out any practicals as part of her preset and walk our local audio through the cues they’ll have during the show.

At this point, we’re done with load in itself and ready for the show. Post-show usually means heading to a restaurant or bar for some late-night food and a drink or two to celebrate getting the show in. Then we look forward to tomorrow and the touring stagehand tradition of No-Alarm Wednesday!

Load-in for The Phantom of the Opera tour (2013-2020) in Ft Lauderdale, FL.

Saving the Show

We all like to think we’re absolutely indispensable, especially in the theatre world. There’s the old adage “the show must go on,” so we push ourselves to get tours into theatres where they barely fit, come to work even when we’re not feeling well because who else can run the show? Once, an actress asked what the A1 and A2 would do if one of us were sick. I told her that whoever’s not sick would mix the show, so she asked what happened if we were both sick. I replied, “then whoever’s less sick mixes with a trashcan at FOH.” Thankfully neither of us ever had to do that, but everyone on the road has a war story of doing a show despite illness or injury, bragging how quickly they came back or how stoically they soldiered through.

Trying to fit the old tour life we knew into a new landscape where Covid dictates so much have proven challenging to say the least. But some good has come from it: now more than ever, we’re focusing more on our physical health. Which is wonderful, and long overdue. However, sailing in uncharted waters leads to so much uncertainty in our lives. That constant stress takes a toll on the mental health of the company. We’re on rigorous testing schedules that race against the efficiency of an ever-evolving virus that threatens cancellations or unexpected layoffs if enough people in the company test positive. Before 2020 most of us would have cheered some unexpected time off and made plans to relax, but now there’s a nagging worry in the back of our minds that our entire industry could shut down again or our show could close for good. We find ourselves half tempted to stay locked in the hotel room in the hope that somehow that will keep a positive test at bay, all the while knowing that our quality of life will suffer drastically if we try to avoid each other completely.

We’re now at a point where being indispensable is a liability, not only to the company but to our own mental well-being. Even more so for the handful of company members who have become linchpins in a Covid world: people that, if they test positive and have to quarantine, have no replacement or understudy onsite to cover, and the show will have to shut down until they can return to work. In most cases, there’s someone, somewhere that could fly out to the tour to cover, but even that would involve at least one or two canceled shows.

At the beginning of January, I ran into both of those situations. Mean Girls had an outbreak of cases and had to cancel a week of shows, which had already happened on a handful of other tours. I found myself with some unexpected time off, but that didn’t last for long because our industry is a very small one. On my first day off, I got a call at 9 pm asking if I could leave on the first flight the next day so I could fill in for the A1 on the My Fair Lady tour, and Tuesday at 10 am I walked into load in to help the A2 get the show-up and running.

This was a job that brought a lot of perspectives. It was a d&b main system and Helixnet com, neither of which I’d toured, and a Yamaha PM10 console, which I’ve never touched before (I have worked on Yamaha consoles, and thankfully that knowledge of the software transferred!), plus a design team that I’d never worked with before. Walking in, I’d toured for long enough that I was able to get the general lay of the land, and the A2 and I worked through setting up FOH and getting the system timed with a few phone calls and emails to design and the A1 to make sure we had the right patches and were getting reasonably close to the original intention of the design.

It was gratifying to see that I’d come far enough in my career that I could take unfamiliar gear in stride or at least know who to ask for help. It also showed me the gap between what we know as someone who runs the show constantly, and what a fresh pair of eyes actually see. Taking that back with me to Mean Girls, I’m starting to covid-proof my system to the best of my ability. So far I’ve added better labeling and color-coding to my FOH setup, taking more pictures of what things look like, and creating a Dropbox folder that I can send someone a link with most of the pertinent information they’d need to load in, run, and load out the show.

Luckily, this leans into one of my strengths. If you threw a dart at a collection of my blogs, you’re almost guaranteed to hit one that either mentions or completely focuses on some kind of paperwork: scripts, console programming, venue advances; I love a solid set of paperwork and some detailed documentation.

One of my projects on the post-Covid version of the tour was creating documentation of the show and my stint at My Fair Lady gave me a better idea of what I want to include:

For some, this sounds like overkill, but I find peace of mind in the idea that I might give someone too much information, but hopefully never too little. I also have a lot of practice doing this kind of documentation because it’s similar to what I’ve done for some of the shows I’ve left, specifically those where I didn’t have much time with my replacement to help train them. The only difference is that this would be a temporary replacement with who I’d have absolutely no crossover, other than answering questions on the phone as I sit in a hotel room in quarantine.

At this point in the touring world, it’s no longer about job security, it’s about sustainability. Eventually, we may move to a point where Covid won’t shut shows down for weeks at a time, but we’re not there yet. Until we make it to that point, we all have to be prepared for the when — not if — of being the person who’s in quarantine. For me, that means lots of time typing on my computer so I can rest just a little easier knowing I’ve done everything I could to make my replacement and my crew’s life as easy as possible.

Production Audio

 

Before Mean Girls was planning to hit the road again, I got the opportunity to work on the re-start of the Cats tour as the production audio. That was a job I had never considered myself remotely capable of pre-pandemic, but as the world started to open back up, I was itching for a chance to get back into a theatre and more than ready for what I now viewed as a challenge instead of an impossibility.

I’m sure more than a few people reading this have never heard of production audio before. It’s not a job that’s billed on the front of the playbill like the designer, and they’re only with the show to get it up and running, so you’re not going to see them in the theatre when you go to watch a show. So what do they actually do?

 

So. Very. Much. They’re responsible for the logistics of taking a show from theory to reality. Given paperwork from the designer, they interface with production, design, and the shop to get all the equipment needed and figure out how everything goes together. How will all the gear fit into racks? What cables do you need to connect everything? Do you need infrastructure for MIDI or timecode? Networked computers so you can operate amps, consoles, or programs remotely? Who in the crew will need com and/or video and how does it get to them? Which speakers will need rigging hardware and do you know where they’re going to go or should you bring multiple options?

It’s a parade of endless questions

Which requires an extremely organized person, a good communicator, and a lot of technical knowledge. My pre-COVID hesitation had always been the last part. I knew I was organized and could keep people in the loop, but I know the tech-heavy aspects of sound don’t hold my interest nearly as much as the more artistic side of things, and I’d always assumed that meant I would be a disaster in such a job.

Thankfully, with the tour re-mounting instead of being a brand new production, the system was already built and sitting in a warehouse. That removed the most complicated technical part of the job from my plate, plus I’d worked with the original designer and production team before, so I was familiar with how they built their shows. That was actually why I got the call for the job: I may never have done production before, but I knew how to tour and what I’d be working with.

With that part already taken care of, my job was mostly coordination and improving efficiency. On a new show, the crew has two or three weeks in the shop to get all the gear, rack it up, cable, and test everything. For the remount, we took the existing system back to the shop and we had two weeks to make the changes the designer and production manager had agreed on so the show could load in and out faster. (It was going to a schedule with shorter stops and more frequent moves.) I had a list of items that were getting cut (under-balcony speakers, remote com stations, etc) and substitutions that were being made (drums mics swapping out for an e-kit, the console changing over from an SD7 to an SD10), as well as evaluating anything we could tweak to make the touring crew’s life easier.

The shop crew consisted of me as the production audio, the A1, A2, and a few locals who are audio people that work on or around Broadway. I was in charge of hiring the local crew which was something completely new to me, but I was fortunate to have friends in the NYC area who were veterans of plenty of shop builds and were both available to work and willing to help me navigate a job I had never done before. Pro tip: hire people smarter than you and listen to them. A large portion of the success of the show can be directly attributed to my shop crew. They helped me work through technical questions, pointed out when I’d missed things or might have incorrect information, and offered advice when I needed help or they knew a better solution. With their help, I didn’t have to know all the technical answers and could lean on their expertise.

At the end of the two weeks, we packed everything on a truck, and the A1, A2, and I went to tech. Now I was back in familiar territory, just in a different role. Instead of loading in the show in my usual role as the A1, my job as production was to take care of setting up anything that the road crew shouldn’t have to touch on a normal load in or out: cameras that live in electrics truss, speakers that are mounted to set pieces, setting up for an orchestra rehearsal that would only happen in tech, etc. My goal was to always be one step ahead of everyone else, whether that was having tech tables set up before designers came in, making sure speakers had the correct hardware and were ready for the crew to set up, or ordering supplies to make sure we had everything we’d need.

I liked this part of the production process the best. After almost a decade on tour, I’d tried many ways to streamline shows and I knew what worked, what didn’t, and what could make a project less of a pain. So I rigged up speakers, spiked placement, color-coded cables, and did my level best to make the system as easy as possible to move.

All in all, I consider my first go at production a success. Did I do everything perfectly? Nope, definitely not. But the fact that I was willing to ask for help and advice meant that most of the problems I encountered were minor or the crew knew it was an honest mistake and were willing to give me some grace while I fixed it. Am I going to change my career trajectory now that I know I wouldn’t be an abject failure at production? Again, no. It was empowering to try something new and I truly enjoyed the work, but in the shop I still found myself wishing every once in a while that I was the one building the racks instead of answering endless emails and phone calls, printing labels, and fielding questions. In tech, I occasionally itched to push faders instead of sitting at my tech table placing yet another online order and looking over what seemed like endless lists of projects to do and fixes to make. On the other hand, I wouldn’t automatically turn down the opportunity as I had in the past. It was gratifying to see my to-do list slowly dwindle down as we went through tech and I loved the feeling of accomplishment when I knew I’d made some part of the tour just a little bit easier to load in. Since it was the A2’s first tour, I was also able to give him advice of pitfalls he should avoid and the best ways I’d found to speed up my workflow. Touring is a very odd combination of skills, and it was good to know I could pass on my accumulated knowledge to make someone else’s life easier.

This past 18 months of pandemic gave me a good opportunity to reevaluate my skills and realize that, not only was I capable of more than I thought, but I had a wonderful community around me who wanted to see me succeed and was willing to help make that happen. So, maybe, as the entertainment world comes back to life, try something new. You might find yourself pleasantly surprised!

 Tips for Tech

My last blog covered tips for touring, but before you truly hit the road, you have to get through tech. Which is hectic and stressful as you try to combine speakers, lights, sets, and props into an actual show.

The tech period is a progression of the show that slowly adds elements into the mix

First is load in with just the crew. Everything comes in from the various shops (lighting, sound, scenic) and you put it all together physically for the first time. Once things are mostly set up, lighting gets a day or two to focus (the rest of the crew will work on projects offstage or at FOH) and sound gets quiet time to tune the system, usually without any other crew in the building (love them dearly, but let’s face it, carps are always better at being unseen than unheard). Next is dry tech where the SM and the crew run through lighting transitions, scene changes, and automation moves without the actors, working through timing and how the SM will call the show. Then the actors leave the rehearsal studio to join the crew at the venue for cast onstage, teching the show with all elements except hair, wardrobe, and the orchestra. After a few days of that, the musicians get settled in the pit and are added to rehearsal for the last few days. Finally, you have the final dress rehearsals with all elements, including hair and wardrobe before you officially open!

It’s a grueling schedule with a lot that has to happen in a short amount of time. I’ve had some tech periods where I worked almost every day from 8 am to midnight for a month straight without a day off. I’ve done others where we had a practically luxurious 8-5 schedule with the rare treat of getting to see the sunset for a week or so before the actors got to the theatre.

Somehow, everything eventually comes together, but opening night seems like it’s very far away when you stand on an empty stage and hear the roll doors of the loading dock clatter open. Even then, opening night is a milestone, not the endgame. Your goal throughout all of load in and tech is to learn the show, learn the system, and get it ready to take on the road.

 

Assume that you won’t remember anything, so document everything

This is the one time where it’s okay to be glued to your phone as you take pictures of how speaker carts or cases pack, how cases line up in the truck, or mic placement in the pit (especially things like drums and percussion that can easily have twenty to thirty mics to set up).

When I take reference photos, I’ll try to get close-ups on things like speaker rigging and mic placements, but also have wider shots where you can see the entire drum kit, the full stage, or where the cluster truss hangs in the space, etc. Details are always good, but having photos of the big picture help establish context. I only take reference photos in tech for specific items, but I’ll take archive photos in every venue I go to: of the layout of the audience, my FOH set up, how I installed the system, where racks lived backstage, etc. When I go back to a theatre on a different tour, I have the photos from the last time I was there as a reference to jog my memory when I’m figuring out my plan for load-in.

 

Keep in mind that tech is the most time you have to spend with the design team

Once the tour’s out, someone from design might stop by for a day or two in a major market (LA, Chicago, DC, etc) or, if the show plans to run for several years, there may be plans to make regular checkups (say every 6 or 9 months), but that’s about it. So make sure to take advantage of the opportunity to get to know your designer. If you’re like me, making a point to spend time with someone for professional reasons feels disingenuous and presumptuous, something akin to greasy schmoozing rather than sincere conversation. It helps me to frame it as a genuine effort to build a relationship rather than a mercenary pursuit of future jobs. Plus, your designers also want to get to know you, not only to see if you’re someone who can take care of this show now, but if you’re someone they might want to work with in the future. I ended up moving from Les Mis to Saigon because I was a known entity to the design team. They felt more comfortable having me pass Les Mis, a show that was already up and running, off to another A1 and move over to Saigon so they didn’t have to gamble with bringing on someone unknown to start a show.

How you interact with your crew during tech will set up the tone for the rest of the tour

Especially with your A2. The A2 is backstage during tech while the rest of the sound team is at FOH, so make a point to include them when you can, usually during meal breaks and post-tech at the bar. This is something that might seem obvious, but that’s not always the case, which I, unfortunately, found out when I spent one tech as an A2 being routinely forgotten by the associate designer and production audio. That show was seven years ago, but the fact that I was made to feel inconsequential by design and unsupported by my A1 left a lasting impression. Now, if I have the opportunity to socialize with design, I try to make a point to invite my A2 or make sure they know where we’ll be for a meal break. That means the A2 has the opportunity for face time with the design team and hopefully conveys that I, as the A1, respect and appreciate their work and view us as part of a team.

Another overlooked aspect of tech is music

Usually, you have a keyboard in the house while the actors are on stage, then the full orchestra joins for the last couple days. However, several days before that, they’re somewhere in the theatre rehearsing (the lobby, a rehearsal room, etc). Whenever you have a moment, go and just listen: it’s one of the few times you have to hear what they sound like on their own. For the rest of the tour, you’re focusing on how they sound through the system or how they’re blending with the cast in the mix, or how inconveniently loud they are in the lobby during load-in while you’re trying to time the room. I’ll try to peek in for a moment during cast breaks onstage, even if it’s just listening to the MD give notes and work through a passage. Few people know the music better than the MD, and hearing how they explain things to the other musicians can give you a better understanding and appreciation of the music.

Finally, a few practical tips

Tech is stressful and tiring, but it can also be fun. You’re meeting new people, taking on new challenges, and getting to mix a new show for the very first time. Enjoy the thrill and get some sleep when you can!

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