January 2, 2024 • 56 mins
In this inspiring episode Joanna Peña-Bickley sits down with the Tony Award-winning sound designer, Jessica Paz, to explore the intricate fusion of art and science in the world of sound design. Jessica, renowned for her work in theater, film, and music, shares her journey and insights that have led to groundbreaking innovations in sound.
Listeners will be enthralled as Jessica recounts her experiences working on various acclaimed projects. She delves into her collaboration with Nevin Steinberg on Anaïs Mitchell’s "Hadestown," a project that not only won them a Tony Award but also a Drama Desk Award and an Outer Critics Circle nomination. Jessica's insights into this creative process provide a rare glimpse into the makings of a theatrical masterpiece.
The conversation also covers her role as an Associate Sound Designer on Broadway hits like "Dear Evan Hansen," "Fela!," and "Disaster! The Musical." Jessica offers a behind-the-scenes look at these productions, discussing the challenges and triumphs of bringing a show's auditory landscape to life.
Throughout the episode, Jessica emphasizes the importance of a hands-on approach and lifelong learning in her field. She shares how her relentless pursuit of acoustic exploration and the 'magic of sifting for gold' to delight audiences has shaped her career and contributions to the industry.
This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in the blend of technical skill and artistic creativity in sound design, and for those who seek to understand how sound shapes our experience of storytelling.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Support for designed by comes from generous
donations from listeners justlike you Visit designed by
us.org/donate ,
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Scanning all frequencies.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Sound is a puzzle.
You know, if I change theoutput volume of a speaker in
the sound system, that willhave a ripple effect on other
things. If I change, you know,the, the level of the guitar
overall through the show , Imean, that has a ripple effect.
The , but , so it's just like,it's, you move one part. And,
(00:38):
you know , Nevin likes to say,and I like his analogy about
this, it's like sifting forgold. Sometimes you solve one
thing and that revealssomething else.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Welcome to Design By I'm your host, Joanna Pena
Bickley . I've always believedthat great design is a journey
of learning, makingintelligence visible. In every
episode, I invite you to meetthe trailblazers and change
makers , hearing their powerfulstories of how they've not just
imagined, but intentionallyforged paths to a brighter
(01:10):
future. Tune in to theinspiring stories that will
energize you to intentionallydare to design a better future
today.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
Design . Design .
The design , the design , thedesign , the design of future
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Today is an absolute truth . As we welcome a true
luminary and sound design toour Aurora 21 Studios, please
give a warm welcome to theincredibly talented Jessica
Poz. Jessica is a TonyAward-winning sound designer,
renowned for her extraordinarycontributions to theater, film,
and music. And as a theaterbuff and a film enthusiast, I
(02:16):
am beyond excited about talkingwith Jessica today as we
unravel her fascinating journeyand go beyond and behind the
scenes. So, without furtherado, let's welcome Jessica.
Jessica, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
Hey, how are you?
Happy to be here. I'm ,
Speaker 1 (02:32):
I'm good, I'm good.
You know, I've always believedthat everybody has a story and
everybody's story matters. Solet's dive into yours. Where
does your story begin?
Speaker 3 (02:42):
So, I grew up in Brooklyn. Um, I had no
indication that I wanted to ,uh, work in theater. I , um,
when I graduated high school, Iwent to John Jay College of
Criminal Justice , uh, to studyforensic psychology. I, within
about a year and a half,decided that that wasn't for
me, and that I wanted to take abit of a break, and I became ,
(03:05):
uh, the assistant manager of ascuba diving store, and then
eventually a bookkeeper. Um,and then I, I was , uh, sort of
the executive assistant forthis accountant, and I realized
she was charging more money formy time than I was being paid
per hour, which totally makessense, and that's how it works.
But I then figured, well, Ican, you know, sort of
(03:28):
freelance bookkeeping and, and, uh, and so I did, and I made
10 more dollars an hour. So Ihad like a little in my, you
know, I was like 19, 20 yearsold, and I had like three
different clients. Um, acosmetic surgeon, a marketing
company, and a cleaningservice. And basically ended
up, instead of working 40 hoursa week, I was working, you
(03:49):
know, half of that. Yeah . Uh ,and making the same amount of
money. So that was really whatsort of opened up my time in
order to pursue theater. Butrewinding a little bit from
that, I , uh, fell into theaterby accident. Truly. I, you
know, in high school, theywould take us on these field
(04:09):
trips to see shows. And , uh,I, I specifically remember
seeing, bringing the noise,bringing the, the funk. And ,
uh, you know, about a week ago,actually, I was doing some
cleaning in my house, and Ifound all these old playbills
from shows that I've seen , uh,when I was in high school. But
it never occurred to me when Iwas watching these performances
that there was like an entirearmy of people behind the
(04:32):
scenes making it happen. Right.
It just, which is a testamentto the magic of live theater.
Right, right. Because there's ,um, it, I, I read this book
once called A Sense ofDirection by William Ball, and
he opens the book by sayingthat both the performers and
the audience, when they enter atheater to, to perform or watch
a show, all agree to suspensionof disbelief. Right? Mm-Hmm.
(04:56):
. And they , theyall agree to play, pretend for
the two and a half hours thatthey're there. And yeah. And,
and I guess I, I just, it justnever, it just never occurred
to me like what magic wasreally happening. And I
remember I had a friend , uh,who would perform , uh, as an
(05:16):
ensemble member in the RockyHorror Show at this community
theater in Long Island , uh, onSaturdays. And I would go every
Saturday, get dressed up, I'dhad know all the shout backs
and like , uh, she also playedEddie, Dr. Scott. And , um, it
was really fun. And, you know,I was 19 or 20 and spending
(05:37):
money on a ticket every weekendwas not something I wanted to
do. So I figured, well, if I'mhere, why not volunteer? And so
I would get to sit in theaudience and watch the show
until the very end when , uh,riffraff comes out on the, you
know, the rocket. And, and Iwould run the Fog Machine from
Backstage . That wasthe very first thing I did in
(05:58):
theater. And from there , uh, Ibegan sort of , uh, stage
managing, like assistant stagemanaging. I also ran automation
, um, why they had me runautomation, which is lowering
Rocky from the ceiling. Yeah .
And this, and it's, it was, itwas not like, it was not a
motor. It was actually a handcrank. And there was no way
(06:22):
that I could drop him 'cause itwould lock. Right. But I'm not
the strong, I'm, I'm like fivefoot four, and I weigh like 110
pounds , um, . So, andI'm like, lowering and 180
pound guy from the ceiling. Idon't know why they thought
that was a good idea, but I, Ididn't, he never got hurt. Um,
so I started stage managing andeventually , uh, that led to
(06:44):
working on a show called BatBoy The Musical. And , uh, one
of the people who was in theshow in New York actually was
playing Bat Boy. And the soundwas particularly terrible. I
don't know why. I'm not surewho did the design. I don't
know that they had a designer.
I think that they just, youknow, it was a small theater
(07:05):
that it's very low budget. Um,and, you know, we'd had
feedback all the time. And so Iremember asking a friend, I was
like, how do you do a miccheck?, that's awesome.
, how do you do a miccheck? I need to do a mic
check. So he is like, well, youdo, you know, you turn it on,
you turn these knobs, and thenyou find the feedback, and then
you get rid of it. And I waslike, okay, cool. So I go in
(07:26):
before the next show and I do amic check, and we finally had a
show without feedback. And ,um, I was running lights and
the lighting designer, oddlywas running the sound. And so
then I decided to switch us.
And so I started mixing theshow, and I just had a great
time. Uh, and, you know, everyday I would, you know, move
knobs around and make it soundbetter. And like, I had no idea
(07:47):
what I was really doing, but itsounded better. So I was pretty
happy with that. And , uh, afriend of mine , uh, on the
following show that I did,which I stage managed , which
was , uh, south Pacific, Iexpressed some interest in
continuing to do sound. And sheknew someone at another theater
in Long Island who wanted a sub, um, so that she could take
(08:10):
time off. And she didn't have asub at the moment. So I started
working there, and I think Imade like $50 a show or
something ridiculous. Um, and Ieventually took over mixing
because Jen, who was the soundperson at the time , um, sort
of moved on into the carpentrydepartment and started , uh,
(08:32):
working on Scenic designs. So,and , uh, you know, the short
story is eventually there wasthis production of Smokey Joe's
Cafe, which was being directedby my super dear friend Ellen
Dumlao , who I'm still friendswith to this day. And I was
super excited about it. And Iwent to my artistic director,
Noelle Ruiz, and I said that Iwanted to design the show. And
(08:56):
I, and he said, oh, really? Isaid, yes. He's like, okay. Um,
he's like, he, he, he didn'tsay yes right away. And so I, I
told him that if after two daysof tech he wasn't happy with my
work, he could fire me. Andthen he didn't fire me. So,
from then on, I was theresident sound designer and
(09:17):
engineer , um, at that theater, um, for about a year and a
half. And I then answered , uh,an ad on this mailing list for
a sound operator on a play forLabyrinth Theater Company. And
I remember interviewing withthe sound designer, and he
asked me if I knew thisparticular piece of software,
(09:37):
and I, he knows that I fibbed.
And I was like, oh, yeah, Iknow that. Um, so, and , but
what I did was, I, I wouldimagine you
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Immediately go out and buy the book or something
to like,
Speaker 3 (09:49):
Oh , well , I mean, there really wasn't a book on
it. Okay . But I, I looked itup, and then I made sure to ,
uh, you know, because he was inrehearsals Yeah . Prior to tech
doing some programming and,and, you know, working on the
sound design with the directorand , and with the actors. And
so I just went into the roomand watched him program. And ,
(10:11):
uh, so I was familiar enoughwith the software by the time
we got to Tech, and I operatedthat show, and he then asked me
to be his assistant on his nextproduction. And he and I ended
up working together for abouteight years on, you know, a
long list of shows that wereall wonderful. And that
(10:34):
culminated eventually into aproduction of a show called
fela . And for its , uh, sortof workshop, I was the engineer
, uh, and the production audioperson who was responsible for
installing the sound system, etcetera. And I was in the room
every day . And , um, wethought we were gonna move to
(10:56):
Broadway after that workshop,but it didn't turn out to be
that way. So the following yearwe did a second workshop that
culminated in a , in a officialoff-Broadway run for a few
weeks. So I was his , uh,assistant on that. And then we
found out that the show wasgonna move to Broadway. And it
(11:16):
was a beautiful moment,actually, because I was sitting
in the hospital holding hisbrand new baby Mm-Hmm . His
wife had just given birth thatafternoon. And I went to the
hospital to meet the baby, andwhile I'm holding his baby, he
told me that the show was gonnamove to Broadway, and that he
wanted me to be his associate.
And the show happened to openon Broadway, and at midnight it
(11:38):
became my 29th birthday, whichis pretty great at the opening
night party, which is superfun.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
That's remarkable.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Yeah. I was kind of , uh,
Speaker 1 (11:48):
How did you contain yourself? Like, just, you know,
you from going from a communityor public theater onto , you
know, the biggest stage in theworld?
Speaker 3 (11:58):
Uh , you know, I, I, I tell this story to everybody.
I, I cried every day on my,like , I cried my way home and
I cried my way to the theaterevery day for no other reason
than, it's just really hard.
It's just really hard work.
It's really hard work. Thehours are long. And I think
there was at one point, goingfrom tech into, through the
(12:20):
first week of previews, the waythat the, the week falls, like
when the week the Union Weekstarts, like the pay week
starts and ends allowed ussomehow to work 13 days in a
row. Hmm . And , uh, you know,honestly, just, I , I think I
cried my way home and into workevery day just because of sheer
(12:41):
exhaustion, , and it's,you know, it's, it's, it's not
just physical exhaustion, it'smental exhaustion. And, but,
you know, we did it and weopened the show and, and we, we
worked on it. Um , there weremultiple productions of it
beyond that. We took it to theNational Theater in London. We,
(13:01):
I got to , uh, take it toNigeria , uh, which was
fantastic. I got to mix aconcert version of the show in
Fela's actual nightclub, theShrine, which was a completely
out of body experience. Um, andthere were a number, a number
of tours, et cetera. So Icontinued to work on that for,
(13:22):
you know, five years. Andeventually, I, I sort of moved
into , uh, doing a lot ofmusic, mixing in, in bars and
clubs and at , at Sleep NoMore. That was like, sleep No
More was great because, youknow, I, I, well , let's
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Just start it like it was, when it first came out,
it was probably one of the mostnovel things that I'd ever
experienced. Yeah . It was likeAlfred Hitchcock's Marnie , um,
you know, meets somethingoperatic
Speaker 3 (13:50):
. I mean, I
think that it was, I believe
that it's the first of its kindin terms of immersive theater.
Like it created immersivetheater. Yeah. I, I saw the
show twice while I workedthere. And even though I knew
where to be at certain moments,somehow, no matter who I
followed, I always ended upback in the dining room,
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Speaker 3 (14:09):
At the feast. I'm like, how is it possible? I
like work here, I know whereI'm going. Um, but I, I mixed
sound in the , uh, I wasn't themain engineer. Uh, I, I just,
you know, sort of worked a fewdays a week. But the, the great
part was, you know , there'sthis jazz band, the house band,
if you've seen the show whereyou enter, there's, it's a bar.
(14:30):
There's no band there when youenter for the show. And then
when you come back at the end,there's a jazz band playing.
When the jazz band is done,then other bands play. So I got
to meet some of, like, thegreatest musicians in New York.
Um, and some of them are stillfriends of mine, and I go see
them play. And I, you know,know, one of the things I
(14:52):
always say about like, how doyou become a good sound
designer? And I, I , I trulythink that so much of my skill
comes from not just workingwith Rob, which was, you know,
he's a wonderful mentor, andthat was like the theater side
of it , but working at Sleep NoMore , which is a nightclub
environment. And I have like abox of s short SMM 50 sevens,
(15:16):
and maybe one kick drum mic.
And I have to make the showsound good. Uh , there are no
choices, right ? It's just likethat mic goes on the trumpet,
it goes on the saxophone, itgoes on the, you know, guitar
amp. But it , there's , it's ,it's just, you gotta , well ,
you got one mic, and you gottamake that sound good on
everything. And that reallyjust taught me how to work
(15:38):
quickly. Mm-Hmm.and, and taught me. I think
that having the samemicrophone, which has its own
sort of imprint, right. Its ownsort of tonal response, right.
And having to use that oneverything, I think really as
I'm thinking about it, made meable to understand how certain
(16:04):
instruments were voiced Mm-Hmm.
, because therewas no, there was no coloring
of anything by some other fancymicrophone. It's the same
microphone on everything. Andso I got to really dive into
like, oh, this is, this is whata baritone wants to sound like.
This is what a tenor wants tosound like. This is what a
guitar amp wants to sound like.
This is , um, what a voicewants to sound like. Mm-Hmm.
(16:28):
. And I thinkthat it didn't, there was no
masking. I just got to reallydig into the instrument. Um, so
I worked there, I worked atQueen of the Night for a while
. I worked at a nightclubcalled The Box , uh, for a
little bit mixing bands there.
I did a lot of events at SleepNo More . That was another
thing that was really great. Sothey'd have these events and
(16:50):
there'd be, you know, fourdifferent locations throughout
the building where bands wouldplay, and there'd be like four
different parties. But it wasall one party throughout the
entire five floors of thebuilding. And I happened to be
there also when they opened uptheir rooftop restaurant, Gallo
Green. So I got to mix bands upthere, and then they opened up
(17:10):
the restaurant just below thatcalled The Heath, and I got to
mix. And then they had a houseband up there on Friday nights
. So I was just like, I wasthere all the time. I was
practically there every daymixing. And , uh, one of the
highlights of that actually wasthe , um, preservation Hall
Jazz band did a residency forfive days, and I got to mix
them. Oh, wow. Yeah..
(17:34):
And, and they ended their setevery night with , uh, when the
Saints go marching in, which,funny enough, my grandfather
used to sing to me when I was ababy to put me to sleep. Oh . I
don't know why. That, and hewould shake me almost
violently. Yeah . Yeah . Andthat would make me stop crying
and fall asleep, . Uh ,so that was a real, it was a
(17:55):
real treat. Um, so yeah, so Idid, I did music for a while ,
and then I started just sort oftaking , um, uh, sound calls
and , and mind, you know,there's, there was also in
between all of this, I wasdoing the sound design for the,
the , the entirety of theLinbrook School district. So
(18:16):
three elementary schools , uh,two middle schools, and two
productions at the high schoolper year. And I was also doing
like, various sound calls andhauling cable across football
fields and pushing boxes and ,um, you know, doing, you know,
just like crazy, anything youcould design, like anything
that I could get my hands on,basically, it wasn't even
(18:39):
designing. It was just likeanything I could get my hands
on I wanted to do. Which, youknow, I also think was really
advantageous for my designcareer, because I know what
goes into unloading a truck,and I know what it takes to be
an A two backstage and runmics. And I, I know what it is
(18:59):
to , um, you know, have tochange over a band four times
in a night. Like, at theKnitting Factory, I had four
bands. There was all I had werestage plots, and I had to make
an input list, and I had to gobackstage, and I had to atch
things, and I just had toremember, yeah . Like, there
were nothing was labeled. Youdidn't, there was no time to
(19:20):
label anything. You have 20minutes to change over the
band, and you have to know,okay, the , that Okay, the
drums stay the drums, and thenwhat was the saxophone now
becomes the trumpet, and whatwas this becomes that. And, you
know, you just gotta, you justgotta roll with it. Yeah . And
then get , like, you're luckyif you get a sound check .
Sometimes people don't evenshow up for their soundtracks.
(19:42):
I've had vocalists just notshow up. Oh, wow. Oh, yeah. And
, and I have a , an interestingstory story to circle back
around , uh, the idea of Yes.
And , and improv , um, that hasto do with Haes Stone and
Broadway. But I , we'll, yeah,we'll get there. Circle back
around to that. Um, so a funstory was, you know, while I
(20:03):
was working at Queen of theNight, I was subbing for the
main engineer, and I happenedto get asked to sub on the New
Year's Eve performance of theshow. And afterward there would
be this, they, they threwparties all the time. And so
there was this band that wouldplay starting at 11 o'clock.
And so what we had to do was,in the day, we set up the band
(20:26):
on stage, they came in, theydid a sound check , then we had
to turn it back over into theshow. And as a matter of fact,
I wasn't doing the show thatnight because I was doing two
different New Year's events. Iwas mixing one of them, and I
hired an engineer because I wasdesigning the other one. So I
left to go to the other venue,which happened to be around the
(20:48):
corner at the Copa Cabana anddeal with that. And then the
engineer who was doing Queen ofthe Night, the actual show that
night, about a half an hourafter I leave, calls me and
says, so if I restored theconsole from the USB stick that
(21:11):
I have the show saved on, doesthat erase the scene that we
created for the bands that goeson tonight? Take it too far .
And I was like , um, uh, yeah,yeah, it does. So essentially,
(21:34):
when he came into Sub on theshow , um, because he wanted to
be super sure that he was usingthe right file and the right,
he would , would just, he wouldload it from the USB stick,
which just erases the wholedesk. Um, and, you know, I had
a snapshot in the desk that waslike, way past the show,
somewhere that was, you know,with Monitor wedge mixes, like
(21:57):
EQs, there was like, it waslike a six piece band. So I
call my production manager, andI'm like, so there's this
thing. And I have, I wouldn'tsay I have like a , a perfect
photographic memory, but I havea pretty good photographic
memory. Like, if I walk intoone of my shows and I look at
(22:18):
Niq for an actor, I can tellyou whether it's correct or
not. Mm-Hmm.most, for the most part. Um, or
if that's like, where I leftit, right? Like , I know, I
know the level, like the outputlevels of, of certain channels
of my processor on my Broadwayshows and my tours. Like, I
could tell you, you know, Icould at least get very close.
(22:39):
Mm-Hmm.. So Ihave to go in and instead of me
being able to help mycounterpart change over from
the show to the band, which weonly have about 30 minutes to
do, I have to sit in front ofthe desk and try to remember
everything that I did duringsoundcheck. And of
course, the band has no idea.
(23:01):
Right ? The band has no clue.
And my production manager'sstanding next to me, and she's
like, are you okay? Is it gonnabe okay? Are you okay? And I
was like, I , you know, I we'regonna find out. I'm gonna turn
it on. And, you know, if they,they're either gonna tell me
that it sounds fine if there ,or it doesn't. And I'll hear
the house and I'll makeadjustments. But my biggest
(23:22):
concern was like, am I justgonna totally throw off the
band if their monitor mixesaren't correct? Mm-Hmm.
. And , uh, youknow, we get to, we get to the
show, and I just like, I'mlike, all right, hold onto your
butts. And I just opened up thefaders and everything was fine.
It was fine. But that was, thatwas absolutely nerve wracking.
(23:43):
It was just, it was completelynerve wracking. I've never had
to just like, all right, Ithink I, I did this, this,
this, this, this, this, this,this. Here we go.
Speaker 5 (24:02):
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Speaker 2 (25:31):
Welcome back.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
That's a pretty, I one of the things I, I think I
kind of pick up is that youhave a sense of resilience,
, , you know,and it is, and I think you've
gotta kind of have that , um,as a creator. Um , sure. You
know, I think there is a senseof the, the meticulous, to your
point around having , um, thephotographic memory and being
(26:00):
able to go back, but in amoment of stress sometimes, I
don't know about you, but I, I, at the most stressful I have,
like, had those moments ofphotographic memory. Oh, recall
not happening..
Speaker 3 (26:13):
Right? Sure. I mean, I think that it, you know, I, I
certainly go through, I, I liketo say that I have , uh, I go
through postmortem at the endof every project, and I, I
certainly have breakdown , um,in a way, like, I'll sleep for
like three days to a week aftera project is done, or after a
(26:35):
series of projects are done.
Sometimes I move from one tothe next, to the next, to the
next. Um, but it's like apostpartum, you know, it's,
it's like, it's like givingbirth to a child.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (26:47):
So, and then all of a sudden, you know, it's, it's
this super intense 16 hours aday high stakes, and then it's
like being dropped off a cliff.
'cause it's now it's open andit's done. And it's over What?
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Yeah. .
Speaker 3 (27:05):
It was just like, yeah. It's just getting like,
pushed out of an airplane andyou're like, all right .
Speaker 1 (27:10):
Well, give me a give, I guess, give our
listeners a little bit. I thinkthat I'd love to dive a little
bit behind the scenes. Likegive us a day in the life of ,
you know, what , uh, you know,what going through tech is
like, and then opening night.
You know, it's, I I think thatday
Speaker 3 (27:27):
In the life I was gonna ask you which day.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
Yeah ., we
might pick a couple days. Yeah.
Let , let's maybe pick up likesome of the, the hardest ones.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
Well, I'll just, I'll summarize sort of the
pre-production process. Um,there's interesting things to
talk about where that'sconcerned. But, you know,
essentially for a Broadway show, uh, all we get is four walls
and some seats and a stage.
There's no cable, there's nospeakers, there's no lights,
there's, there's nothing. Andthere, there aren't even
sometimes systems in thedressing rooms. And so I and my
(28:00):
team spec every single piece ofsound equipment that goes into
a production. Um, speakers,amplifiers, microphones, like
every adapter, like it's, youname it. Yeah . Um , paging
Systems. We also handleIntercom and all of the closed
caption television , uh, thatthe, the team uses backstage to
(28:23):
stage management uses the callthe show, and everybody look ,
you know, watches , uh, hasmonitors to , uh, see what's
going on on stage. And so we,we also take care of all of
that. So the , I get hired fora show, and what happens is we
go to a site visit, I look atthe space in 3D, and then on a
, in, you know, a 2D medium ,uh, for drafting. I turn that
(28:44):
into a prediction. I take itinto prediction software, and
then I look at speaker systemsand spec what it is I want. And
then we draft that on the 2Dmedium, and then we share that
with other departments. Andthen, you know, lighting. And
I'll figure out, you know,okay, well, can you put the
speaker here? Can you go onefoot over there? You know, can
(29:04):
we, I , you know, can you takethat light out of center? I
need to put a speaker there. Wedo all of that. And , um, then
I create like a flow. There'sa, there's a workbook that has
about, I don't know, 30different Excel sheets in it
that specify inputs, outputs,amplifier channels, processing
channels, networkconfiguration, intercom
(29:27):
configuration, videoconfiguration. Uh , there's
pivot tables that tally things.
It's, it's a very involveddocument that evolves over
time. But that , that, thatinput output flow gets created.
And that's how I then make alist that gets sent to the
shops for bid. They come backwith pricing. They also come
(29:48):
back with, we have this, butnot that we have this speaker,
but not that speaker. And , youknow, can, can you deal with
this substitution? If not, thenthey have to buy that equipment
because I want it. Right?
Mm-Hmm . So , Mm-Hmm .
. And it's , it'sa matter of like choosing and
engineering where you want tomake the exceptions and say,
okay, well yes, I can use thatthing that you have in stock to
replace this thing that I askedfor, but I can't do it for this
(30:11):
item. Like, I can't do that forthe console because I need that
for being able to mix the showand design it the way that I
want and to get the result thatI'm looking for. So that
happens. And then we go into ,uh, go through that process
that producing producers,producing company general
managers will agree with a shopon pricing for a per weekly
(30:35):
rental cost. Mm-Hmm.
. And then , um,my team, so my, my engineer, a
one who mixes the show, a twowho works backstage , uh, and
does all the RF work and workswith the actors and their
microphones, the productionaudio person who oversees the
installation, my associate anda number of other people who
(30:57):
come in to help build the show,build the show from scratch.
Like all of that equipmentcomes in . We all , we , it
gets built custom for everyshow. We put it together, we
test it, and then we take itapart. And we don't take it all
the way apart, but we like, youknow, 'cause we don't take
everything out of the racks,but , um, it's sort of like ,
(31:19):
um, what's that show with themotorcycles?
Speaker 1 (31:21):
? ,
I'm not sure.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
They build, the motorcycles come and then they
have to take them apart becausethey have to send all the parts
out for being like, to bepainted. And then it comes
back, and then it gets p putback together. I forget the ,
it's like the name is escapingme. So it gets taken apart, put
on a truck sent to the theater,and then it gets installed in
the theater. And then we starttech. Yeah . We tune the
(31:44):
system. So I go in, I make abunch of pink noise, I, it's
awful sounding. And then I, youknow, calibrate the speaker
system and, and then we starttech.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
It sounds like what, what's interesting to me is
that as you're going throughit, it really sounds like you
are a conductor of an orchestraof everything from the
equipment to the people. Andthen there's the sound, which
is the thing that everybody isproducing.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Oh . And we haven't even gotten to that part yet.
Yeah. Right .
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Like ,
Speaker 3 (32:10):
All of that's happening , and we haven't even
gotten to sound. Um, uh, a afun thing that , uh, Nevin, my
, my partner in Hades Town ,uh, I , I learned from him, and
he likes to say is, you know,on the first day of Tech Sound
comes out, no one gets hurt.
Like, that's, that's the onlygoal for the first session of
Tech Sound came out, no one gothurt . Um , so yeah.
(32:31):
And, you know, tech is, tech isintense in many ways. It's
intense because sometimesyou're sitting around and
waiting, you know, it can becompletely frustrating. I've
had a show where we had so muchautomation on, on this show
that I think we actually turnedon microphones for an , like,
(32:54):
an entire 25 minutes totalacross the 16 hour day. So, you
know, sometimes it's like a lotof waiting. And I work on other
things. I work on, you know,just preliminary EQs for the
band before I get them, youknow, we're working on setting
up the band wherever it is.
(33:16):
They're located in the pit, onstage , on a band platform, et
cetera, in sometimes a dressingroom . Sometimes drums will be
in a dressing room on thefourth floor. Mm-Hmm.
, you know, inthe tower. Um, you know, we
work on sound effects or anysound cues. Sometimes we're
helping to , uh, facilitateshow control. So like time code
(33:37):
that will trigger lighting orprojections. Um, so there's,
there's stuff to do, you know,and, and of course all of the ,
um, utility microphones thatthe , the director and the
choreographers speak over,like, that's coming through our
sound system. Intercom is ourresponsibility. Videos are a
responsibility, not video thatis part of the show, but the
(33:59):
backstage video backstage isbizarre . Yeah. So there's,
there's lots going on. Um, andduring that time, prior to
getting the band, we just havelike a rehearsal piano,
sometimes rehearsal drums thatare just in the house . And,
and I, I focus really on thevocal system. Mm-Hmm.
(34:20):
the sound systemand how the vocals come through
the sound system. And I, I workvery hard on getting that too
sound as good as possiblebefore we get the band in
earnest, right? Mm-Hmm.
. So then we'lldo, usually it's two band
calls, so 9:00 AM to noon priorto two, four or five hour text
(34:44):
sessions. So it's like a, it'slike an 8:00 AM to 11:00 PM
day. Mm-Hmm. .
Um, and the first day isseating, but by then we've
pretty much line checkedeverything already on our own.
So we seat the band, we makethem comfortable, but all of
their stuff is functional, andall their monitoring is already
functional. And so seatinggenerally turns into like a
(35:06):
line check with the actualplayers, and then them checking
their in air monitors and theirlittle personal mixers and
making sure that they have whatthey need, you know, utility
wise . And then I'll usuallyend that session , uh, more,
more often than not, like 99%of the time that, that sound,
(35:28):
that seating session ends withbeing able to play through a
song . And then the secondsession, the next day , uh, is
playing through the show fromtop to bottom. Mm-Hmm.
. Um, and I justlisten to the band and it's,
that's really about, I'm notdoing too many sort of level
changes of individual inputsper song. What I'm really doing
(35:51):
in that session is making surethat we have something cohesive
top to bottom for the show.
Like, does the guitar soundgood all of the time? Mm-Hmm.
like, yes, wehave to bring out little
accents here and there, etcetera. That's programming that
we'll take care of as we nowmove through the tech process
with the band and, and bandsessions and through notes. Um,
(36:13):
but it's really about gettingthe band to sound good as a
whole. And then there's the,the , um, the very, it , it
always ends up going fine, butit's always very stressful the
first day that you put cast andband together for the first
time. Hmm . There's , uh,usually something called a Sits
probe , where we go into a ,you know, a rehearsal studio
(36:33):
and the, the actors get to singthrough the show with the full
band and, and everyone gets tohear the orchestrations on
Hades Town . We don't do sitsprobes. We do V probes. And so
it's just, and, and we did thaton Beautiful Noise as well.
It's just, we just get on stageand the first time cast in band
is together, is everyonesinging through the show in
(36:54):
microphone and with sound. AndI get to hang out on stage and
make sure monitoring , uh,monitoring systems and, and ,
uh, are sufficient for theactors to hear what they need
to hear , uh, in terms of bandinformation and that they're
getting what they want. Andthen in certain circumstances ,
uh, on shows in which theactors are wearing boom
(37:15):
microphones, headset mics.
Mm-Hmm. , uh,there may very well be vocals
in the onstage monitors aswell. Got it. So I get to have
a lot of time to work on thatduring the V probe. Um, so
it's, you know, the first timewe put the cast in band
together, I'm , I'm usually onstage with my iPad that can
control the console and alaptop that can control the
(37:37):
sound system. And just makingsure that , um, everyone's
feeling comfortable. And, andof course, everyone has the
ability to stop that rehearsalshould they not be able to hear
something. And , um, you know,I'm there to help. So, and that
gives me a , you know, a goodidea of like, oh, okay, well ,
you know what? The band is notdrowning out the vocals. It's
actually fitting togetherpretty well. And like Mm-Hmm.
(37:58):
, it gives me anidea of what work is ahead of
us, you know? Um, and then wehave run throughs, you know,
and we just, we just keep everyday , you know, the , every day
the, the focus get gets smallerand smaller. Like, it, it
starts as the big picture andthen, you know, and then you
just, it's like dial in and youfocus in. And I, I , I'd like
to say that it's like this,it's , um, sound is a puzzle,
(38:22):
you know? Mm-Hmm .
, if I change theoutput volume of a speaker in
the sound system, that willhave a ripple effect on other
things. If I change, you know,the, the level of the guitar
overall through the show . Imean, that has a ripple effect
though . But , so it's justlike, it's, you move one part
(38:42):
and, you know , Nevin likes tosay, and I like that his
analogy about this, it's likesifting for gold. Sometimes you
solve one thing and thatreveals something else. Right.
Uh, so, you know, you sort of,it's sort of a, like a spiral.
You sort of circle around itand, and the circle gets
smaller and smaller and smallerand smaller and smaller until
one day it just goes dinging . Yeah . It
Speaker 1 (39:05):
Just all, it all
Speaker 3 (39:06):
Slot slots together.
And that also has to do with ,you know , the a one learning
the show. I mean, they'remixing , um, they're mixing the
show line by line . So ifthere's two people on stage
having a conversation, only oneperson's microphone is open at
one at a time.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 3 (39:24):
For every single line that they speak. There's a
really interesting , um, videothat was done where , where you
can witness , um, a friend ofmine, Kevin McCoy mix some of
Hamilton actually, and I, Iforget what show it was on,
it's it , there's a video onYouTube and ,
Speaker 1 (39:45):
Uh , oh my gosh. At the rate and pace that those,
they are going and it's like a, it , they're calling back.
It's, there's no pause. What anorchestration. Like, oh my
gosh,
Speaker 3 (39:55):
I've attempted to learn the show. Yeah. And , uh,
uh, I was actually training tobecome a sub on it, which ended
up not panning out because Iended up on some other
projects. And so I couldn'tstay committed to it. But , uh,
my, a friend of mine was like,Hey, good luck with the
Reynolds pamphlet, which islike the, the really fast wrap
number in Act two . The , youknow , uh, you're never gonna
(40:19):
be president. Mm-Hmm .
, it's sounbelievably fast. It's so
fast. It really, I'll saythough, it being fast is fine
because once you learn it,because that entire show, and
Hades Town similarly, is all tomusic, right ? It all has to
like slot into a rhythm. And sofor me, actually mixing
(40:43):
dialogue scenes is harderbecause they don't necessarily
follow the same, the actorsdon't necessarily follow the
same rhythm in those scenes.
'cause they have a little bitmore freedom. They don't have
to be on, on a beat. Right. So,but I mean, I haven't mixed
anything in about five years.
So,
Speaker 1 (41:02):
So let's talk about this remarkable journey. Like,
you, you go from, like, itsounds like you go from like,
kind of stumbling into it, youknow, during high school, while
you're juggling lots of otherthings , um, you come into this
space, and one of the thingsthat I have loved about this is
that you seem to have avoracious desire to learn. Um,
(41:24):
right. Because it seems likeyou didn't have formal training
coming into the space. It waslike, I'm gonna learn this
thing. I work , we're gonnafigure it out, out, and then
I'm gonna make an art of it.
Mm-Hmm. . And itseems like you're having a ton
of fun. So you get to thispoint where you've started to
build a network, you've gotthat, and then Tony's like,
(41:46):
when, and , and, you know, I ,I hit the Tony's, you go, okay.
Along those ways, you've wontons of awards , uh, you've had
a tremendous amount ofrecognition, but then you get a
show like Hayestown Mm-Hmm .
that , um, forour listeners out there, and
I'd love for you to kind oftake us through it, but you
know, for me , um, you know, Ithink we all know Hamilton, but
(42:09):
Hayestown is actually , um, issomething so remarkable in the
story that it tells, but it islike the, the music is so
stirring and there , the, theblend between effects and
music, and it all culminatesand creates a part of the
story. If you turned off thesound, you'd miss so much of
(42:34):
the emotion Mm-Hmm .
, uh, the humanemotion in, in every scene. And
so tell us a little bit aboutone, how do you land a show
like that? And then two, because that in itself, right
, uh, is I think an importantpart of the journey. But I
think too is, you know, how doyou go from, when you were
talking a little bit about, youknow, every day of that first
(42:56):
in interaction of when you getto Broadway crying, to finding
the joy and getting reallyexcited about doing something
this big.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
Oh gosh, yeah. I mean, there was a lot of joy.
And there was also, you know,the, the absolute just sheer
knowledge of, oh my gosh, I'mactually designing a Broadway
show. Um, but just to rewind alittle bit , um, I, I landed a
show like Hayestown because ofNevin. He hired me as his
(43:25):
associate to do the Canadaproduction. And , um, he had
limited availability. Heoffered my me up as an
associate who could go in hisstead , and he would come
visit. And I went to Canada,worked on the show, and then a
year later, approximately ayear , uh, they were gonna do a
(43:48):
production of the show, anotherout of town. Like , I think the
idea was to move the show toBroadway after Canada. But ,
uh, they decided to do anotherout of town . And we did it in
London at the National, whichis just like one of the most
amazing facilities to work at.
I just love that place. Um, andI remember I had stopped into a
(44:11):
rehearsal one day to like watcha run through , and my producer
was there and she's like, can Italk to you for a minute in the
other room? And I was like,what? ? Oh God. Okay.
Uh , sure. And , um, she saidthat they wanted to make me
co-designer of the show. And Iwas like, does Nevin know about
(44:32):
that? Like, she's like, oh,yeah, no. He was part of the
conversation. And so I calledhim and he, you know, he is
like, are you okay with that?
And I was like , yeah, I'm okaywith that. So I went to London
to do the show there, and hecame out to visit, and, and
then we were, we were actuallytogether the whole time on
Broadway, which was great. And,you know, I, I learned so much
(44:54):
from him. Um, and it was sowonderful to have a friend and
a colleague and a mentor that Iadmire and love working with,
be there for my first design.
You know, the Mm-Hmm .
. It , it just,it felt like, it just felt like
(45:19):
such a wonderful supportsystem. And I, I, I remember ,
uh, I'm not certain that I, I ,I think at this point I've told
him this story, but rightbefore we went to Broadway, I
read Tina Faye's book , uh,bossy Pants . I love
that book. It's so good. Sogood. Yeah. It's so good. But
there was one part that reallystood out to me because I, of
(45:42):
course was, you know, Nevin wasaround for part of Canada and
London, but not through thewhole process each time. And I
was having a little bit ofstress about how do I do this
with him the whole time? Um,and, and the reason I was
(46:06):
stressed is because I believethat , um, I believe at , at
least for me, in , in my storyin my life, that equality is
not just about people treatingme as their equal, but about
feeling like I am their equal.
Yeah . Right? Yeah. Because,and, and I think that they're
two very separate things. Yeah.
(46:28):
And they also play into eachother. Right. Because he could
treat me like his equal all daylong. If I don't feel that way
in myself, in my own body, inmy own spirit, in my own work,
then it, you know, how hetreats me isn't gonna land. I
mean , he always treats me asan equal. That's totally a
thousand percent. But I wentinto it going like, okay, I
(46:50):
have to, I have to believe thatI have to show up feeling like
he's equal. And when I amhaving a conversation with him
artistically about a moment inthe show, I need to not feel
intimidated. Mm-Hmm.
. And not only ,uh, is he my mentor, but you
know, for the last five years,the relationship we had was me
(47:15):
as his associate, not as hisco-designer. Mm-Hmm.
. Right. And asan associate, there's just a,
you know, I may have an opinionabout something and I might
share that with him, butultimately it's not up to me.
Right. I , like, I might havean idea. Um, and, but as a
co-designer, I'm, I can have anidea and I can also be like,
(47:37):
no, I really think this is howit ought to be. And in Tina
Faye's book , there is, andit's actually in a like gray
box, and she describes improv,and I read that portion . I
actually like took a photo ofit, so I carried it around with
me everywhere. And it's aboutimprov being about, yes. And ,
(48:01):
you know, it's, improv doesn'twork if someone says that
they're a pickle and the otherperson doesn't believe that
they're a pickle, they can'trespond in an improvisational
way. And I just thought thatwas such a great piece of
advice to take with me intothat room and, and approach
(48:22):
working with him in a yes endway, in which if he questioned
me or he had an idea, I wouldsay yes. And also, what if we
did Yes. And also, yes. And thereason it was born that way, or
the reason that it is designedthat way is because here are
the steps that we took inCanada and London that landed
(48:44):
us into this place, but what is, what is it that you think
and, oh, yeah, that's a greatidea. Let's do that. Um, and
then we'd have really like goodfun on stage because I'd be
like, oh my God, this monitorsounds terrible. We'd like walk
it around like , Jason , he'slike, well, why'd you, why'd
you make it that way?
Speaker 1 (49:01):
? Yeah .
Why'd you do that ?
Speaker 3 (49:04):
Um, and , uh, or, you know, something would
happen and he'd be like, Idon't know, go talk to the
sound designer
Speaker 1 (49:11):
.
Speaker 3 (49:12):
So we'd have, we'd have a lot of, we'd have a lot
of fun, which was good. Butthat, that book and that
particular excerpt about improvhas just been something I've
carried with me for since that,since that moment, since I've
read it.
Speaker 1 (49:25):
How do you, so where do you find your confidence? I
mean, where do , where does itcome from? Because you, you
have a con . It's contagious.
Um, it really is.
Speaker 3 (49:34):
Uh , uh, that's really interesting that you say
that. And, and , um, uh, I ,people laugh at me when I say
that I'm shy, actually, andthey're like , you are not shy.
You are not subtle. You are notshy.
Speaker 1 (49:45):
I have never met a New York kid, like somebody who
grew up in New York, who'sactually shy.
Speaker 3 (49:51):
Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1 (49:52):
How does that work?
taken a lot of work.
Yeah . Um ,
Speaker 3 (49:56):
To be honest, you know, it's, I, I was very shy
as a child . Okay. And , um, I,I, you know, I was not popular
in elementary school. I was anerd. And , um, I was as
Speaker 1 (50:08):
The greats are usually.
Speaker 3 (50:10):
Yes. I was super tiny. Um, I'm still only like
115 pounds soaking wet, and I'mfive foot three and a half. You
know, I'm, I'm a small, smallperson. I don't feel , I , I
don't, I don't act like I'msmall. Like I don't, it doesn't
occur to me that I'm little.
It's like, it's like thoselittle tiny dogs that think
that they're like hugedobermans or something. It's
(50:32):
like that's how does , itdoesn't occur to me how tiny I
actually am. Um, I , I wouldjust say that it's always been
a work in progress. And, youknow, I have a lot of days
where I 100% have completeimposter syndrome. Um, I don't,
I don't know anyone personallywho doesn't ever have that.
Yeah. I think that it's,
Speaker 1 (50:51):
How do you quiet that? Yeah. How do you quiet
that down? 'cause I, I haveactually, I had a girlfriend
who said , uh, to me, once upona time I was having terrible
imposter syndrome. I justlanded a new role. It was
thing, and we were doingsomething and I was feeling
completely outta my comfortzone, which meant I was
growing. Mm-Hmm .. But I remember, like, she
could see it in, in my face,and she said, you need to shut
(51:14):
that up.
Speaker 3 (51:15):
,
Speaker 1 (51:17):
You got into this room because of this, this, and
this. Shut her up.
Speaker 3 (51:23):
I, I say that I, I, you know, I cope with it in ,
in the , in the sense that whenI, when it comes down to having
to get it done, I just get itdone. There is no, there is no
other option. It just needs toget done. Right. It needs to
get done. It needs to get done.
Well, we're working at thehighest level that we're
(51:45):
working. I am 100% aperfectionist. Um, and I will
never actually achieveperfection. And I, but
Speaker 1 (51:53):
You know that. Yeah.
But you know that, right. Thatthere's a part of you that says
you can strive for perfectionand that's what makes you great
.
Speaker 3 (52:02):
Right. Okay . So there will always be a note.
There will always be a note. Ofcourse. I, you know, I will
never mix a perfect show. Iwill never, you know, it's,
it's, there will always be somelittle thing that probably the
audience doesn't even notice.
Um, but I know it , I know, Iknow that that was like ever so
slightly a millisecond too lateor what have you. Um, but yeah,
when it comes down to it, I,there there's no room for that
(52:24):
voice in my head when it's likego time. Um, it'll usually come
into my brain at night or on myday off. And I mean, there's
just no, there's just no choice
Speaker 1 (52:38):
In a live situation.
You're absolutely right. Youjust, it feels like it's,
you've gotta go with what yourinstinct is. And if you're, if
you're good at your craft, thenyour instincts are probably
right. Mm-Hmm. .
Speaker 3 (52:51):
Mm-Hmm.
a lot of thetime. Sometimes they're wrong,
but Yeah . But then, but youknow, they're wrong. 'cause you
try it and then you're like,oh, that's not right.
Speaker 1 (53:00):
. Right.
,
Speaker 3 (53:04):
Uh , you know, and I think that it actually, part of
the way that I quiet her isthat I have learned to not be
afraid to fail. That took a lotof work and I still am working
on that and I will be workingon that for the rest of my
life. But I, I constantlyremind myself that it is okay
to make a mistake becauseactually sometimes making a
(53:24):
mistake might lead you to theright answer. Mm-Hmm.
and the rightidea. Um, so that's how I quiet
it because we're human
Speaker 1 (53:35):
Listening to this episode with you, Rachel, our
podcast sound designer. I'malways really curious as , uh,
somebody who's in the area ofthis craft, what did you think?
Speaker 6 (53:47):
Well, the two things that really stuck out to me is
sound is like a puzzle. Uh , Ireally love that because that
is the truth of sound,especially when you're working
in such a live setting. Becausethe guitar, the people, the
general orchestra do not soundthe same, but yet they need to
have equal measure when itcomes to being sure everyone
(54:07):
has the same focus on what'shappening on stage. And, you
know, I enjoyed hearing asawkward as that sound. I
enjoyed hearing that I'm notthe only one with imposter
syndrome. And it allows Jessicato fight to the eventual path
of growth.
Speaker 1 (54:23):
I think she was so candid about that. I think the
fact that she talked about ,um, you know, that her growth ,
um, came with crying everysingle day. That that feeling,
that discomfort actually meantthat she was growing and she
was growing , um, in a paththat wasn't easy.
Speaker 6 (54:40):
Exactly. And it's also just the humility of
understanding that while you dohave all these awards and
accolades, you need to behumble enough to be able to
understand failure Totally. Ina sense of a learning
opportunity and not a step backin your career.
Speaker 1 (54:55):
Totally. And I think Jessica Poz is a great example
of how that humility comes tolife. It makes her so real, so
approachable. Um, and I reallythink the world of Jessica and
her work,
Speaker 6 (55:09):
No. And I'm very excited 'cause uh, when we go
to the premium content, you'llhear a lot more about that.
Want to read us out?
Speaker 1 (55:15):
This episode was written and produced by the
Design Corps at Aurora 21 inthe heart of New York's magical
Hudson Valley. Special thanksto the musical talents of
Rachel Bickley, our podcastsound designer. Our theme music
was composed by substancestudios. If you're already
following the show, you arewell on your way to designing a
(55:37):
better future today. Design .
If not, design ,
Speaker 3 (55:40):
Design , design , design ,
Speaker 1 (55:41):
It's time to join our community and feel the
magic. Go to your favoritepodcast, service and search
designed by with Joanna PenaBickley . And hit follow .
Support for designed by comes from generous
donations from listeners justlike you Visit designed by
us.org/donate ,
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Scanning all frequencies.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Sound is a puzzle.
You know, if I change theoutput volume of a speaker in
the sound system, that willhave a ripple effect on other
things. If I change, you know,the, the level of the guitar
overall through the show , Imean, that has a ripple effect.
The , but , so it's just like,it's, you move one part. And,
(00:38):
you know , Nevin likes to say,and I like his analogy about
this, it's like sifting forgold. Sometimes you solve one
thing and that revealssomething else.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Welcome to Design By I'm your host, Joanna Pena
Bickley . I've always believedthat great design is a journey
of learning, makingintelligence visible. In every
episode, I invite you to meetthe trailblazers and change
makers , hearing their powerfulstories of how they've not just
imagined, but intentionallyforged paths to a brighter
(01:10):
future. Tune in to theinspiring stories that will
energize you to intentionallydare to design a better future
today.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
Design . Design .
The design , the design , thedesign , the design of future
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Today is an absolute truth . As we welcome a true
luminary and sound design toour Aurora 21 Studios, please
give a warm welcome to theincredibly talented Jessica
Poz. Jessica is a TonyAward-winning sound designer,
renowned for her extraordinarycontributions to theater, film,
and music. And as a theaterbuff and a film enthusiast, I
(02:16):
am beyond excited about talkingwith Jessica today as we
unravel her fascinating journeyand go beyond and behind the
scenes. So, without furtherado, let's welcome Jessica.
Jessica, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
Hey, how are you?
Happy to be here. I'm ,
Speaker 1 (02:32):
I'm good, I'm good.
You know, I've always believedthat everybody has a story and
everybody's story matters. Solet's dive into yours. Where
does your story begin?
Speaker 3 (02:42):
So, I grew up in Brooklyn. Um, I had no
indication that I wanted to ,uh, work in theater. I , um,
when I graduated high school, Iwent to John Jay College of
Criminal Justice , uh, to studyforensic psychology. I, within
about a year and a half,decided that that wasn't for
me, and that I wanted to take abit of a break, and I became ,
(03:05):
uh, the assistant manager of ascuba diving store, and then
eventually a bookkeeper. Um,and then I, I was , uh, sort of
the executive assistant forthis accountant, and I realized
she was charging more money formy time than I was being paid
per hour, which totally makessense, and that's how it works.
But I then figured, well, Ican, you know, sort of
(03:28):
freelance bookkeeping and, and, uh, and so I did, and I made
10 more dollars an hour. So Ihad like a little in my, you
know, I was like 19, 20 yearsold, and I had like three
different clients. Um, acosmetic surgeon, a marketing
company, and a cleaningservice. And basically ended
up, instead of working 40 hoursa week, I was working, you
(03:49):
know, half of that. Yeah . Uh ,and making the same amount of
money. So that was really whatsort of opened up my time in
order to pursue theater. Butrewinding a little bit from
that, I , uh, fell into theaterby accident. Truly. I, you
know, in high school, theywould take us on these field
(04:09):
trips to see shows. And , uh,I, I specifically remember
seeing, bringing the noise,bringing the, the funk. And ,
uh, you know, about a week ago,actually, I was doing some
cleaning in my house, and Ifound all these old playbills
from shows that I've seen , uh,when I was in high school. But
it never occurred to me when Iwas watching these performances
that there was like an entirearmy of people behind the
(04:32):
scenes making it happen. Right.
It just, which is a testamentto the magic of live theater.
Right, right. Because there's ,um, it, I, I read this book
once called A Sense ofDirection by William Ball, and
he opens the book by sayingthat both the performers and
the audience, when they enter atheater to, to perform or watch
a show, all agree to suspensionof disbelief. Right? Mm-Hmm.
(04:56):
the two and a half hours thatthey're there. And yeah. And,
and I guess I, I just, it justnever, it just never occurred
to me like what magic wasreally happening. And I
remember I had a friend , uh,who would perform , uh, as an
(05:16):
ensemble member in the RockyHorror Show at this community
theater in Long Island , uh, onSaturdays. And I would go every
Saturday, get dressed up, I'dhad know all the shout backs
and like , uh, she also playedEddie, Dr. Scott. And , um, it
was really fun. And, you know,I was 19 or 20 and spending
(05:37):
money on a ticket every weekendwas not something I wanted to
do. So I figured, well, if I'mhere, why not volunteer? And so
I would get to sit in theaudience and watch the show
until the very end when , uh,riffraff comes out on the, you
know, the rocket. And, and Iwould run the Fog Machine from
Backstage
(05:58):
theater. And from there , uh, Ibegan sort of , uh, stage
managing, like assistant stagemanaging. I also ran automation
, um, why they had me runautomation, which is lowering
Rocky from the ceiling. Yeah .
And this, and it's, it was, itwas not like, it was not a
motor. It was actually a handcrank. And there was no way
(06:22):
that I could drop him 'cause itwould lock. Right. But I'm not
the strong, I'm, I'm like fivefoot four, and I weigh like 110
pounds , um,
pound guy from the ceiling. Idon't know why they thought
that was a good idea, but I, Ididn't, he never got hurt. Um,
so I started stage managing andeventually , uh, that led to
(06:44):
working on a show called BatBoy The Musical. And , uh, one
of the people who was in theshow in New York actually was
playing Bat Boy. And the soundwas particularly terrible. I
don't know why. I'm not surewho did the design. I don't
know that they had a designer.
I think that they just, youknow, it was a small theater
(07:05):
that it's very low budget. Um,and, you know, we'd had
feedback all the time. And so Iremember asking a friend, I was
like, how do you do a miccheck?
check. So he is like, well, youdo, you know, you turn it on,
you turn these knobs, and thenyou find the feedback, and then
you get rid of it. And I waslike, okay, cool. So I go in
(07:26):
before the next show and I do amic check, and we finally had a
show without feedback. And ,um, I was running lights and
the lighting designer, oddlywas running the sound. And so
then I decided to switch us.
And so I started mixing theshow, and I just had a great
time. Uh, and, you know, everyday I would, you know, move
knobs around and make it soundbetter. And like, I had no idea
(07:47):
what I was really doing, but itsounded better. So I was pretty
happy with that. And , uh, afriend of mine , uh, on the
following show that I did,which I stage managed , which
was , uh, south Pacific, Iexpressed some interest in
continuing to do sound. And sheknew someone at another theater
in Long Island who wanted a sub, um, so that she could take
(08:10):
time off. And she didn't have asub at the moment. So I started
working there, and I think Imade like $50 a show or
something ridiculous. Um, and Ieventually took over mixing
because Jen, who was the soundperson at the time , um, sort
of moved on into the carpentrydepartment and started , uh,
(08:32):
working on Scenic designs. So,and , uh, you know, the short
story is eventually there wasthis production of Smokey Joe's
Cafe, which was being directedby my super dear friend Ellen
Dumlao , who I'm still friendswith to this day. And I was
super excited about it. And Iwent to my artistic director,
Noelle Ruiz, and I said that Iwanted to design the show. And
(08:56):
I, and he said, oh, really? Isaid, yes. He's like, okay. Um,
he's like, he, he, he didn'tsay yes right away. And so I, I
told him that if after two daysof tech he wasn't happy with my
work, he could fire me. Andthen he didn't fire me. So,
(09:17):
engineer , um, at that theater, um, for about a year and a
half. And I then answered , uh,an ad on this mailing list for
a sound operator on a play forLabyrinth Theater Company. And
I remember interviewing withthe sound designer, and he
asked me if I knew thisparticular piece of software,
(09:37):
and I, he knows that I fibbed.
And I was like, oh, yeah, Iknow that. Um, so, and , but
what I did was, I, I wouldimagine you
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Immediately go out and buy the book or something
to like,
Speaker 3 (09:49):
Oh , well , I mean, there really wasn't a book on
it. Okay . But I, I looked itup, and then I made sure to ,
uh, you know, because he was inrehearsals Yeah . Prior to tech
doing some programming and,and, you know, working on the
sound design with the directorand , and with the actors. And
so I just went into the roomand watched him program. And ,
(10:11):
uh, so I was familiar enoughwith the software by the time
we got to Tech, and I operatedthat show, and he then asked me
to be his assistant on his nextproduction. And he and I ended
up working together for abouteight years on, you know, a
long list of shows that wereall wonderful. And that
(10:34):
culminated eventually into aproduction of a show called
fela . And for its , uh, sortof workshop, I was the engineer
, uh, and the production audioperson who was responsible for
installing the sound system, etcetera. And I was in the room
every day . And , um, wethought we were gonna move to
(10:56):
Broadway after that workshop,but it didn't turn out to be
that way. So the following yearwe did a second workshop that
culminated in a , in a officialoff-Broadway run for a few
weeks. So I was his , uh,assistant on that. And then we
found out that the show wasgonna move to Broadway. And it
(11:16):
was a beautiful moment,actually, because I was sitting
in the hospital holding hisbrand new baby Mm-Hmm . His
wife had just given birth thatafternoon. And I went to the
hospital to meet the baby, andwhile I'm holding his baby, he
told me that the show was gonnamove to Broadway, and that he
wanted me to be his associate.
And the show happened to openon Broadway, and at midnight it
(11:38):
became my 29th birthday, whichis pretty great at the opening
night party, which is superfun.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
That's remarkable.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Yeah. I was kind of , uh,
Speaker 1 (11:48):
How did you contain yourself? Like, just, you know,
you from going from a communityor public theater onto , you
know, the biggest stage in theworld?
Speaker 3 (11:58):
Uh , you know, I, I, I tell this story to everybody.
I, I cried every day on my,like , I cried my way home and
I cried my way to the theaterevery day for no other reason
than, it's just really hard.
It's just really hard work.
It's really hard work. Thehours are long. And I think
there was at one point, goingfrom tech into, through the
(12:20):
first week of previews, the waythat the, the week falls, like
when the week the Union Weekstarts, like the pay week
starts and ends allowed ussomehow to work 13 days in a
row. Hmm . And , uh, you know,honestly, just, I , I think I
cried my way home and into workevery day just because of sheer
(12:41):
exhaustion,
just physical exhaustion, it'smental exhaustion. And, but,
you know, we did it and weopened the show and, and we, we
worked on it. Um , there weremultiple productions of it
beyond that. We took it to theNational Theater in London. We,
(13:01):
I got to , uh, take it toNigeria , uh, which was
fantastic. I got to mix aconcert version of the show in
Fela's actual nightclub, theShrine, which was a completely
out of body experience. Um, andthere were a number, a number
of tours, et cetera. So Icontinued to work on that for,
(13:22):
you know, five years. Andeventually, I, I sort of moved
into , uh, doing a lot ofmusic, mixing in, in bars and
clubs and at , at Sleep NoMore. That was like, sleep No
More was great because, youknow, I, I, well , let's
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Just start it like it was, when it first came out,
it was probably one of the mostnovel things that I'd ever
experienced. Yeah . It was likeAlfred Hitchcock's Marnie , um,
you know, meets somethingoperatic
Speaker 3 (13:50):
that it's the first of its kindin terms of immersive theater.
Like it created immersivetheater. Yeah. I, I saw the
show twice while I workedthere. And even though I knew
where to be at certain moments,somehow, no matter who I
followed, I always ended upback in the dining room,
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Speaker 3 (14:09):
At the feast. I'm like, how is it possible? I
like work here, I know whereI'm going. Um, but I, I mixed
sound in the , uh, I wasn't themain engineer. Uh, I, I just,
you know, sort of worked a fewdays a week. But the, the great
part was, you know , there'sthis jazz band, the house band,
if you've seen the show whereyou enter, there's, it's a bar.
(14:30):
There's no band there when youenter for the show. And then
when you come back at the end,there's a jazz band playing.
When the jazz band is done,then other bands play. So I got
to meet some of, like, thegreatest musicians in New York.
Um, and some of them are stillfriends of mine, and I go see
them play. And I, you know,know, one of the things I
(14:52):
always say about like, how doyou become a good sound
designer? And I, I , I trulythink that so much of my skill
comes from not just workingwith Rob, which was, you know,
he's a wonderful mentor, andthat was like the theater side
of it , but working at Sleep NoMore , which is a nightclub
environment. And I have like abox of s short SMM 50 sevens,
(15:16):
and maybe one kick drum mic.
And I have to make the showsound good. Uh , there are no
choices, right ? It's just likethat mic goes on the trumpet,
it goes on the saxophone, itgoes on the, you know, guitar
amp. But it , there's , it's ,it's just, you gotta , well ,
you got one mic, and you gottamake that sound good on
everything. And that reallyjust taught me how to work
(15:38):
quickly. Mm-Hmm.
that having the samemicrophone, which has its own
sort of imprint, right. Its ownsort of tonal response, right.
And having to use that oneverything, I think really as
I'm thinking about it, made meable to understand how certain
(16:04):
instruments were voiced Mm-Hmm.
of anything by some other fancymicrophone. It's the same
microphone on everything. Andso I got to really dive into
like, oh, this is, this is whata baritone wants to sound like.
This is what a tenor wants tosound like. This is what a
guitar amp wants to sound like.
This is , um, what a voicewants to sound like. Mm-Hmm.
(16:28):
masking. I just got to reallydig into the instrument. Um, so
I worked there, I worked atQueen of the Night for a while
. I worked at a nightclubcalled The Box , uh, for a
little bit mixing bands there.
I did a lot of events at SleepNo More . That was another
thing that was really great. Sothey'd have these events and
(16:50):
there'd be, you know, fourdifferent locations throughout
the building where bands wouldplay, and there'd be like four
different parties. But it wasall one party throughout the
entire five floors of thebuilding. And I happened to be
there also when they opened uptheir rooftop restaurant, Gallo
Green. So I got to mix bands upthere, and then they opened up
(17:10):
the restaurant just below thatcalled The Heath, and I got to
mix. And then they had a houseband up there on Friday nights
. So I was just like, I wasthere all the time. I was
practically there every daymixing. And , uh, one of the
highlights of that actually wasthe , um, preservation Hall
Jazz band did a residency forfive days, and I got to mix
them. Oh, wow. Yeah.
(17:34):
And, and they ended their setevery night with , uh, when the
Saints go marching in, which,funny enough, my grandfather
used to sing to me when I was ababy to put me to sleep. Oh . I
don't know why. That, and hewould shake me almost
violently. Yeah . Yeah . Andthat would make me stop crying
and fall asleep,
(17:55):
real treat. Um, so yeah, so Idid, I did music for a while ,
and then I started just sort oftaking , um, uh, sound calls
and , and mind, you know,there's, there was also in
between all of this, I wasdoing the sound design for the,
the , the entirety of theLinbrook School district. So
(18:16):
three elementary schools , uh,two middle schools, and two
productions at the high schoolper year. And I was also doing
like, various sound calls andhauling cable across football
fields and pushing boxes and ,um, you know, doing, you know,
just like crazy, anything youcould design, like anything
that I could get my hands on,basically, it wasn't even
(18:39):
designing. It was just likeanything I could get my hands
on I wanted to do. Which, youknow, I also think was really
advantageous for my designcareer, because I know what
goes into unloading a truck,and I know what it takes to be
an A two backstage and runmics. And I, I know what it is
(18:59):
to , um, you know, have tochange over a band four times
in a night. Like, at theKnitting Factory, I had four
bands. There was all I had werestage plots, and I had to make
an input list, and I had to gobackstage, and I had to atch
things, and I just had toremember, yeah . Like, there
were nothing was labeled. Youdidn't, there was no time to
(19:20):
label anything. You have 20minutes to change over the
band, and you have to know,okay, the , that Okay, the
drums stay the drums, and thenwhat was the saxophone now
becomes the trumpet, and whatwas this becomes that. And, you
know, you just gotta, you justgotta roll with it. Yeah . And
then get , like, you're luckyif you get a sound check .
Sometimes people don't evenshow up for their soundtracks.
(19:42):
I've had vocalists just notshow up. Oh, wow. Oh, yeah. And
, and I have a , an interestingstory story to circle back
around , uh, the idea of Yes.
And , and improv , um, that hasto do with Haes Stone and
Broadway. But I , we'll, yeah,we'll get there. Circle back
around to that. Um, so a funstory was, you know, while I
(20:03):
was working at Queen of theNight, I was subbing for the
main engineer, and I happenedto get asked to sub on the New
Year's Eve performance of theshow. And afterward there would
be this, they, they threwparties all the time. And so
there was this band that wouldplay starting at 11 o'clock.
And so what we had to do was,in the day, we set up the band
(20:26):
on stage, they came in, theydid a sound check , then we had
to turn it back over into theshow. And as a matter of fact,
I wasn't doing the show thatnight because I was doing two
different New Year's events. Iwas mixing one of them, and I
hired an engineer because I wasdesigning the other one. So I
left to go to the other venue,which happened to be around the
(20:48):
corner at the Copa Cabana anddeal with that. And then the
engineer who was doing Queen ofthe Night, the actual show that
night, about a half an hourafter I leave, calls me and
says, so if I restored theconsole from the USB stick that
(21:11):
I have the show saved on, doesthat erase the scene that we
created for the bands that goeson tonight? Take it too far .
And I was like , um, uh, yeah,yeah, it does. So essentially,
(21:34):
when he came into Sub on theshow , um, because he wanted to
be super sure that he was usingthe right file and the right,
he would , would just, he wouldload it from the USB stick,
which just erases the wholedesk. Um, and, you know, I had
a snapshot in the desk that waslike, way past the show,
somewhere that was, you know,with Monitor wedge mixes, like
(21:57):
EQs, there was like, it waslike a six piece band. So I
call my production manager, andI'm like, so there's this
thing. And I have, I wouldn'tsay I have like a , a perfect
photographic memory, but I havea pretty good photographic
memory. Like, if I walk intoone of my shows and I look at
(22:18):
Niq for an actor, I can tellyou whether it's correct or
not. Mm-Hmm.
if that's like, where I leftit, right? Like , I know, I
know the level, like the outputlevels of, of certain channels
of my processor on my Broadwayshows and my tours. Like, I
could tell you, you know, Icould at least get very close.
(22:39):
Mm-Hmm.
being able to help mycounterpart change over from
the show to the band, which weonly have about 30 minutes to
do, I have to sit in front ofthe desk and try to remember
everything that I did duringsoundcheck
course, the band has no idea.
(23:01):
Right ? The band has no clue.
And my production manager'sstanding next to me, and she's
like, are you okay? Is it gonnabe okay? Are you okay? And I
was like, I , you know, I we'regonna find out. I'm gonna turn
it on. And, you know, if they,they're either gonna tell me
that it sounds fine if there ,or it doesn't. And I'll hear
the house and I'll makeadjustments. But my biggest
(23:22):
concern was like, am I justgonna totally throw off the
band if their monitor mixesaren't correct? Mm-Hmm.
show, and I just like, I'mlike, all right, hold onto your
butts. And I just opened up thefaders and everything was fine.
It was fine. But that was, thatwas absolutely nerve wracking.
(23:43):
It was just, it was completelynerve wracking. I've never had
to just like, all right, Ithink I, I did this, this,
this, this, this, this, this,this. Here we go.
Speaker 5 (24:02):
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Speaker 2 (25:31):
Welcome back.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
That's a pretty, I one of the things I, I think I
kind of pick up is that youhave a sense of resilience,
gotta kind of have that , um,as a creator. Um , sure. You
know, I think there is a senseof the, the meticulous, to your
point around having , um, thephotographic memory and being
(26:00):
able to go back, but in amoment of stress sometimes, I
don't know about you, but I, I, at the most stressful I have,
like, had those moments ofphotographic memory. Oh, recall
not happening.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
Right? Sure. I mean, I think that it, you know, I, I
certainly go through, I, I liketo say that I have , uh, I go
through postmortem at the endof every project, and I, I
certainly have breakdown , um,in a way, like, I'll sleep for
like three days to a week aftera project is done, or after a
(26:35):
series of projects are done.
Sometimes I move from one tothe next, to the next, to the
next. Um, but it's like apostpartum, you know, it's,
it's like, it's like givingbirth to a child.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (26:47):
So, and then all of a sudden, you know, it's, it's
this super intense 16 hours aday high stakes, and then it's
like being dropped off a cliff.
'cause it's now it's open andit's done. And it's over What?
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
It was just like, yeah. It's just getting like,
pushed out of an airplane andyou're like, all right .
Speaker 1 (27:10):
Well, give me a give, I guess, give our
listeners a little bit. I thinkthat I'd love to dive a little
bit behind the scenes. Likegive us a day in the life of ,
you know, what , uh, you know,what going through tech is
like, and then opening night.
You know, it's, I I think thatday
Speaker 3 (27:27):
In the life I was gonna ask you which day.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
Yeah .
Let , let's maybe pick up likesome of the, the hardest ones.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
Well, I'll just, I'll summarize sort of the
pre-production process. Um,there's interesting things to
talk about where that'sconcerned. But, you know,
essentially for a Broadway show, uh, all we get is four walls
and some seats and a stage.
There's no cable, there's nospeakers, there's no lights,
there's, there's nothing. Andthere, there aren't even
sometimes systems in thedressing rooms. And so I and my
(28:00):
team spec every single piece ofsound equipment that goes into
a production. Um, speakers,amplifiers, microphones, like
every adapter, like it's, youname it. Yeah . Um , paging
Systems. We also handleIntercom and all of the closed
caption television , uh, thatthe, the team uses backstage to
(28:23):
stage management uses the callthe show, and everybody look ,
you know, watches , uh, hasmonitors to , uh, see what's
going on on stage. And so we,we also take care of all of
that. So the , I get hired fora show, and what happens is we
go to a site visit, I look atthe space in 3D, and then on a
, in, you know, a 2D medium ,uh, for drafting. I turn that
(28:44):
into a prediction. I take itinto prediction software, and
then I look at speaker systemsand spec what it is I want. And
then we draft that on the 2Dmedium, and then we share that
with other departments. Andthen, you know, lighting. And
I'll figure out, you know,okay, well, can you put the
speaker here? Can you go onefoot over there? You know, can
(29:04):
we, I , you know, can you takethat light out of center? I
need to put a speaker there. Wedo all of that. And , um, then
I create like a flow. There'sa, there's a workbook that has
about, I don't know, 30different Excel sheets in it
that specify inputs, outputs,amplifier channels, processing
channels, networkconfiguration, intercom
(29:27):
configuration, videoconfiguration. Uh , there's
pivot tables that tally things.
It's, it's a very involveddocument that evolves over
time. But that , that, thatinput output flow gets created.
And that's how I then make alist that gets sent to the
shops for bid. They come backwith pricing. They also come
(29:48):
back with, we have this, butnot that we have this speaker,
but not that speaker. And , youknow, can, can you deal with
this substitution? If not, thenthey have to buy that equipment
because I want it. Right?
Mm-Hmm . So , Mm-Hmm .
engineering where you want tomake the exceptions and say,
okay, well yes, I can use thatthing that you have in stock to
replace this thing that I askedfor, but I can't do it for this
(30:11):
item. Like, I can't do that forthe console because I need that
for being able to mix the showand design it the way that I
want and to get the result thatI'm looking for. So that
happens. And then we go into ,uh, go through that process
that producing producers,producing company general
managers will agree with a shopon pricing for a per weekly
(30:35):
rental cost. Mm-Hmm.
one who mixes the show, a twowho works backstage , uh, and
does all the RF work and workswith the actors and their
microphones, the productionaudio person who oversees the
installation, my associate anda number of other people who
(30:57):
come in to help build the show,build the show from scratch.
Like all of that equipmentcomes in . We all , we , it
gets built custom for everyshow. We put it together, we
test it, and then we take itapart. And we don't take it all
the way apart, but we like, youknow, 'cause we don't take
everything out of the racks,but , um, it's sort of like ,
(31:19):
um, what's that show with themotorcycles?
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Speaker 3 (31:24):
They build, the motorcycles come and then they
have to take them apart becausethey have to send all the parts
out for being like, to bepainted. And then it comes
back, and then it gets p putback together. I forget the ,
it's like the name is escapingme. So it gets taken apart, put
on a truck sent to the theater,and then it gets installed in
the theater. And then we starttech. Yeah . We tune the
(31:44):
system. So I go in, I make abunch of pink noise, I, it's
awful sounding. And then I, youknow, calibrate the speaker
system and, and then we starttech.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
It sounds like what, what's interesting to me is
that as you're going throughit, it really sounds like you
are a conductor of an orchestraof everything from the
equipment to the people. Andthen there's the sound, which
is the thing that everybody isproducing.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Oh . And we haven't even gotten to that part yet.
Yeah. Right .
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Like ,
Speaker 3 (32:10):
All of that's happening , and we haven't even
gotten to sound. Um, uh, a afun thing that , uh, Nevin, my
, my partner in Hades Town ,uh, I , I learned from him, and
he likes to say is, you know,on the first day of Tech Sound
comes out, no one gets hurt.
Like, that's, that's the onlygoal for the first session of
Tech Sound came out, no one gothurt
(32:31):
And, you know, tech is, tech isintense in many ways. It's
intense because sometimesyou're sitting around and
waiting, you know, it can becompletely frustrating. I've
had a show where we had so muchautomation on, on this show
that I think we actually turnedon microphones for an , like,
(32:54):
an entire 25 minutes totalacross the 16 hour day. So, you
know, sometimes it's like a lotof waiting. And I work on other
things. I work on, you know,just preliminary EQs for the
band before I get them, youknow, we're working on setting
up the band wherever it is.
(33:16):
They're located in the pit, onstage , on a band platform, et
cetera, in sometimes a dressingroom . Sometimes drums will be
in a dressing room on thefourth floor. Mm-Hmm.
work on sound effects or anysound cues. Sometimes we're
helping to , uh, facilitateshow control. So like time code
(33:37):
that will trigger lighting orprojections. Um, so there's,
there's stuff to do, you know,and, and of course all of the ,
um, utility microphones thatthe , the director and the
choreographers speak over,like, that's coming through our
sound system. Intercom is ourresponsibility. Videos are a
responsibility, not video thatis part of the show, but the
(33:59):
backstage video backstage isbizarre . Yeah. So there's,
there's lots going on. Um, andduring that time, prior to
getting the band, we just havelike a rehearsal piano,
sometimes rehearsal drums thatare just in the house . And,
and I, I focus really on thevocal system. Mm-Hmm.
(34:20):
the sound system. And I, I workvery hard on getting that too
sound as good as possiblebefore we get the band in
earnest, right? Mm-Hmm.
calls, so 9:00 AM to noon priorto two, four or five hour text
(34:44):
sessions. So it's like a, it'slike an 8:00 AM to 11:00 PM
day. Mm-Hmm.
Um, and the first day isseating, but by then we've
pretty much line checkedeverything already on our own.
So we seat the band, we makethem comfortable, but all of
their stuff is functional, andall their monitoring is already
functional. And so seatinggenerally turns into like a
(35:06):
line check with the actualplayers, and then them checking
their in air monitors and theirlittle personal mixers and
making sure that they have whatthey need, you know, utility
wise . And then I'll usuallyend that session , uh, more,
more often than not, like 99%of the time that, that sound,
(35:28):
that seating session ends withbeing able to play through a
song . And then the secondsession, the next day , uh, is
playing through the show fromtop to bottom. Mm-Hmm.
that's really about, I'm notdoing too many sort of level
changes of individual inputsper song. What I'm really doing
(35:51):
in that session is making surethat we have something cohesive
top to bottom for the show.
Like, does the guitar soundgood all of the time? Mm-Hmm.
accents here and there, etcetera. That's programming that
we'll take care of as we nowmove through the tech process
with the band and, and bandsessions and through notes. Um,
(36:13):
but it's really about gettingthe band to sound good as a
whole. And then there's the,the , um, the very, it , it
always ends up going fine, butit's always very stressful the
first day that you put cast andband together for the first
time. Hmm . There's , uh,usually something called a Sits
probe , where we go into a ,you know, a rehearsal studio
(36:33):
and the, the actors get to singthrough the show with the full
band and, and everyone gets tohear the orchestrations on
Hades Town . We don't do sitsprobes. We do V probes. And so
it's just, and, and we did thaton Beautiful Noise as well.
It's just, we just get on stageand the first time cast in band
is together, is everyonesinging through the show in
(36:54):
microphone and with sound. AndI get to hang out on stage and
make sure monitoring , uh,monitoring systems and, and ,
uh, are sufficient for theactors to hear what they need
to hear , uh, in terms of bandinformation and that they're
getting what they want. Andthen in certain circumstances ,
uh, on shows in which theactors are wearing boom
(37:15):
microphones, headset mics.
Mm-Hmm.
in the onstage monitors aswell. Got it. So I get to have
a lot of time to work on thatduring the V probe. Um, so
it's, you know, the first timewe put the cast in band
together, I'm , I'm usually onstage with my iPad that can
control the console and alaptop that can control the
(37:37):
sound system. And just makingsure that , um, everyone's
feeling comfortable. And, andof course, everyone has the
ability to stop that rehearsalshould they not be able to hear
something. And , um, you know,I'm there to help. So, and that
gives me a , you know, a goodidea of like, oh, okay, well ,
you know what? The band is notdrowning out the vocals. It's
actually fitting togetherpretty well. And like Mm-Hmm.
(37:58):
us, you know? Um, and then wehave run throughs, you know,
and we just, we just keep everyday , you know, the , every day
the, the focus get gets smallerand smaller. Like, it, it
starts as the big picture andthen, you know, and then you
just, it's like dial in and youfocus in. And I, I , I'd like
to say that it's like this,it's , um, sound is a puzzle,
(38:22):
you know? Mm-Hmm .
the sound system, that willhave a ripple effect on other
things. If I change, you know,the, the level of the guitar
overall through the show . Imean, that has a ripple effect
though . But , so it's justlike, it's, you move one part
(38:42):
and, you know , Nevin likes tosay, and I like that his
analogy about this, it's likesifting for gold. Sometimes you
solve one thing and thatreveals something else. Right.
Uh, so, you know, you sort of,it's sort of a, like a spiral.
You sort of circle around itand, and the circle gets
smaller and smaller and smallerand smaller and smaller until
one day it just goes dinging
Speaker 1 (39:05):
Just all, it all
Speaker 3 (39:06):
Slot slots together.
And that also has to do with ,you know , the a one learning
the show. I mean, they'remixing , um, they're mixing the
show line by line . So ifthere's two people on stage
having a conversation, only oneperson's microphone is open at
one at a time.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 3 (39:24):
For every single line that they speak. There's a
really interesting , um, videothat was done where , where you
can witness , um, a friend ofmine, Kevin McCoy mix some of
Hamilton actually, and I, Iforget what show it was on,
it's it , there's a video onYouTube and ,
Speaker 1 (39:45):
Uh , oh my gosh. At the rate and pace that those,
they are going and it's like a, it , they're calling back.
It's, there's no pause. What anorchestration. Like, oh my
gosh,
Speaker 3 (39:55):
I've attempted to learn the show. Yeah. And , uh,
uh, I was actually training tobecome a sub on it, which ended
up not panning out because Iended up on some other
projects. And so I couldn'tstay committed to it. But , uh,
my, a friend of mine was like,Hey, good luck with the
Reynolds pamphlet, which islike the, the really fast wrap
number in Act two . The , youknow , uh, you're never gonna
(40:19):
be president. Mm-Hmm .
fast. It really, I'll saythough, it being fast is fine
because once you learn it,because that entire show, and
Hades Town similarly, is all tomusic, right ? It all has to
like slot into a rhythm. And sofor me, actually mixing
(40:43):
dialogue scenes is harderbecause they don't necessarily
follow the same, the actorsdon't necessarily follow the
same rhythm in those scenes.
'cause they have a little bitmore freedom. They don't have
to be on, on a beat. Right. So,but I mean, I haven't mixed
anything in about five years.
So,
Speaker 1 (41:02):
So let's talk about this remarkable journey. Like,
you, you go from, like, itsounds like you go from like,
kind of stumbling into it, youknow, during high school, while
you're juggling lots of otherthings , um, you come into this
space, and one of the thingsthat I have loved about this is
that you seem to have avoracious desire to learn. Um,
(41:24):
right. Because it seems likeyou didn't have formal training
coming into the space. It waslike, I'm gonna learn this
thing. I work , we're gonnafigure it out, out, and then
I'm gonna make an art of it.
Mm-Hmm.
of fun. So you get to thispoint where you've started to
build a network, you've gotthat, and then Tony's like,
(41:46):
when, and , and, you know, I ,I hit the Tony's, you go, okay.
Along those ways, you've wontons of awards , uh, you've had
a tremendous amount ofrecognition, but then you get a
show like Hayestown Mm-Hmm .
I'd love for you to kind oftake us through it, but you
know, for me , um, you know, Ithink we all know Hamilton, but
(42:09):
Hayestown is actually , um, issomething so remarkable in the
story that it tells, but it islike the, the music is so
stirring and there , the, theblend between effects and
music, and it all culminatesand creates a part of the
story. If you turned off thesound, you'd miss so much of
(42:34):
the emotion Mm-Hmm .
so tell us a little bit aboutone, how do you land a show
like that? And then two
, uh, is I think an importantpart of the journey. But I
think too is, you know, how doyou go from, when you were
talking a little bit about, youknow, every day of that first
(42:56):
in interaction of when you getto Broadway crying, to finding
the joy and getting reallyexcited about doing something
this big.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
Oh gosh, yeah. I mean, there was a lot of joy.
And there was also, you know,the, the absolute just sheer
knowledge of, oh my gosh, I'mactually designing a Broadway
show. Um, but just to rewind alittle bit , um, I, I landed a
show like Hayestown because ofNevin. He hired me as his
(43:25):
associate to do the Canadaproduction. And , um, he had
limited availability. Heoffered my me up as an
associate who could go in hisstead , and he would come
visit. And I went to Canada,worked on the show, and then a
year later, approximately ayear , uh, they were gonna do a
(43:48):
production of the show, anotherout of town. Like , I think the
idea was to move the show toBroadway after Canada. But ,
uh, they decided to do anotherout of town . And we did it in
London at the National, whichis just like one of the most
amazing facilities to work at.
I just love that place. Um, andI remember I had stopped into a
(44:11):
rehearsal one day to like watcha run through , and my producer
was there and she's like, can Italk to you for a minute in the
other room? And I was like,what?
Uh , sure. And , um, she saidthat they wanted to make me
co-designer of the show. And Iwas like, does Nevin know about
(44:32):
that? Like, she's like, oh,yeah, no. He was part of the
conversation. And so I calledhim and he, you know, he is
like, are you okay with that?
And I was like , yeah, I'm okaywith that. So I went to London
to do the show there, and hecame out to visit, and, and
then we were, we were actuallytogether the whole time on
Broadway, which was great. And,you know, I, I learned so much
(44:54):
from him. Um, and it was sowonderful to have a friend and
a colleague and a mentor that Iadmire and love working with,
be there for my first design.
You know, the Mm-Hmm .
(45:19):
such a wonderful supportsystem. And I, I, I remember ,
uh, I'm not certain that I, I ,I think at this point I've told
him this story, but rightbefore we went to Broadway, I
read Tina Faye's book , uh,bossy Pants
that book. It's so good. Sogood. Yeah. It's so good. But
there was one part that reallystood out to me because I, of
(45:42):
course was, you know, Nevin wasaround for part of Canada and
London, but not through thewhole process each time. And I
was having a little bit ofstress about how do I do this
with him the whole time? Um,and, and the reason I was
(46:06):
stressed is because I believethat , um, I believe at , at
least for me, in , in my storyin my life, that equality is
not just about people treatingme as their equal, but about
feeling like I am their equal.
Yeah . Right? Yeah. Because,and, and I think that they're
two very separate things. Yeah.
(46:28):
And they also play into eachother. Right. Because he could
treat me like his equal all daylong. If I don't feel that way
in myself, in my own body, inmy own spirit, in my own work,
then it, you know, how hetreats me isn't gonna land. I
mean , he always treats me asan equal. That's totally a
thousand percent. But I wentinto it going like, okay, I
(46:50):
have to, I have to believe thatI have to show up feeling like
he's equal. And when I amhaving a conversation with him
artistically about a moment inthe show, I need to not feel
intimidated. Mm-Hmm.
know, for the last five years,the relationship we had was me
(47:15):
as his associate, not as hisco-designer. Mm-Hmm.
you know, I may have an opinionabout something and I might
share that with him, butultimately it's not up to me.
Right. I , like, I might havean idea. Um, and, but as a
co-designer, I'm, I can have anidea and I can also be like,
(47:37):
no, I really think this is howit ought to be. And in Tina
Faye's book , there is, andit's actually in a like gray
box, and she describes improv,and I read that portion . I
actually like took a photo ofit, so I carried it around with
me everywhere. And it's aboutimprov being about, yes. And ,
(48:01):
you know, it's, improv doesn'twork if someone says that
they're a pickle and the otherperson doesn't believe that
they're a pickle, they can'trespond in an improvisational
way. And I just thought thatwas such a great piece of
advice to take with me intothat room and, and approach
(48:22):
working with him in a yes endway, in which if he questioned
me or he had an idea, I wouldsay yes. And also, what if we
did Yes. And also, yes. And thereason it was born that way, or
the reason that it is designedthat way is because here are
the steps that we took inCanada and London that landed
(48:44):
us into this place, but what is, what is it that you think
and, oh, yeah, that's a greatidea. Let's do that. Um, and
then we'd have really like goodfun on stage because I'd be
like, oh my God, this monitorsounds terrible. We'd like walk
it around like , Jason , he'slike, well, why'd you, why'd
you make it that way?
Speaker 1 (49:01):
Why'd you do that
Speaker 3 (49:04):
Um, and , uh, or, you know, something would
happen and he'd be like, Idon't know, go talk to the
sound designer
Speaker 1 (49:11):
Speaker 3 (49:12):
So we'd have, we'd have a lot of, we'd have a lot
of fun, which was good. Butthat, that book and that
particular excerpt about improvhas just been something I've
carried with me for since that,since that moment, since I've
read it.
Speaker 1 (49:25):
How do you, so where do you find your confidence? I
mean, where do , where does itcome from? Because you, you
have a con . It's contagious.
Um, it really is.
Speaker 3 (49:34):
Uh , uh, that's really interesting that you say
that. And, and , um, uh, I ,people laugh at me when I say
that I'm shy, actually, andthey're like , you are not shy.
You are not subtle. You are notshy.
Speaker 1 (49:45):
I have never met a New York kid, like somebody who
grew up in New York, who'sactually shy.
Speaker 3 (49:51):
Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1 (49:52):
How does that work?
Yeah . Um ,
Speaker 3 (49:56):
To be honest, you know, it's, I, I was very shy
as a child . Okay. And , um, I,I, you know, I was not popular
in elementary school. I was anerd. And , um, I was as
Speaker 1 (50:08):
The greats are usually
Speaker 3 (50:10):
Yes. I was super tiny. Um, I'm still only like
115 pounds soaking wet, and I'mfive foot three and a half. You
know, I'm, I'm a small, smallperson. I don't feel , I , I
don't, I don't act like I'msmall. Like I don't, it doesn't
occur to me that I'm little.
It's like, it's like thoselittle tiny dogs that think
that they're like hugedobermans or something. It's
(50:32):
like that's how does , itdoesn't occur to me how tiny I
actually am. Um, I , I wouldjust say that it's always been
a work in progress. And, youknow, I have a lot of days
where I 100% have completeimposter syndrome. Um, I don't,
I don't know anyone personallywho doesn't ever have that.
Yeah. I think that it's,
Speaker 1 (50:51):
How do you quiet that? Yeah. How do you quiet
that down? 'cause I, I haveactually, I had a girlfriend
who said , uh, to me, once upona time I was having terrible
imposter syndrome. I justlanded a new role. It was
thing, and we were doingsomething and I was feeling
completely outta my comfortzone, which meant I was
growing. Mm-Hmm .
could see it in, in my face,and she said, you need to shut
(51:14):
that up.
Speaker 3 (51:15):
Speaker 1 (51:17):
You got into this room because of this, this, and
this. Shut her up.
Speaker 3 (51:23):
I, I say that I, I, you know, I cope with it in ,
in the , in the sense that whenI, when it comes down to having
to get it done, I just get itdone. There is no, there is no
other option. It just needs toget done. Right. It needs to
get done. It needs to get done.
Well, we're working at thehighest level that we're
(51:45):
working. I am 100% aperfectionist. Um, and I will
never actually achieveperfection. And I, but
Speaker 1 (51:53):
You know that. Yeah.
But you know that, right. Thatthere's a part of you that says
you can strive for perfectionand that's what makes you great
Speaker 3 (52:02):
Right. Okay . So there will always be a note.
There will always be a note. Ofcourse. I, you know, I will
never mix a perfect show. Iwill never, you know, it's,
it's, there will always be somelittle thing that probably the
audience doesn't even notice.
Um, but I know it , I know, Iknow that that was like ever so
slightly a millisecond too lateor what have you. Um, but yeah,
when it comes down to it, I,there there's no room for that
(52:24):
voice in my head when it's likego time. Um, it'll usually come
into my brain at night or on myday off. And I mean, there's
just no, there's just no choice
Speaker 1 (52:38):
In a live situation.
You're absolutely right. Youjust, it feels like it's,
you've gotta go with what yourinstinct is. And if you're, if
you're good at your craft, thenyour instincts are probably
right. Mm-Hmm.
Speaker 3 (52:51):
Mm-Hmm.
but Yeah . But then, but youknow, they're wrong. 'cause you
try it and then you're like,oh, that's not right.
Speaker 1 (53:00):
Speaker 3 (53:04):
Uh , you know, and I think that it actually, part of
the way that I quiet her isthat I have learned to not be
afraid to fail. That took a lotof work and I still am working
on that and I will be workingon that for the rest of my
life. But I, I constantlyremind myself that it is okay
to make a mistake becauseactually sometimes making a
(53:24):
mistake might lead you to theright answer. Mm-Hmm.
it because we're human
Speaker 1 (53:35):
Listening to this episode with you, Rachel, our
podcast sound designer. I'malways really curious as , uh,
somebody who's in the area ofthis craft, what did you think?
Speaker 6 (53:47):
Well, the two things that really stuck out to me is
sound is like a puzzle. Uh , Ireally love that because that
is the truth of sound,especially when you're working
in such a live setting. Becausethe guitar, the people, the
general orchestra do not soundthe same, but yet they need to
have equal measure when itcomes to being sure everyone
(54:07):
has the same focus on what'shappening on stage. And, you
know, I enjoyed hearing asawkward as that sound. I
enjoyed hearing that I'm notthe only one with imposter
syndrome. And it allows Jessicato fight to the eventual path
of growth.
Speaker 1 (54:23):
I think she was so candid about that. I think the
fact that she talked about ,um, you know, that her growth ,
um, came with crying everysingle day. That that feeling,
that discomfort actually meantthat she was growing and she
was growing , um, in a paththat wasn't easy.
Speaker 6 (54:40):
Exactly. And it's also just the humility of
understanding that while you dohave all these awards and
accolades, you need to behumble enough to be able to
understand failure Totally. Ina sense of a learning
opportunity and not a step backin your career.
Speaker 1 (54:55):
Totally. And I think Jessica Poz is a great example
of how that humility comes tolife. It makes her so real, so
approachable. Um, and I reallythink the world of Jessica and
her work,
Speaker 6 (55:09):
No. And I'm very excited 'cause uh, when we go
to the premium content, you'llhear a lot more about that.
Want to read us out?
Speaker 1 (55:15):
This episode was written and produced by the
Design Corps at Aurora 21 inthe heart of New York's magical
Hudson Valley. Special thanksto the musical talents of
Rachel Bickley, our podcastsound designer. Our theme music
was composed by substancestudios. If you're already
following the show, you arewell on your way to designing a
(55:37):
better future today. Design .
If not, design ,
Speaker 3 (55:40):
Design , design , design ,
Speaker 1 (55:41):
It's time to join our community and feel the
magic. Go to your favoritepodcast, service and search
designed by with Joanna PenaBickley . And hit follow .
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com