View the full Broadway Master Classes Schedule here.
Jonathan Deans: Keynote Address
Acclaimed sound designer Jonathan Deans, who has delighted BSMC audiences in recent years with his in-depth—and often hilarious— discussions of his sound design for such shows as The Pirate Queen and Young Frankenstein, returns to present the keynote address for the 2009 BSMC. From his work on more than a dozen hit shows for Cirque du Soleil to a wide range of Broadway shows, Deans is indeed a leading dean of contemporary sound design. Current work includes a show in Macau, Ragtime at The Kennedy Center, Spiderman on Broadway, the new Cirque touring show and a new Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas.
Designing Hair: Then and Now
Nevin Steinberg and Sten Severson of Acme Sound Partners present an in-depth look at the sound design for the current Broadway revival of the rock musical, Hair, while the legendary Abe Jacob talks about the design for the original production and tour back “then.” Moderated by David Johnson, associate publisher/editorial director, Live Design. All attendees at the 2009 BSMC will recieve a ticket for Hair on Friday, May 15.
Scott Lehrer: Acoustical Issues in the Vivian Beaumont
How to respect the sonic world of a classic American musical using appropriate new technologies and good old fashioned physics (with special thanks to our laser disto and spreadsheet). In doing my third musical at the Vivian Beaumont theater over the last 15 years, I finally felt that we had the tools available to begin to conquer the unique acoustical issues encountered in designing live sound in that thrust style space. We haven't by any means fully solved the puzzle, but the solutions we came up with for South Pacific were a good start.
Bob McCarthy: Preparing the Sound System for Optimization
Bob McCarthy will detail the keys to creating sound designs that can be reach their full potential through the process of tuning with high-resolution analyzers. The challenges of physical acoustics, the available solutions in speaker technology, signal processing, analysis tools and objective optimization methodologies will be discussed.
Duncan Edwards, sound design, Beijing Olympics
Duncan Edwards was on the team charged with creating effective sound in the 91,000 seat Bird’s Nest stadium for the 2008 summer Olympic games in Beijing. To do so, the audio team needed to create the largest sound system ever designed. Edwards discusses this challenge, as well as the challenges of working in a foreign country.
Darron L. West, From The Page To The Stage
An open forum with Darron L. West on design from the page to the stage and a discussion on tools for collaboration with actors and directors.
John Taylor: Achiving Sound Design
John Taylor from d&b audiotechnik's Education department and Ken Jacob of Bose Professional take a fresh look at the problems of archiving theatre sound design.
The Changing RF Landscape: What's Happening, How it Affects Production
Henry Cohen of Production Radio Rentals, Chris Lyons from Shure, and Joe Ciaudelli from Sennheiser, present a clear explanation of the FCC rules changes governing the TV broadcast RF spectrum used by production wireless equipment, how that wireless equipment will likely be affected, with the 700MHz band re-allocation and proposed white space devices being predominant considerations, and ways in which the sound designer can minimize potential problems. Followed by a short Q & A.