“Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night” at Third Avenue PlayWorks in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, is a story about trivia night, cheaters in billowy khakis, bosses with big watches, and bartenders in tight t-shirts, and about coming face to face with demons. Marci and Richie are the best trivia team this side of the Monongahela River and have they got a story to tell! So, grab a seat, pop a can of Iron City, and enjoy Alec Silberblatt’s quirky, distinctive storytelling!
Trivia for Tickets! Leading up to the show, TAP partnered with Cherry Lanes Arcade Bar, Stone Harbor Resort, The Thirsty Cow Taphouse, and Buzz Social to give away tickets for Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night. (all the events have passed)
Design Team
Director – Jacob Janssen Set Design – Alex Polzin Costume Design – Kotryna Hilko Lighting Design – Colin Gawronski Sound Design, Original Score – Brian Grimm Production Stage Manager – Kelsey Brennan York Properties Master – Haley Cranstoun Guest Artist, Percussion – Nick Lang
TAP’s Community Partner for “Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night” is JAK’s Place, Lakeshore CAP’s unique local response to the shortage of mental health facilities and practitioners in rural Northeastern Wisconsin. JAK’s Place empowers adults with diagnosed mental illness as well as anyone with a mental health concern by building support and providing the resources to move toward recovery. JAK’s Place doors are open Monday through Thursday 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. and Friday 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Our Pay-What-You-Will Preview is the Wednesday prior to opening night at 7:30 p.m. Those interested in attending the preview to support this organization, may arrive as early as 6:30 p.m. on the evening of the performance for general admission seating. Space is available on a first come, first served basis. Donations may be made in cash or with checks made out to Third Avenue PlayWorks. Half of the proceeds will benefit this show’s Community Partner.
Larry Mohr Photography
Recording Session with our Guest Artist, Nick Lang
For years now, Jacob has been wanting to get his long time friend and fantastic Milwaukee based percussionist Nick Lang to be involved on a project with Third Avenue Playworks. When envisioning the music world and genre of this play, I knew it wanted to live in a rock territory. We’ve got a dive bar jukebox slinging hits from the 80’s, 90’s & today. Heck, just being set in a midwest dive bar made me think of my local dive, which always had metal playing. Plus, the story involves a deal with the devil, I mean come on – it’s gotta be rock’n roll baby. I knew that drums would really come in clutch as a centerpiece to the music sound that transitioned us between scenes. Jacob wanted short, snappy transitions infused with energy, and drums are perfect for that. So we reached out to Nick and he was down! I went over to his home studio in Milwaukee for a day and we had so much fun jamming out together on drums and bass. I really love playing this style of music, getting filthy mc nasty on the jazz bass is such a blast. Really made me want to play this music we created live!
Musically, the main concept for this show was to deconstruct Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin'” into its bits & pieces and rebuild from there. The song is mentioned a number of times in the script, and is a perfect theme tune or mantra for Marci’s journey to sobriety and conquering her demons. We started with having Nick record the main drum groove from the classic 80’s hit in a number of different styles and variations. I also transformed the original Journey song material through augmented chord structures, re-constructing the bass lines to fit my Devil Tonality (more below). We would shift back and forth between the original Journey bass lines, and the modified Devil versions, resulting in new chord progressions and melodic material. Jamming on different feels, tempos changes, cadences, articulations, dynamics, and exploring variations based on the energy of the moment.
Nick also put impletments on his drum kit so we could record the groove from Taylor Swift’s “Look What You Made Me Do” (also mentioned in the script for a very pivotal moment), but have an industrial, distorted, and literally augmented sort of feel to the drums. Here’s the instrumental version of that remake, with me layering bass, cello, piano, and pipa lute parts on top (plus the bonus demonic version of Taylor singing remix too…)
We also spent time recording new original tunes that explored the devil tonality through a couple of different rock styles: a slow Elliott Smith distorted strummer, a dusty Desert Rock style featuring reverse pipa, some Drum’n Bass industrial glitches, in your face Punk 16th notes, and an open descending bass line with augmented swirlies into hell, you get the picture. Here are a few examples to check out:
Pipa Desert Rock mega mix in 4 parts
Elliott Smith Style, Slow Strum Distorted Version
Long Descending Augmented Devil Line Rock
16th Note Nasty Bass Chuggalug
Moody Dark Tom Exploration
Huge Thanks to Nick Lang for his amazing contributions to this show!!
Set by Alex Polzin, Larry Mohr Photography
Devil Tonality concept (augmented vs diminished)
I started diving into Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ for note combos & chord progressions we could use. But I knew it would take some work to shift it towards a devilish soundscape or tonality. After some exploration I ended up playing Augmented chords for each chord of the song’s progression – and that is when it started to click for me. Traditionally, in western tonalities, the Devil is represented by the tri-tone. This is a diminished (lowered) 5th. For example, if your perfect 5th is from C to G, and you lowered that G to a Gb (or F#), you would then have a tri-tone, aka a diminished 5th. But as we all know, the Beast is also represented by the number 666. Well… when you stack augmented 5ths (raising the 5th instead of lowering it) on a cello, it sounds enharmonically as a grouping of minor 6ths… meaning that the chord structure is a stack of three minor 6ths, aka 666!! So this augmented chord ended up signifying the Devil for our show, 666 🤘.
Then it came down to which scale would I pair with the augmented chords. You can play a whole tone scale over any augmented chord and it will work. The whole tone scale is 6 notes comprising of all whole steps, or major seconds: 1 2 3 #4 #5/b6 b7 1′ (key of C = C D E F# G#/Ab Bb C). However, this scale tonality did not feel rock enough; sometimes it can sound too ethereal, or mysterious but in a lifted up to the sky sort of way. We needed something dirty and coming down from below. So I focused on a different type of augmented scale, still with 6 notes, but comprising of alternating 1/2 steps and minor 3rds: 1 b3 3 5 b6 7 1′ (key of C = C Eb E G Ab B C) . This version of a 6 note scale (666 🤘😛) unlocked everything I needed to Rock. All half steps and minor thirds just keeps lending itself to nasty patterns. So I spent some time recording ideas and parts on pipa and bass guitar in this scale; using rhythm, tempo, and rock feel inspirations from the Journey song, before coming to jam with Nick. Once we were together for the recording session, everything fell into place and it was a blast to jam out in this world. You can see from my notes here some of the tonal ideas and chord progressions that I was exploring (in the key of E)
The Jukebox!
In the script there is mention of a Jukebox in the bar. Hayley, our Props Master, was able to track down this fantastic vintage Wurlitzer jukebox for our show! (It’s got full stereo music y’all!) When we originally opened up the back panel to look at the insides, it reminded me of the original atomic bombs. A little brother to fat boy, the next machinery in line at the Manhattan project. After assessing the electronics on board (which did conveniently have an RCA input!) we decided to just gut all of the innards and hot-rod the wiring directly to the speakers. Better to pump in signal from a head amp and control that rather than try to rely on this old technology for the run of the show… if we could even get it working in the first place! And guess what, it sounds fantastic! I had a 9 speaker surround design going, but we specifically used the Jukebox on it’s own for 2 specific transition cues in the play. One of those transitions was a big highlight for me, I love how it played. Doug’s character goes over to the jukebox, punches a chunky button and Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’ ” starts playing. The Jukebox it also is utilized as part of the speaker mix in the unsettling devil soundscape, specifically for all of the reverse pipa undulating in unsettling queasy dissonance, whenever the demon is present.
A spirited homage to fandom, for sports and theater lovers alike.
“King” LeBron James was just the hero that Cleveland needed. One of the greatest NBA players to ever hit the court, his influence brought promise and renewal to an entire city. Set against the backdrop of James’ electrifying basketball career, this fast-paced comedy chronicles the turbulent bond between two die-hard fans, whose intertwined fortunes are tied to those of their idol. A hilarious and heartfelt exploration of loyalty, legacy, and the shared moments that define us. [from Forward Theater’s website]
Names of Actors and Design Team listed in Forward’s Post above!
Overall Concept
This is the only play I’ve worked on that when I read the script, I heard no music. This is extremely rare, normally when I read a script I will hear music in my head and get a lot of intuition information on where there could be music, underscore, or sound support (even if we don’t put any there in the actual show). So it was quite a remarkable reading for me to not have that happen at all; I thought, “hmmm, what exactly will I be doing on this one?…”. But as I started to understand the quick costume changes and huge amount of set transformations between scenes, it was pretty clear that sound would be crucial in supporting the transitions of this show. It was the fewest amount of cues I’ve ever had in my Qlab session! It’s also the first time I haven’t composed any original music for a show and worked exclusively with existing recordings. Even though there weren’t many music cues, the remixes I made were absolutely jam packed with action and a lot of work went into each one.
Besides helping with transitions, these music tracks played a big part in setting the year of each scene, as well as activating our cultural memories of that time. It also served a unique function in this show in that I was able to add a little more information and context of what was happening in LeBron’s career leading up to the scene. It’s not something that often happens, but it proved to be a powerful approach to how sound design can serve the story. It was always my goal to tee-up the ball for the actors, but to not reveal too much info, or give away any important bits that the actors are meant to unveil within the scene. I was just there to make the assist, tossing the ball up in the air so they could dunk it.
The main concept was to use popular songs from the year that each scene takes place to set the time period and remix it. This was in complement to the specific “vintage” cell phones (shout out Kaya) & basketball shoes (shout out Karen) used in each scene to set place and time. I specifically wanted to choose a song that had meaning either to the fans of that team or that was used a “theme song” for LeBron during that particular season. Something that would have been used at a sports game, something tied to that moment in time. I then remixed the track to include highlight reel sound bites of announcers calling big plays, crowd reactions, and newscasters discussing the hype or big events of that particular season. I really wanted to infuse the electric energy of what it’s like to be in the crowd at a sporting event or watching a big game with your friends. I wanted to hype up the audience and give the actors a bunch of energy to do the next scene!
I free-handed all of the remixes, nothing was “warped” to the tempo or on the beat “grid”. So when I was chopping up bits of the track & stems, I was lining everything up to the transients of where the next beat would start to splice things in (you can see examples in the photos below). Everything is heavily manipulated and chopped up, moved around, and twisted upside down, but the goal was for you not even to notice, for it just to flow. However, if you go back and listen to the original tracks compared to these remixes, you’ll hear how heavy handed I was and just how much has been changed. It also took a lot of finesse and experimentation placing all of the announcer game calls and newscaster clips. I worked carefully to line things up with a certain beat or match the phrase length of the music, all while telling a coherent story. These remixes were a blast to work on and an interesting puzzle to put together!
Here are some screenshots of my different Remix sessions in Ableton:
Q1 Jesus Walks – overviewQ2 All I Do Is Win – overviewQ2 All I Do Is Win – zoom in on Vocal Chops -not used in greyQ2 All I Do Is Win – lining up the beat chops free handQ2 All I Do Is Win – lining up the transients free hand zoom inQ4 Started From the Bottom – overviewQ4 Started from the Bottom – edits zoom inQ4 Started From the Bottom – fx automation
Of course, just the clip arrangement view doesn’t tell you the whole story of manipulation involving effect chains, and automation moves, etc. Even on individual clips themselves (like the highlighted ones in the 2nd to last photo), I’m changing the pitch or envelopes in certain ways so that “repeated” sounds are never quite the same twice.
2003-2004 – Pregame Warmup / Pre Show playlist
To set the time period, all of the pre show songs were chart topping hip-hop and club hits from 2003-2004. Millennials, this one’s for you: 50 Cent “In Da Club”, Eminem “Lose Yourself”, Snoop Dogg “Drop It Like It’s Hot”, Usher “Yeah!”, Beyonce “Crazy In Love”, etc, etc… you get the idea, it was basically our prom soundtrack hahaha.
2004 – Quarter 1 / Tip Off
“Jesus Walks” Remix – Original 1st Draft:
Kanye’s first lyrics place us in the heartland, “you know what the Midwest is, young and restless”, we hear the sound bite of the announcer and crowd reacting to LeBron’s first dunk of his first NBA game. Later the news pundet asks “Do you see anything that suggests, he might actually live up to the hype?” followed by Kanye saying “it’s kinda hard and” ending with “the only thing that I pray is that my feet don’t fail me now…”, as if coming from LeBron’s perspective.
In the 2nd Quarter, Shawn talks about sports “fans” being fanatics and that being the term’s origin word. He brings it around to religion, comparing the parallels of LeBron being “a savior” like Jesus. Shawn highlights all the things devoted followers are asked to do in order to please their “vengeful deity” and avoid suffering. So choosing “Jesus Walks” to kick things off this was both a nod to that moment in the script and serving up how much hype there was in the media surrounding LeBron James potentially becoming basketball’s new Messiah.
Top Of Show – “Jesus Walks” Coronation of King James Remix – Final Show Version:
Musically, you can hear in the final Show version, that only a little phrase of music got cut about 3/4 of the way through the track, we put a reverb sting to Kanye’s last vocal note, and added drums in under that final vocal line. Mikael had the idea to add a National Anthem to the start of this cue, since it was the Top of Show and that’s how we’d start the NBA game! I found a few different of clips of the full arena of CAVS fans singing the National Anthem during various playoff games! Here in an earlier draft of the cue, you can hear the full version of the intro where the Announcer asks the fans to join in the Cleveland tradition of singing the national anthem together. Even this bit of the Announcement is edited down, but it still ended up adding about 30 seconds to the top of show cue and that was just too long. Also, we were worried some audience members might stand up to start singing, instead of settling into their seat for the start of the show… So as much as we wanted to include that sound bite to let them know they were actually hearing CAVS fans sing the national anthem – it had to get cut for time.
“Jesus Walks” remix – Longest Intro version with original CAVS Announcer:
“Jesus Walks” remix – Shortest Singing Intro version with “By” moment:
In this shortest version of the singing, a really nice effect happened when the music track hits the downbeat and the CAVS fans are singing the word “By” in the anthem. It was such a cool sounding crowd sample that I wanted to add more of that into the track, but in the end, it felt like once we transitioned into the remix, we should just stay there and leave the anthem clips behind – on to setting up the story up.
2010 – Quarter 2
“All I Do Is Win” Miami Remix – Final Show Version:
In 2010 LeBron James left the Cavs to play for the Miami Heat, where they shortly went on to win 2 NBA championships. “All I Do Is Win” (2010) became one of the theme songs for that team and time period. It was so perfect to use, especially because Matt and Shawn spend most of Quarter 2 being sour and pissed off at LeBron for leaving the CAVS. Further antagonized by Ludacris’ line in the song about being the “South’s Champion, cause all I do, all I – all I – all I – all I do is WIN”!
There were 4 teams in the running trying to secure James for their roster in 2010 and LeBron famously sat down for a live interview on TV to unveil his decision. I added newscasters speculating whether this would be the end of LeBron’s career with the CAVS and actual audio of that live interview.
“The Decision Interview” clip that ends this cue leads with Jim Gray asking, “The answer to the question everybody wants to know… LeBron, what’s your decision?” and leaves LeBron saying “Umm.. In this Fall, man… this is very tough…” The very next sentence LeBron says in that interview is the now infamous line and Shawn’s first line of the scene: “I’m going to take my talents to South Beach…” . The sound design here sets up the actual moment right before Shawn’s first line and then the actor gets to finish it. I really liked how it became a super smooth continuation from the real life recording down into the world of the stage with the actors getting to play off of it start the scene.
2010-2014 – Halftime / Intermission
NBA Game Horn into “All of the Lights”
When looking through 2010 songs for this moment, I spotted “All of the Lights” by Kanye West. Originally, I just thought it would be a funny way to troll my friend, collaborator, and the lighting designer on this show, Colin Gawronski (Stones in His Pockets, Birds of North America, Garbologists, I Carry Your Heart With Me, and more!). How fun if the song lyrics would literally tell the lights what to do: dramatic end to the scene, we’re in black out, then out of the darkness – “Turn up the lights in here baby…” and then the lights would come up in the house for intermission, “Extra bright, I want y’all to see this!”. I was 100% expecting this to get cut, especially because it meant using a 2nd Ye song, but Mikael was down and we kept it in the show! Much to my delight.
During the Intermission, we move progressively from year to year between 2010 to 2014 with each track. This time highlighting the party atmosphere that pop music had shifted into during the 2010s, to contrast from the hip hop club vibes of the mid 2000’s pre show playlist. This again was to help us set the time period and feeling. It was important that these were all songs that might be heard in an NBA arena during a game too, I wanted to keep that high energy atmosphere up during the intermission. I still wanted the audience to feel like they were in a sports arena.
During intermission, there is a massive on stage transition where they rotate the entire back wall and transform the space from a minimal sleek wine bar to a cluttered old vintage store. Huge props to the backstage crew for making that all happen each night!!!
Here’s the Halftime Playlist: (2010) “All of the Lights” – Kanye West (2011) “Party Rock Anthem” (feat. Lauren Bennett & GoonRock) by LMFAO (2011) “We Found Love” (feat. Calvin Harris) by Rihanna (2012) “Call Me Maybe” by Carly Rae Jepsen (2012) “Don’t Stop the Party” (feat. TJR) by Pitbull (2013) “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk, Pharrell (2014) “Turn Down for What” by Lil Jon (2014) “Shake It Off” by Taylor Swift (2014) “Uptown Funk” (feat. Bruno Mars) by Marc Ronson
LeBron’s 1st Game Intro back with the Cavs – Classic NBA Intro Remix – Final Show Version:
Original Clip with Diddy “Comin’ Home” song in background…
This is the actual announcement bringing LeBron James onto the court for his first game back with the CAVS in 2014. And the theme song that was used to celebrate LeBron’s return was Diddy’s “Comin’ Home” track from 2014… As most of you know now, in 2024, Diddy has come under public scrutiny for abuse towards women caught on tape, as well as going to court with charges ranging from sexual abuse to potential sex trafficking. So I felt we should remove the Diddy track from this moment. It’s instead covered up with the Alan Parsons Project’s classic track “Sirius”, which has become synonymous in our zeitgeist with the introductions of players in an NBA game. Though simple in concept, it actually took some tricky finessing to achieve this by of adding extra crowd noises, lining up the two tracks perfectly together in a way that “Sirius” obscured what was left of the Diddy track after some vocal stem isolation. It took some fussy tweaking for it to sound natural and real. To be honest, I felt like there was a problematic nature to some of the other major artists I selected too. Kanye with his anti-semitic comments in recent years. And of course, Drake with all of the “pedo” child grooming allegations being thrown about during this year’s insane rap battle with Kendrick Lamar… to the point where I still debate with myself about whether I should have used their tracks or not. This is not the first time this sort of debate has happened, especially in our age of cancel culture. Simply look at Wagner, R. Kelly, or Michael Jackson… Do we keep listening to their music? Do we separate the Art from the Artist? Is it case by case? It’s especially tricky when these happen to be the biggest songs of an era and completely intertwined with the culture & memory of that time. This is the first time I haven’t composed any original music for a show and this is an issue I didn’t expect to be thinking about when using other people’s music for a show. I’m not claiming to have an answer here, but the Diddy situation was serious enough with the court case happening at the same time as the show, that I felt we at least needed to get rid of his track from that sound clip.
In the 3rd Quarter, Shawn (black) and Matt (white) fall into an argument over Matt’s off-handed, problematic statement that “LeBron should have known his place”. Shawn doesn’t let this slide and it brings up a tough and tricky confrontation over racism between the best friends. At one point, Shawn asks, “What’s my place Matt?”. Matt’s normally unchecked white privilege gets challenged head on, but instead of listening to Shawn explain how these racist remarks have impacted him in a negative way, Matt quickly becomes defensive. Like many white people do, Matt gets caught up about that ‘not being his intent’, rather than recognizing it’s not at all about his feelings and but rather the impact his words and actions do make on other people. Shawn even riffs on Matt’s frequent refrain that “this is (actually) the problem with America”.
I found this moment to be such a parallel with the recent sit down interview that Trump gave at the National Association of Black Journalists conference in Chicago. Trump made the remark that “… a lot of the journalists in this room are Black… coming from the border are millions and millions of people that happen to be taking Black jobs.”, to which the journalist cut in to ask, “What exactly is a “Black Job”, sir?”. Trump tries to wiggle out of it by saying, “A black job, that is anybody that has a job, that’s what it is…” It’s very clear in that moment that trump has an “idea” of what a “Black Job” should be (and is not saying it out loud), just as Shawn points out that it must be the case that Matt “has an idea of what LeBron’s place is”. When the ‘what did you mean by that’ push back comes, in both cases the person making the remark fumbles a bullshit response trying to recover the remark as ‘not really meaning anything’. In the play, when Matt tries to weasel out of the true racist meaning of his comment, he reasons that LeBron “stepped out of the place of being a decent person, and should have known to stay in that place”, Shawn fires back with, “That’s not what you meant, that’s slippery Matt – don’t get all slippery on me…” This moment with Trump was almost verbatim what that moment was in the play, very slippery.
In a recent talk back, one of the audience members pointed out that these statements written into Matt’s dialog, that “LeBron doesn’t know his place”, or that he “lacks class” were actual criticisms people were throwing at James during this time period.
2016 – Quarter 4
“Started From the Bottom” Championship Parade Remix – Final Show Version:
This transition exits us out of that huge, relationship changing argument over racism at the end of Quarter 3. It’s the button out of that scene and I wanted to capture the fracturing of that friendship into a low point of what comes after, being alone and apart from each other. So we hear the sound of a person playing basketball by themselves, without their friends. We hear them obviously bricking a shot off the rim, the ball miss the basket, then bounces on the floor a few times before it rolls away. Originally one of my concepts was to have each transition start with basketball sounds that mirrored the friendship arc in the story. This is one of those concepts that made the final cut and I love how the basketball sounds turned out over the remixed beat at the top of the track.
Drake’s “Started From the Bottom” (2013) was actually used by Miami Heat fans to celebrate their titles with LeBron and Wade, but in this case, it lyrically made more sense to use it for the CAVS. The fans were celebrating their first NBA championship title in 52 years with LeBron back on the team. After all they had been through, they “started from the bottom, and now we’re here”, champions at the top, “..the whole team’s here” including their MVP LeBron James. I tried to only use the chorus and a few small bits of rap sound bits (“story stayed the same through the money and the fame”), focusing more heavily on remixing the beat itself. We’re setting the context about the big parade that’s happening around Cleveland. I specifically left out any obvious remarks about the CAVS winning the championship, focusing more on how big the parade was going to be. I wanted the audience to be able to imagine that it could have been a parade for one of the big games in that Finals series happening in Cleveland. I felt it was important to let the characters reveal what the parade was actually about, that it was the Championship parade to celebrate the CAVS 1st NBA title. In the first half of the cue we hear a lot of news caster commentary about the parade and the fans excitement. Throughout the middle through the end of the cue, we hear some very special highlights from Game 7 of the 2016 NBA Championship against the Golden State Warriors. Including one of my favorite sound bites: the actual game sounds of LeBron’s enormous block on “Iggy” with the crowd and announcer’s huge reaction to that moment. I was hoping to get this into the cue if possible because Shawn recounts his courtside view of this very moment to Matt as the characters find their friendship again, bonding over their love of the game and mending old wounds.
I originally drafted all of these cues to about 35 seconds long, in the end there was so much stuff to clear off of the stage for this transition from Q3 to Q4 that I had to continue remixing the track and added 2 minutes more! This is the most manipulated of all the beats & I’m pretty stoked on how this remix turned out, I tried to match that energy that I had found for the “Jesus Walks” remix and carry that over to this one as well. There is a little nod to one of my favorite producers, J Dilla, in this track with the sweeping “siren” sounds to add hype, though a little different tone not as loud as Jay Dee’s. I also had the crowd noises get “chopped up” by the drum beat throughout this remix – which is a sound I love, it just has so much energy!
2016 – Buzzer Beater & Post Game / Post Show
End of Show – “We Are The Champions” Buzzer Beater Remix – Final Show Version
At the end of the show, Shawn and Matt play a one-on-one game to 11 with a ball of paper and the trash basket to decide whether they’ll go downtown to enjoy the parade or if they’ll stay and have some “baby time” for Matt’s potential phone break up. Here the script leaves a nice opening for basketball crowd and game noises to creep in under their impromptu game to bring us into the final silhouette moment.
The sound originally started a little earlier, first with some squeaking sneakers on the court of a friendly pick up game, followed by the ramping up of arena crowd cheers. This ended up lasting a little too long, so we tightened it up to start just after Matt makes his final basket. In both the original and final versions, you can hear the actual play call of the announcer counting down the final seconds of Game 7 of the 2016 Championship, to say “final seconds, it’s over, it’s over! Cleveland is a city of Champions once again!”. We go into blackout with Queen’s “We are the Champions” to bring us home for curtain bows. One of the nice touches that I loved about the moment of lights coming up for bows, is Marques and Greg are there holding each others hands up high, as champions together.
“We Are The Champions” the Post Game / Post Show Interview mix
If you listen to the original draft of the this cue, you’ll hear sound bites from the post game interview and team mates and crowd chanting “MVP!” to James. We cut this out of the curtain call itself, but then added it into a little “post game” cue which comes after the curtain call and announcement for talkback, which I thought worked very nicely.
“We Are The Champions” – Original Draft 1
There are no losers in this beautiful story of friendship.
It probably took you as long to read this post as it does to run the whole show! I always seem to have a lot to say about the design and process… Thanks so much for checking out my work. I am dyslexic, so it takes a very long time for me to put these posts together. Please make grace for my grammar and spelling errors!!! ❤️ Brian
Wednesday, June 12: Pay-What-You-Will Preview Thursday, June 13: Final Preview Friday, June 14: Opening Night
Wednesday – Saturday evenings at 7:30pm Friday matinee June 21st at 2:00pm Sunday matinees at 2:00pm
Rural Ireland goes Hollywood glam!
Charlie and Jake are a couple of resourceful Irish lads working as extras on a Hollywood flick being shot in their homeland. Directors, divas, local legends, and pub crawlers come and go at breakneck speed as Big-Time Pictures and small-town Ireland battle it out for top billing. Two intrepid actors portray fifteen characters in this hilarious and heartbreaking tale of Hollywood corruption, hometown mischief, and universal pathos.
Stones in His Pockets
Directed by Michael Wright, this comedic two hander play features the dynamic duo Neil Brookshire & Dan Klarer – two of the funniest fellows in Door County! They play a staggering 20 or so characters between the two of them over the course of two hours. It’s super impressive and a daring feat I could never brave doing!
Cast Jake – Neil Brookshire Charlie – Dan Klarer
Production Director – Michael Wright Choreographer – Andria Nikoupolis-Weliky Scenic Designer – Steve Barns Costume Designer – Kärin Kopischke Lighting Designer – Colin Gawronski Sound Designer & Score – Brian Grimm Production Stage Manager – Kelsey Brennan York Dialect Coach – Greg Pragel Production Manager – Jenevieve Lee Props Master – Jenevieve Lee Production Assistant – Haley Cranstoun Technical Director/Scenic Charge Artist – Alex Polzin Production Photos – Cody LeSage of LeSage Media Production
Featured Guest Musicians Fearn – Irish music trio from Milwaukee, WI Fearn is Asher Gray on flute, Erin Brooker-Miller on harp, Andy Miller on bodhrán drum Brian Grimm on cello, 12 string guitar, orchestration
TAP Community Partner – Sunshine Resources of Door County
For every show, Third Avenue Playworks picks a different local Door County organization to be their community partner. The Wednesday night preview is always a pay-what-you-will performance fundraising for this show’s community partner, Sunshine Resources of Door County. Sunshine Resources helps folks with special needs and disabilities, here’s some info about the organization’s mission from their website:
Sunshine Resources of Door County (known as Sunshine House) is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization. Sunshine House Inc. was started in Door County by a handful of parents in 1971. These parents wanted more for their children to experience and be a part of and with their determination Sunshine House Inc. evolved into the great organization it is today. We are still operating this non-for-profit organization 40 some years later with the same Mission – of achieving full participation in society of people with special needs.
Over the years, changes have been made to adjust to the growing needs of our clients. As we have grown in scope and size, many of our wonderful services have been masked behind what Sunshine House once was. And we are much more than what we were in 1971. In order to educate the community and provide the information needed to those that can benefit from opportunity through our services, we have decided to rebrand our company and will look forward to serving Door County into the future under the name Sunshine Resources of Door County. This speaks to who we are, a resource. We offer many opportunities for those with special needs in our community, and finding the right fit for the individual is important in their lives.
Our goal is to provide “Best in Class” day service programming, prevocational employment, community employment and educational opportunities to build confidence and foster independence. Families and clients are fully involved in the path chosen for success, ensuring our clients live their best life and reach their dreams and goals.
The score for this show is a collaboration between myself and the Irish music trio from Milwaukee, FEARN. Fearn is Asher Gray on Irish wood flute, Erin Brooker-Miller on harp, and Andy Miller on bodhrán drum! In April, I traveled over to Milwaukee to record with Erin and Andy in the UW-Milwaukee dance studio. It was a transportive and delightful recording session. They played delightfully well and gave me a lot to work with, as a duo and soloists. Later on, I caught up with Asher virtually and we were able to layer flute parts over the tunes that the director Michael and I thought had the most potential for certain scenes. There was definitely a level of trust needed from Michael on a few cues where I thought, “this is the right fit”, but it didn’t have the full orchestration yet. It can be hard to pitch something as a big film cue sound when you just have the first two starting layers! Honestly it was such a huge reminder of how big a part Orchestration plays into music choices as a composer. For this first example above, it was in the right ballpark of exuberant energy with the drum and harp duo version, but it didn’t start to cook until the flute was layered on top. Holy cow! The flute in the mix just added and incredible amount of energy and brightness. Then the strings were able to fill things out and build a big backdrop for the trio to shine.
After those two sessions, we had a ton of material including solo instrument tunes, duo tunes, and trio performances. I then started recording my own string parts on cello, with a bit of 12 string guitar, and orchestrated layers of brass, winds, and the sounds of real Uilleann Irish bagpipes and a real gaelic women’s choir.
I had such a blast recording with Fearn, and then mixing & layering in orchestra parts with the music they performed. It’s just so beautiful, and I’ve been very excited to start sharing this music! In the video above, we hear the “Hollywood-ized” version of the traditional tune “George White’s Reel”. In this show, there is a dichotomy between the locals and the outsider film crew. We use the raw acoustic sound of Fearn’s trio for moments with the local Irish townsfolk and the beefed up, fully orchestrated score version of the tunes for the Hollywood film set moments.
This show has incredible set and lighting eye candy to check out as well! With lights by Colin Gawronski, set design by Steve Barnes, and build by Alex Polzin. With the lighting on the back painted landscape, it looks like its changing between different oil paintings right before your eyes! And the green and gold of the travel postcard infant of it is such a cool visual contrast, it really pops.
Though it’s a comedy, the play deals with some serious topics. It centers around the sorts of things we hide from others under facades. Only true friends can cut through those walls we erect to get at what’s underneath. The sorts of things we should talk more freely to others about. There is a great story of true friendship and helping others here. It’s a reminder that if you need help, please reach out to your friends and loved ones.
This is the 2nd “Hollywood” cue, the “Dispossessed” film cue. For this cue, I asked Erin to play some common minor progressions on harp, both as chords and arpeggios. Then Asher recorded some flute layers in a number of different styles. I also asked Andy to record some special effects on the bodhrán drum to sound like wind blowing over the surface of a lake, which turned out really cool! After that I recorded all the string parts and added in the sounds of a Gaelic women’s choir and created a distant Uilleann Irish bagpipe melody to tug on the heart strings. Of all the Hollywood cues in the show, I think it has the most unique mix of instruments between the bagpipes, choir, strings, fx drum, flute, and harp.
With the solemn and contemplative theme of the music, I’d like to highlight the show’s darker looks. The interplay of lighting and set design creates captivating effects throughout the show. When different colored lights illuminate the painted landscape backdrop, it transforms before your eyes, resembling a series of ever-changing oil paintings. The sky and cloud textures paired with travelling sunset effects were my favorite backdrop visuals.
I love Irish music and I love harp, so I was super excited to get to record with Erin on this project! Here is one of my favorite Harp features from the show, it’s the classic “meet cute” Hollywood film cue. The extras are watching as the stars of the Rom-com exchange glances for the first time… and some shenanigans ensue.
This lovely traditional tune is called “Inisheer”. First Erin laid down the tune on solo harp, then I filled out the string parts on cello, and lastly Asher doubled the melody on flute. I could listen to this one all day. I hope you enjoy it too ❤️
I’d like to highlight the beautiful friendship and collaboration of Neil Brookshire and Dan Klarer. I’ve had so so so much fun working with these two jokesters at TAP for the Christmas Radio play productions we’ve done together. They always keep me laughing on their quest for the next punchline. The genuine friendship these two have off stage translates and shines so well on stage too. I couldn’t imagine a better pairing for this comedy show. Much love to both of you Neil and Dan! 😊
Here’s to some wide shots, mid shots, and close ups!
This traditional harp tune “Loftus Jones” or “Planxty Loftus Jones” was written by blind Celtic harpist Turlough O’Carolan (1670 – 1738). You can really hear the Baroque flavor of this composition, and it fit perfectly for the Hollywood Wedding Marquee scene setting. This is the A-section of the piece, performed first by Erin, then layered on with flute and strings by Asher and myself. This composition has so many fun little sections to play with; it’s a jovial little tune & we hope you enjoy!
I’ll probably post one or two more videos and add them here. As you can imagine, there are more tunes that were recorded and used as top-of-show music, curtain call, and intermission music. Some fantastic pieces weren’t used at all in the show. I’d really love to release this as a collaborative album with Fearn, it’s something that still needs to be worked out. Hopefully this year, you’ll have an album version of this music available to stream and buy. More updates on that if it comes to fruition, but it’s lovely music and I’d really love to share more with y’all!
New Play “Oak” by Terry Guest, directed by Mikael Burke runs May 31st through June 30th at Urbanite Theatre in Sarasota, Florida! [ Get Tickets ]
It’s 7pm. Do you know where your children are? It’s snatching season, and town-wide curfew regulations have fostered a culture of fear in the community along Odella Creek. Too many have fallen victim to the freedoms promised by the red-eyed monster…Will cousins Suga, Big Man, and Pickle resist temptation, or become the next names in the morning news? Step into the darkness and experience the terror firsthand in the new Southern Gothic horror, OAK. (from Urbanite Theatre‘s site)
Oak’s Cast Suga – Jaeda LaVonne Pickle – Trezure B. Coles Big Man – William Rose II Peaches – DeAnna Wright*
Headshots and bios here *Member of Actors Equity Association
Creative Team Playwright – Terry Guest Director & Video Designer – Mikael Burke Production Stage Manager/ Prop Designer – Tori Heikenfeld Production Manager/Technical Director/Light Designer – Alex Pinchin Assistant Stage Manager – Fiona Coffey Composer and Sound Designer – Brian Grimm Sound Engineer – Rew Tippin Costume Designer – Adrienne Pitts Scenic Designer – Frank Chavez Master Carpenter – Eugene Alcorn Scenic Charge – Anna Baldwin Lack Graffiti Artist – Kaitlin Kelly Production Photos – Sorcha Augustine
special thank yous section at the bottom of the post
“Oak” Urbanite Theatre production photos by Sorcha Augustine (c) 2024
Composer and Sound Designer’s Notes
First off, let me say that I’m a huge fan of both Terry Guest’s scripts and Mikael Burke’s directing. As a lover of horror films and scary sounds, I was thrilled to be brought on board for this project. In preparation for Oak, I carefully selected a variety of modern horror classics that resonate with the themes of this play. You can expect to hear hints of iconic elements from recent horror hits such as the ‘IT’ and ‘Candyman’ series (both original and new), along with films like ‘Get Out,’ ‘Suspiria,’ ‘La Llorona’, and Prokofiev’s ‘Peter and the Wolf’ woven into the fabric of the sound design & score.
Looking for old ghost story traditions and songs with roots in Africa, I was drawn to the haunting legend of La Tunda. This tale shares an eerie resemblance to the chilling swamp ghost featured in Oak. This living legend of the shape-shifting spectre La Tunda, who comes out from the woods after 7pm to snatch your children comes from within the African descendant communities in Ecuador and Colombia. It’s also a direct parallel to the Mexican and Central American ghost story of La Llorona. All of the original music in this production, including the main themes for Odella, derive directly from the melodic motifs, chord progressions, and rhythms used in the folklore songs and dances which spin tales and warnings of La Tunda.
Another unique feature of my design is that the immersive swamp sounds accompanying the ghost’s presence are all crafted from vocalizations by the cast. I have manipulated their vocal noises and run them through custom made “animal filters” of frogs, snakes, alligators, cicadas, rain, thunder, and more! This technique aims to blur the boundaries between reality and imagination, offering a glimpse into the eerie auditory landscape experienced by the characters.
*warning, some plot and production spoilers below*
Odella’s Whistle Themes
La Tunda / Odella themes sketch board
Since this entire process was completely remote for me, I decided to record some guided audio walkthroughs of my ideas for the Whistle Themes to send to the director, Mikael Burke. It was my first time doing something like this and it unintentionally created little podcast episodes, explaining and documenting the Whistle Theme process. I thought I’d share a version of episodes 2, 3 and 4 stitched together, for those who like that medium. Everything in the score for Oak comes out of these whistle themes:
Throughout the play, we hear Odella’s ghost whistling her entrancing lullaby from the swamp. These whistles serve as a constant reminder that she lurks in the distance, deep within the trees, waiting and ready to snatch you! During my initial research for similar ghost stories and lullabies within African descendant communities of the diaspora, I happened to be visiting my older brother and his family. As I described the story of Oak to them, my brother remarked how similar Terry’s swamp ghost Odella was to the Hispanic ghost story of La Llorona. Then my sister-in-law, who is from Ecuador, shared the parallel ghost story from where she grew up, called La Tunda. La Tunda is essentially the African counterpart of La Llorona. In the La Llorona ghost story, a mother drowns herself in the creek after her children accidentally drown there. In the La Tunda version, the mother loses her daughter deep in the woods of the mountain. After the tragedy, the mother returns as a ghost, emerging from the waters (La Llorona) or mountains (La Tunda), and shapeshifts to appear to children as their mother or close relative, enticing them to come to the waters/mountains so she can take the children away with her. Both La Llorona and La Tunda put the children in a trance, promising that everything will be alright in the water/mountain if they come with her. The ghost haunts on, perpetually searching for her lost children.
I couldn’t believe it; this was exactly like Odella’s ghost story in Oak, you just had to swap the woods or waters for the creek in the swamp. The similarities didn’t end there! My sister-in-law shared that growing up, they were all afraid to be outside after 7 pm. Once it got dark, they would rush home, fearing that La Tunda was real and would come to get them! Similarly, in the world of Oak, there is a siren alarm that goes off at 7pm every day to remind parents of the curfew and ensure their children make it home safely. It turns out there are several different La Tunda songs that recount her ghostly tale and issue warnings to the listener—so I wanted to start with those songs to see what sort of material could work for Odella’s whistle theme.
There are two parts of Odella’s main Whistle Theme. The first part of the phrase | C D— | C E— | (in solfege: do re—, do mi —) come from the background vocals in this song. You can hear them singing “La Tunda—- (do re, re—) La Tunda—- (do mi, mi—-)”. Which I simplified to the phrase you see above. I love the main vocalist and story teller in this rendition of the La Tunda song:
Here is the 1st tune where I sourced Odella Whistle Theme notes from in the background vocals
Chord Progression: from this first tune I utilized the spooky and fun diminished to minor chord progression. This chord progression can be seen in two ways, G# diminished to A minor which gives us more of a ghostly flavor. Or if you add an E in the bass of the first G# diminished chord, it turns it into an E7 chord. This stabilizes the progression by both chords sharing the E in the bass note, becoming an E7 to A- chord progression. I mostly leaned into the dissonance of the G# diminished flavor throughout the production.
The second part of Odella’s main Whistle Theme comes from this video of a La Tunda dance. We hear again in the background vocals some lyrics about La Tunda; the musical phrase is ||: – EEEE | F D – :|| (mi mi mi mi fa re – in the first tune’s key). In this lively dance, we see the ghost entrances the kids on stage, then ventures out to the audience and scares the kids so bad they start running away!
Here is the 2nd tune I sourced Odella Whistle Theme notes from, also in the backing vocals. A dance where La Tunda chasing after children and scaring them!
When combined together the themes go as such: | C D— | C E— | EEEE | F D —- | When transformed to be a little more melodic, it goes like this: | C D — | C E — | C E F D —- | Here is another melodic variation in a 3 count: | C D – | C E – | D E E | F D – |
Bass Line: There is also an amazing 1/2 step bass line in this second tune which sometimes leads from G# up to A on the last beat of a measure to the down beat, and sometimes leads from Bb down to A. I use both motions quite extensively throughout the score of Oak for tension. Sometimes in series | Bb A—-| G# A—-| and sometimes in parallel with a double stop of Bb and G# together, resolving in a pure A octave!
Olélé Moliba Makasi – a Congolese lullaby. I also searched for some West African lullabies that could complement these La Tunda whistle themes. After delving into various lullabies, I stumbled upon one from the Congo, coming from slightly further south than my initial search area. However, it resonated so well with the existing La Tunda themes that it became the perfect way to begin the original version of Odella’s theme. In the opening of the play, we hear the origin story of Odella. She was an enslaved person in America during the 17 or 18 hundreds who became impregnated by her master, and subsequently punished for it. Determined to escape the plantation, she faces the toughest decision of her life: to remain a slave and care for her baby, or to make a run for freedom, albeit leaving her child behind. She ultimately chooses freedom, soothing the child with this lullaby as she flees, whistling it from a distance.
The main melody we hear fits exactly with the existing La Tunda phrases: ||: C—D E – | C—D E, DE | D—, CD | C—- :||
~ and how perfect that it has water sounds in the music and is on the water!
The entire score for Oak, including all chords, scales, rhythms, and melodic material, is derived directly from the main elements of these La Tunda and Olélé Lullaby tunes. Of course, I am breaking them down into basic music elements and then recombining or twisting them to fit the needs of the production, but everything originates from the wellspring of this source material. In my notebook pages above, you can see that I created some scary hybrid scales, combining all the various note combinations of La Tunda themes, Olélé themes, and some other whistle intervals I had independently been developing. The La Tunda material is used when Odella (or the Wolf) is more threatening or “snatching” a child, while the Olélé lullaby themes are utilized when Odella is attempting to hypnotize the children to come with her.
Odella’s Music
Accompanying Odella, Oak’s swamp ghost, you will hear scary vocalizations from the cast, along with Odella’s Snatching Theme. This theme is based on the E F D note motif from the 2nd La Tunda tune discussed above, played here on the guzheng zither. These snatching themes are sometimes played with dulcimer hammers to create an eerie piano sound, while other times they are plucked with steady rhythm during Odella’s “trances”. Throughout the production, variations of these trances are used when Odella is attempting to charm the children. In the later trance portion of this cue, you can especially hear the sweetness of the Olélé Lullaby themes, as Odella tries to persuade the main character that everything will be just right down in the swamp waters if she but comes with her.
Here is the original sketch of Variations on Odella’s “Snatching Theme”. Some of these sections were utilized as the top of show theme and at the moments of a child being snatched by Odella.
The 7pm Siren
“It is 7pm, do you know where your children are?…”
Heard everyday in Oak across the swamp, this siren cue is made entirely out musical instruments. It includes 12 string guitar played with brass slide and distortion, cello siren wails, and bawu flute manipulated to sound like the buzzing alarm. The siren voice features the haunting vocals talents of Rebecca Rose Mims. I really love how this cue turned out, one-and-done!
˄ Keep an ear out for her, hopefully recorded for a book on tape near you soon, cause her voice is amazing!
The Princess and the Wolf
This cue deals with the trauma of a young survivor of sexual assault. In the show it is narrated by the cast and accompanied by a video projection of a paper puppet show. (Mikael edited it together and it looks incredible!!) The use of a puppet show is mentioned in the script and our production’s vision for it was inspired by the recent Candyman film. In both cases, it serves as a way to present trauma and violence against Black bodies, but with a visual layer of removal, acting as a defensive storytelling barrier. This approach aims to tell the story and spark conversation without completely triggering audience members (or those performing). In Candyman, the subject matter is of public brutality against Black people, whereas in this production, it deals with rape by a family member.
Given the title and the orchestrated storytelling, I couldn’t help but draw inspiration from Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf” for narrator and orchestra. This piece has several cartoon adaptations and is in spirit with the puppet show concept. It absolutely influenced the brass chords accompanied by cymbal roll crescendos during moments where the Wolf appears. This storytelling method also resonates with Little Red Riding Hood themes and it parallels the Odella snatching scene at the end of the play.
All the chords and melodies in this cue stem from the Odella (La Tunda) Whistle Themes variations.
As part of the Wolf’s growl sound, you will hear a man’s zipper unzipping.
1st Lady Temple’s Swamp Environment, Cast Vocalizations & Animal Filters
For the scene introducing the enigmatic character 1st Lady Temple, I envisioned a swamp environment built entirely out of pre-recorded vocalized sounds made by the cast. This concept drew inspiration from Terry’s idea of the playful diy theater we create as children. Terry wanted to capture the vast imagination we possess as kids and how immense that world felt. I asked the cast to individually record a set of vocalizations including sirens, vocal tones, grunts, whispers, various animal sounds, and swamp sounds mentioned in the script. I then edited and manipulated these sounds to create the majority of the textures for both Odella and 1st Lady Temple. I wanted emotions like the fear, suspense, and danger that the cast is feeling to be manifested externally from the sounds and voices in her own head, much like the psychological terror in IT. When a character’s imagination takes over, the audience hears the soundscapes that the characters themselves imagined.
This approach, combined with another technique I called “animal filters”, resulted in one of the show’s most distinctive sound profiles. I began by manipulating the cast’s vocalizations to sound as close as possible to the real animal and swamp sounds they imitated. Then, I processed these sounds through “animal filters.” I created these filters by feeding different sounds—snake hisses, alligator growls, cicada calls, frog and toad croaks, and even landscape elements like calm lakes and thunderstorms—into a convolution reverb. Instead of using a traditional reverb impulse-response file, I loaded these natural sounds, allowing the vocalizations to be filtered through these real animal or environmental sounds. Instead of putting the source sound into a hall or room or other space like a normal reverb would, I was putting it inside of a swamp sound or animal noise.
This process not only altered the sounic profile of the original audio but also imprinted a subtle “ghost” of the filter’s own animal sound, creating a more intriguing and layered auditory experience. I used this extensively throughout the show to craft a unique swamp soundscape. Not only were the cast’s vocalizations filtered like this, but I also applied this treatment to all of Odella’s whistles, as well as the music instrument parts for the cello, 12-string guitar, and guzheng zither. This gave everything a cohesive, swampy animal filter reverb effect and really filled out the environment around the individual sounds.
Here are some examples of what that filtering effect sounds like.
Jaeda’s distressed bird sound. First plays the original, then examples are filtered through: warning croak of a frog, baby crocodile sound, barking tree frog, pig frog, two different snake hiss noises, the sound of rain, and sound of a calm lake. You’ll notice that through the filter, not only do you get the bird sound, but it comes with an environment surrounding it, a very powerful sound effect:
Next up is another creative sound from Jaeda! It’s a mosquito sound which became a sort of “mosquito violin” during the 1st Lady Temple and Odella scenes. Again first the original sound that was recorded, and then examples of it being filtered through an alligator roar, pig frogs, fowler toad, two different cicada sounds, a chorus of frogs at night in a swamp, and two different rain and thunder sounds:
The Whispers I had the cast record display very well the effects of these animal/swamp filters. Here are two different whisper environments run through a bunch of these filters. It’s the same chunk of the track and the filter changes about every 20 seconds, so you can skip around to quickly sample some different filter sounds – or if you are freaky like me, put this on while you are working on emails, or doing chores…
Swamp Whispers 1 – 15 filters
Swamp Whispers 2 – 13 filters
Night Terrors (1912 Atlanta)
Here, the 1912 version of the 7pm siren goes off as we transition into Big Man’s nightmare. This time, the siren cue incorporates real siren and police car sounds. To create the night terror texture, I utilized and manipulated a recording of Louis Armstrong and his Hot 7 playing a tune called “You’re Next.” The title perfectly fit the scene’s theme, where Big Man has a nightmare about the “Atlanta Ripper,” and the original track itself has a spooky undertone.
Although I initially believed this track was recorded between 1912 and 1915, I later discovered it was actually recorded in 1926—about a decade and a half later than the 1912 mark. Despite this, it was the closest match to what I envisioned and the first sound that came to mind for this scene.
The soundscape includes Odella’s whistle theme, twisted low bass harmonics, 12-string guitar accents highlighting specific lines, and dramatic horror cellos at the end.
As always, I put a lot of effort, time and care into my work. My scores and sound design go deep and are full of many layers. I do intend to put this out as a soundtrack and along with many other scores from the recent productions over the last 3 years. So please don’t download any of these tracks just yet, kindly wait till I release them officially to buy them! There is a lot going on in my life right now that has delayed these soundtrack releases – so thank you for your patience.
Much more on the way!
❤️ Brian
Special Thank Yous
For the first time on any production, I was remote/virtual for the entire process. It was a tougher room to mix than I had anticipated being that it is an L shaped room with an 11 speaker setup. Plus, it was a room I have never been in before, on a setup I’ve never heard, so there was a limit to how much I could envision the room and rough mix or conceptualize ahead of time. Plus! Zoom did such a fantastic job of cancelling out “noise” (aka my design), so much so that everytime we played back my sound or music cues, I could not hear it… the only thing I could hear was the actor’s voices. On top of that, I couldn’t see any wave forms in the remote control / zoom screen shared view of Qlab…. so it was quite an interesting and difficult experience to neither hear or nor see any of my sounds and still make adjustments. Wild! So an EXTRA SPECIAL THANK YOU goes out to Rew Tippin, who was the onsite sound engineer helping me mix and make adjustments in Qlab. I absolutely could not have done this show without you!!! Thanks for your amazing collaboration, advice, adjustments and perspective on the sounds in the space. It was so easy to communicate and work with you!
Unrelated, it was an extra stressful process due to a tornado rolling through Madison two nights before Tech started. This left me without power for 4 days, which obviously doesn’t work if you are trying to Zoom into work all day long! So another big thank you goes out to my parents, Rick and Bea, who allowed me and Zelda dog to take over their basement in order to have power and internet to complete my tech duties for about 5 days.
Another special thanks to Alex Pinchin, who on top of his duties of Production Manager, Technical Director, and Light Designer, was super responsive to any needs that I had from a distance during Tech. Alex also helped as an on site operator after hours when we worked on the live mic vocal effects for both the Wolf and Odella. Thanks for all that you do! I think we both learned some things on that mixer setup for this show!
Thanks to everyone at Urbanite Theatre on this production, the cast and crew, Mikael and Terry – y’all are amazing and I wish I could have been there in person to work with you all! ~ much love!
*Bonus Material for anyone who made it this far… here are a few other of my favorite La Tunda jams I was listening to >>
