Wednesday, January 03, 2018
Sound Designer Ryan Hickey: Listening as an Art Form
NEA: While sound has always been an integral part of theater, sound design is relatively new as a distinct craft. And just to complicate things, sound designers often wear two hats. For “straight” plays, they work with the director to create the right sound for the play—which can mean content building, such as composing incidental music, creating sound effects and sound beds. For musical theater, on the other hand, the sound designer’s main job is to create sound systems that allow the music, the singing, and the dialogue to be heard uniformly and organically throughout the theater.
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The science and skill involved with the creation of sound systems blows my mind. Out of all the parts of sound in theatre, I like the setting up of sound systems with all the speakers and cables, and in stagecraft last semester I enjoyed learning how to angle speakers and hanging with chain motors. Listening to Hickey talk about the timing of all the speakers so that the sound being amplified still sounds like it is "organic" and seamless is so interesting. I think that the trick Hickey uses involving the metronome to sync all the speakers together is brilliant. Being able to hear the little differences in the time of the speakers to make the sound of the production the same from every section of the house is so cool. And all that work can be messed and needing of alteration on the spot for certain kinds of weather?! The skill that sound designers have is one that I admire and envy.
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