www.livedesignonline.com: At the Tony Awards in 2008, sound designers were among the recipients for the first time. Sound design is an art, after all, and finally, everyone knew it. “I had always thought if I show up and do my job well, everyone will understand and recognize what I do. The value of that work spoke for itself,” says Lindsay Jones.
2 comments:
Sound is a category that I don’t have a lot of experience in. Frankly, I am still trying to figure out just what sound designers do. I guess I should ask one, but I feel that I will get multiple opinions. As a freelance lighting designer, I hate seeing my name in reviews. If you’ve noticed my lighting, that means, to me, that it distracted you from the world of the play. Sound can do that, especially if a sound effect is mis-timed or mis-fired. I can see why the Tony Awards kicked the category, people don’t know what it is or what they do. I am glad to see that they brought it back and are recognizing these designers as well. There are a variety of awards that an actor can get, but it’s limited in scope for people who work in technical or design. We need more awards for our fields. There are so many fantastic people whose work goes unnoticed simply because there is no award for it. Maybe next year.
I completely disagree with everything Joshua said. I feel like in the world of lighting design, you should not aim to be forgotten by the audience. A good lighting design NOTICEABLY enhances the world of the play. If you cannot do that, then you have not reached full potential with your lighting design. As a lighting design- focused theatre- goer, I can say that I am pretty disappointed when the design is just a bunch of the same washes. Similarly, in sound design, the job of a sound designer is to immerse the audience in the world of the play. Yes, a 'misfired' audio cue can much more noticeably take you out of that world of the play, but to say that nobody knows what sound designers do is a gross overstatement. That attitude is one I unfortunately see a lot around this school; Your experience is not universal. Just because you do not know what sound design is, does not mean that nobody does. I was saddened when the Tony's took away the award for sound design, but to see to the popular backlash, not only from sound designers, but from the whole community (#Tonyscanyouhearme) I think shows that pretty much the entire professional industry knows and appreciates sound design.
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