I had honestly not previously given much thought to the requirements of the sound and light team behind a live production. I guess in ideal circumstances they disappear in the narrative, if you can hear and see what the actors are doing to move the story forward, you’re not really thinking about how great a job the sound tech is doing balancing out the volume of the various actors or sound effects or music. Similarly, if you’re attention is being focused where it’s meant to be on the stage, and you can see it as intended, you’re probably not thinking about the effort going into illumination.

I’ve become more and more aware of it only because I’ve been noticing when those aspects fail to live up to the ideal. It’s become particularly obvious in the case of musicals where the balance of instruments and vocals is so imperative. Outside of a good song being a joy in it’s own right, in a musical the songs are important to advancing the story, and if you can’t hear the words, you miss out on development of the narrative.

Godspell, presented in the Engine Room by Stage Center, used recorded music, but even though the sound tech, who was also the director was set up about four feet from where we were sitting, he often had the volume of the instrumental track so loud it was difficult to hear the singers. More problematic was the mic on the actor playing Jesus which was either defective or not connected properly, and when he would move around while singing or speaking his mic would cut in and out. We were hoping it would be fixed during intermission, but it was about as bad after as it was before. I felt for the young man, but have to hand to him, he powered through it all completely unfazed.

In Beauty and the Beast at RiverView Theater, the production used a full, live orchestra, but because the orchestra pit is between the audience and the actors, when they got too loud it became impossible to hear the singers who weren’t micced, and depending on how well the sound person was doing their job, it was also difficult to hear the micced actors at times. This production was by the Shreveport Opera, and as some of their productions are classic operas in non-english languages, they project translated lyrics on a small screen above the stage as the players sing. No translation was need in this production, but because of the volume disparity I often found myself having to look up at the subtitles to see what was being sung. Unfortunately, who ever was running this aspect of the production was often running either behind or ahead of the performers, and at least once or twice it seemed their slides were mixed up. Ideally I would rather have not had to bother with the subtitles at all, but because I had to and they weren’t being done well, it made the experience more frustrating.

In Shreck: The Musical, presented by the Texarkana Repertory Company at Texarkana College, they also made use of the orchestra pit, though it was with a more limited selection of musicians (guitar, keyboard, percussion, and horn, far as I could discern), even so the volume of the music again was prone to drowning out the vocals.

In contrast, The Hunchback of Notre Damme presented by Stage Center at the Marjorie Lyons Playhouse, used a live choir, but recorded instrumentals to back the performers, and they had carefully dialed in the volume of the recording. The combination of a beautiful choir and properly balanced instruments made for a breath taking, powerful experience. Even so . . . Many of the actors were individually micced in this production, and there were a few instances where the sound person didn’t have the right mics lit on time.

My complaints aren’t meant to be as mean spirited as they likely sound, but a confession of my own ignorance in how difficult these off stage jobs are, while being an integral part of the performance. I understand better now the tradition of actors during their curtain call directing the applause and attention of the audience to off stage performers, and how warranted such direction is.