Keywords in Sound

During my time at university, I had the pleasure of studying under Dr. Joel Overall, who specializes in writing and rhetoric and has a particular fascination with the intersection of music and persuasion through what is known as sonic rhetoric. Prior to meeting and working with Dr. Overall, I had no idea that this was even a topic of study, but after taking some time to research it, I, too, became completely captivated. Dr. Overall recommended David Novak’s Keywords in Sound to take a closer look at not just sonic rhetoric, but sound in conjunction with “philosophical debates, and core problems in defining, classifying and conceptualizing sound, and sets new challenges for the development of sound studies” (Keywords in Sound). In today’s blog, I am going to highlight the first section of Novak’s novel that left me contemplating my own relationship to sound and the ways in which we use language to define it.

Keywords in Sound takes the idea of sonic rhetoric and divides it into twenty chapters written by twenty different specialists in various audio and linguistic fields. As a casual practitioner of epeolatry, but also someone who has studied sound only in a technological environment, I dove headfirst into this book and only came up to breathe when I turned the last page. In being shown how to analyze sound in this new perspective, I was left feeling both motivated and enlightened. I am excited to share some of my thoughts with you today in what will hopefully become the first of many philosophical deep dives on these pages.

Let’s begin with the introduction so we can get acquainted with the atmosphere of this book. Novak, in partnership with editor Matt Sakakeeny, writes that “sound resides in this feedback loop of materiality and metaphor, infusing words with a diverse spectrum of meanings and interpretations” (Novak, 1). Therefore, it is highly necessary that we are mindful and specific with the language we use to speak about sound, especially as engineers and artists. With the depth that the word, the industry, and the art that “sound” includes, the more specific and focused our language becomes, the more we are able to bring those unfamiliar (and by this I mean lacking specific knowledge and technical understanding) with the topic into the conversation. I find this to be of utmost importance, as sound effects all of us, and dictates the ways in which we live and experience life. Novak and Sakakeeny continue:

“to engage sound as the interrelation of materiality and metaphor is to show how deeply the…separate fields of perception and discourse are entwined in everyday experiences and understandings of sound, and how far they extend across physical, philosophical, and cultural contexts.” (Novak, 1)

When people hear the word “sound”, the first of which comes to mind is the physical experience with it; self-location with reverbnation, waves of music, binary codes for digital formats.

Conceptual sound experiences, such as voice and silence, “circulate not as passive descriptions…but ideas that inform experience” (Novak, 1). We have the ability to hear a person and to hear a person: one is literal, in hearing them talk or yell or sing, whereas the other is to encounter their metaphorical “voice” as a manifestation of their character and their personal beliefs.

As professionals in this industry, it is crucial that we do our part to enhance the study of sound by “saying more about what we mean when we reference sound, and becoming more reflective about how its meanings are positioned within a range of interpretations” (Novak, 5). I would argue that it is our duty to embrace the nuance and engage in depth with the conversations we have around sound, noting the contexts in which it is discussed. For example, Alvin Lucier’s artistic sound study I am sitting in a room can be discussed in several different contexts as both a technical sound analysis and likewise a composed piece of art. These things can and do coexist in the same space, and we would be remiss not to acknowledge a subject’s ability to transform based on context, as is true with our human experiences.

First, Lucier’s piece through the lens of technical sound; the heart of this composition is a feedback loop of frequencies until the ultimate room frequency is reached. I agree with percussionist Trevor Saint in his conclusion that Lucier is an “archaeologist rather than a creator, where he’s just basically making the listeners aware of the world around them,”” (Dankosky). In the artistic perspective Lucier was one of the first to demonstrate a redefinition of “music” in spatial environments, and challenge the objective interpretation of music that had been socially adopted (or rather, constructed). I love the way this idea is referenced in Keywords in Sound, suggesting that:

“the more we follow the trail of sound studies, the more we often bump into things that had always been called music, walking like a ghost through the gleaming hallways of the house that sound built….the generalizability of sound, it its most imprecise uses, can sidestep the effects of institutional histories and the structuring influence of entrenched debates. While we are not endorsing the doctrinaire approaches, the risk of ignoring the historical particularity of sonic categories is the misrecognition of sound’s specific cultural formations.” (Novak, 6)

Sound and music have been synonymous for thousands of years. However, not all sound is music and not all music is sound. Take “4’33” by John Cage. The silence itself is the composition, and yet if you listen to the piece, there is little silence at all. You hear coughing, the shifting of shoes and cloth. If you listen to “4’33” today, you hear the composition of your own environment: car engines, air conditioning, voices in the hall. Cage himself stated that he “thought of music as a means of changing the mind … In being themselves, [sounds] open the minds of people who made them or listened to them to other possibilities that they had previously considered,”(Kostelanetz, 27); in other words, “4’33” is the ultimate musical meditation, transcending and bending the way in which music was defined in the 1950s and promoting a deeper discussion of our relationship to music, sound, and artistic experience. Today more than ever, I believe it is pivotal that we take the necessary steps to address social, cultural, and

historical contexts in sound so that we might have the ability to understand, metaphorically, where the intention began, where it is projected to go, and where it ultimately lands.

If it wasn’t already clear, I am wildly passionate about this subject, this meeting place of sonic experience and cultural interpretation– particularly, the philosophical conversations that act as the bridge between them. I find these topics of nuance motivating, and I fear should we forget the subtlety in this field in presuming universality, we will continue the trend of treating sound as a unchanging, predictable and often technologically determined generalization in the social consciousness, which as Novak states “might even be reduced to an entire ‘human condition’” (Novak, 7). I hope in this first installment of my in-depth analysis of sound and language, you feel a newfound sense of invigoration, and might enter your next sound-related conversation a little more mindful of the words you use and the power behind them.

Notes:

Dankosky, John, and Ira Flatow. “The Resonating Room Tones of Composer Alvin Lucier.”

Science Friday, 2 Dec. 2021, www.sciencefriday.com/segments/soundscape-alvin-lucier/. Kostelanetz, Richard. Conversing with Cage. Routledge, 2003.

Novak, David, and Matt Sakakeeny. Keywords in Sound. Duke University Press, 2015.

Unfinished Symphony To Swan Song: What The Future May Hold

Keeping up with technological developments can sometimes feel impossible, as the changes arrive bolder and faster than ever before. Living in 2024 has often crossed into the realm of watching childhood sci-fi become a reality for those of us past a certain age, and it brings with it a series of feats as well as quandaries.

When Tupac’s hologram “performed” at Coachella 2012, it was talked about for weeks – we re-watched and spoke about it around the proverbial water cooler time and again, and it’s astonishing looking back at just how many other technological developments have been implemented in the decade since, and the relentless pace at which these creations keep coming.

Get Back To The Future

The 2021 Peter Jackson documentary The Beatles: Get Back utilised de-mix technology, meaning that the musical parts could be isolated, re-built, and edited in high quality with modern-day digital methods, with an overall effect that hit like a person living in 1955 hearing Johnny B. Goode for the first time. By the end of 2023, the documentary team and the wizards at Abbey Road Studios had achieved the unlikely task of creating an all-new Beatles track – taking the starting point of a rough vintage demo recording of John’s vocals, and adding George’s guitar parts from a 1995 session, with Paul, Ringo, and an orchestral string ensemble recording in the present day. Bearing in mind that Lennon‘s demo was a 1978 tape recording of vocal and piano, it’s quite the leap to hear the 21st century final track of Now and Then. With a creation process that spanned five decades, the emergence of this technology meant that the group could turn the “Unfinished Symphony” into a Swan Song.

Paul McCartney spoke about the decision to go ahead with the track in the mini documentary that accompanied the song’s release, saying:

“George and Ringo came down to my studio. Nice day. Fabulous day,” recalls McCartney of the ’95 reunion. “We listened to the track. There’s John in his apartment in New York City, banging away at his piano, doing a little demo. Is it something we shouldn’t do? Every time I thought like that, I thought, ‘Wait a minute. Let’s say I had a chance to ask John, ‘Hey John, would you like us to finish this last song of yours?’ I’m telling you, I know the answer would’ve been: Yeah! he would’ve loved that.

Just a few short months after the release of Now and Then, the long-awaited version of Logic Pro 11 included the new “Stem Splitter” feature, bringing this de-mix technology into portable home studios of the world. The accessibility, low cost, and ease of use with such an advanced feature is astonishing, and it makes me wonder what possibilities lie ahead in the months and years to come.

Creatives And Computers

There have been many famous “Unfinished Symphonies” which have been completed by others. Mozart’s Requiem still remains shrouded in suspicion as to how much his faithful assistant Franz Xaver Süssmayr may have contributed to it, while the Queen album Made in Heaven was completed by the remaining three band members following Freddie Mercury’s passing. In the literary world, Eoin Colfer authored And Another Thing… which was the sixth and final installment of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy with the blessing of Douglas Adams’ widow Jane Belson, while David Lagercrantz did the same with Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Series.

While there’s no doubt that these well-loved creations were crafted in honour and admiration, we are currently living in times that pose the question of just exactly where the line is between a homage from a friend or superfan, and something more ethically ambiguous. YouTube announced last year the upcoming launch of their new text-to-music creation Dream Track – an AI voice & music cloning tool that will create music for YouTube Shorts “in the style” of collaborating artists including John Legend, Alec Benjamin, Charlie Puth, and Charli XCX. This technology comes from Google’s DeepMind and Lyria, a music generation model that will mean users simply choose one of the artists and enter a prompt. The result will be a 30-second track with lyrics in an AI-generated voice, along with music, all in the style of the chosen artist.

Looking at how quickly de-mix technology hit the shelves, I wonder how far away we are from being able to create entire albums in the style of our favourite artists, with just a few clicks from the couch? And just how easy will it be to hijack this technology and apply it to all artists and music, whether they have partnered/opted-in or not? Are we looking at a day pretty soon when it will be possible to prompt the technology to provide us with a new “Beatles” track, singing about our exact situation in the style of our choosing, and then repeat the process ad infinitum?

Individual use of this technology admittedly sounds intriguing, however, if altered and computer-generated images of figures such as Marilyn Monroe and Albert Einstein can freely be used in advertising campaigns in the present day, what are the implications for other uses of creative works in the “style” of an artist, but which are not officially created or owned by anybody?

From the era of Tupac’s resurgence into our current Deepfake confusion, it’s becoming harder to decipher just what is real anymore, therefore is there a possibility that we will soon hear the musical equivalent of this with the advent of programs such as Dream Track? Additionally, the question arises that if I’m so inclined, and decide to make enough tweaks and changes to my generated “Beatles” song to make it my own, record it, and release it – did its creation truly come from The Beatles, the program/company, or from me?

Looking Ahead

Experts in the technology field advise caution across the board when it comes to the use of new developments, as would be expected. One such expert, Ray Kurzweil, author of The Singularity Is Nearer says: “Exponential growth in technology means we must prepare for changes beyond our current imagination.” I appreciate his choice of words, as the discourse around the definition of imagination is always the most perplexing thing when it comes to the creative process, and is the frequent focus of current issues with generated content. Everyone from the ancient Greeks to the modern day has theorised on what the heck imagination actually is, what defines genius and originality, and even whether supernatural external forces exist and give people a hand.

Perhaps looking simply at the similarities between the way machine learning and the human brain both work with information is a good enough starting point. Our creative processing tools are certainly similar to computers in the way they are an amalgam of our retained knowledge, influences, preferences, and output intentions, the difference being they are merely wrapped in a human bow of neuroses and emotion. Many have argued that there is no such thing as true originality, and perhaps it’s fair to say the ancient philosophical dilemma has simply modernised and gone digital. There’s undoubtedly a cycle of human imagination broadening when technology provides us with more capabilities, and this spiralling dance of expansion is what Kurzweil has predicted for years – leading to the point of singularity he speaks of when the technology eventually surpasses us.

While the future is filled with potential that my mind cannot comprehend, it’s clear we are standing on the shoulders of giants, with easy access to more information and tools than ever before. Documentarian Peter Jackson has hinted that he has more footage tucked away, meaning there could be further unheard real Beatles songs to come, and of course, there are the infinite possibilities of whatever music cloning and generative tools lay ahead. It’s an exciting time to observe and be a part of, and I for one am optimistic about expanding the limits of our current capabilities.

Old Script, New Tricks

Sound people have a lot of opinions so there are always things we can debate. One of the bigger ones concerns scripts. Do you always have one in front of you or should you memorize the show? Is a digital or paper script better? Everything has its pros and cons, even down to what’s the most efficient way to turn pages.

For several years, early in my career, I worked with a designer who preferred that his mixers be off-book as quickly as possible, so I developed the habit of memorizing the show and getting rid of the script. Now I find something satisfying about walking up to a console that is clear of all clutter: no script tray, no extra lights, no knick-knacks, just you and the board.

There are sometimes you have to use a script. For shorter shows (a couple months or less) or readings and workshops (typically a couple days at most), there simply isn’t enough time to confidently be off-book. With any new show things can (and will) change daily and it’s always better to have a script in front of you to document and stay on top of everything.

On Outsiders I ran into a new situation. I was on a show that would hopefully run for a while, so the goal, as usual, was to get off-book. However it was a new show, so from December when I saw a reading of the show until we opened five months later in April, I needed a script to keep track of all the changes.

I found prepping a new show was a completely different process from an established one. On tour, you can memorize months ahead of time, knowing things may change, but they’ll likely be minor at best. On a new show everything is in flux: pieces of songs were added or rearranged, lines got reassigned, and whole sections got cut, added, or moved on a daily basis. There were things we were running for the first or second time during a preview performance, so trying to memorize ahead of time would have been a pipe dream at best.

On my previous shows, I was completely off-book within a month or two of opening. With an April opening for Outsiders, operating under a similar timeline put the show in the middle of having Tony voters in the audience, a time where making any mistakes would be frowned upon, let alone missing something because I chose not to have my script in front of me.

With that in mind I knew that I’d be on-book until at least mid-June, after the Tonys, what I didn’t expect was how hard it would be to get off-book once I was so used to having it in front of me. I’d learned to rely on it instead of having the show memorized and it was a comfortable safety blanket. Logically, there’s no reason besides personal preference to not have my script in front of me so it was another two months before I felt completely comfortable putting it away. And I only pushed to do that because I was training a sub on the mix and I’ve always found it easier when you don’t have to share the script dolly or swap back and forth between books.

After seeing both sides of things, what’s my recommendation?

Whatever works best for you, maybe with some weight given to the specific preference of the designer.

Having a script means you don’t have to rely on your memory and the show typically drifts less because everything is right in front of you. However, there is more of a tendency to look only at the script and pay less attention to what’s going on onstage.

This is especially true for newer mixers who have to look down at their hands to make sure they’re hitting the correct levels for pick ups and read the script for the next thing. That’s a lot to do on it’s own without adding in looking up at the stage.

More experienced mixers tend to have a muscle memory for fader throws so they don’t have to look at their hands as much to know they’re hitting close to -5dB or -10 or whatever they need. For them it’s easier to divide their attention between two places (script and stage) instead of three. Which was true for me. So even though I was still on-book for Outsiders, I already had the habit of getting my head up and paying more attention to the stage and was able to find a happy medium.

The benefit of being memorized is that you don’t have anything in front of you besides the show. When you’re looking at the stage you automatically start to connect what you’re hearing to match the visual onstage.

Physically you don’t have as many things covering the console when you need to make adjustments (the script dolly for the SD7 blocks a lot of real estate). But, you’re relying solely on memory which can be faulty: it’s easier to forget things and miss pick ups or drift as you think you remember the levels you usually hit, but it starts changing slowly over time.

Again, do whatever makes you the most comfortable.

Now I know that I like the comfort of having a script just as much as I like the look of an uncluttered console. On the flip side, I also realized that I pay better attention when I don’t have the script in front of me.

I went through a few waves as the show progressed. At the beginning I was focused while I was still learning the show. Once I got comfortable my mind started drifting. That was when I started trying to get off-book, and that challenge pulled my focus back in again. Honestly, I think I’ll stay off-book for the majority of the time, but still pull my script out every once in a while to make sure I haven’t drifted or if I gone for a week or two on vacation.

The biggest improvement is that I wouldn’t beat myself up for having (or choosing) to pull out the script. Before it would have been a failing that I’d “lost my touch” or didn’t know the show anymore, but now it’s getting to revisit an old, helpful friend.

I had a taste of that when I hopped back to the Les Mis tour last year to cover the A2’s vacation. I had a couple shows out front to refresh on the mix and, even though I’d been off-book when I was on the tour before, it would have been egotistical to a fault to think that I still remembered everything six year and four shows later, so the script came back out.

Past the opinions of on- or off-book, there’s also a debate on using a digital script (iPad, Surface, etc) or sticking to a physical hard copy. I prefer a digital script: I find it easier to make clean changes, and it was very useful when I was subbing on multiple shows because all my scripts were in my iPad instead of carting around multiple binders. On the flip side, paper never runs the risk of running out of battery, and if you need to change a page you just pull it out and put the new one in instead of dealing with transferring files. I never ended up needing them, but I still had a paper copy of my script at each show, just in case.

So, I guess I do a hybrid approach. I use my digital script (with a charger set up at the console) but I also have that hard copy. Which would also come in handy if I got hit by a bus: there’s always a copy of the script at FOH for someone to grab.

Again, it’s all about your own comfort level.

If you like the convenience of having everything self contained and don’t want to deal with an extra light at the console, digital is the way to go, just make sure you keep an eye on battery level and have a charged pen to go with it.

If the possibility of your script dying at a random point in the show gives you anxiety, stick with the tried and true hard copy.

There are endless other debates: do you use the version that the SM gives you or make your own? If you have a digital script do you want to minimize how many times your hands move off the faders and add in a foot pedal to turn pages for you or do you bite the bullet and doing it manually?

For me, I make my own script and put page turns in the most convenient spots which makes adding in a foot pedal feel too complicated for a minimal benefit. If I want to turn pages less I just get off-book and call it good.

Does any of this mean that’s how you have to do it? Absolutely not.

I try to give you multiple opinions of whatever I’m talking about because nothing in this industry is one-size-fits-all. Listen to people and their opinions. Use what makes sense to you, but maybe try something new to see if it might work better for you. Before I did Outsiders I never would have thought that I’d actually like having a script in front of me, but I got to try something new and it worked. Doesn’t matter how old the (road) dogs are, we can still learn new tricks.

Kitzy – Independent Touring FOH Engineer and Production Manager

Kitzy is an independent touring FOH (Front of House) Engineer and Production Manager based in Philadelphia, has been immersed in the world of audio for over 20 years. In addition to owning a small audio production and rental company, Kitzy dabbles in studio work and podcasting.

Their journey began in the early 2000s, organizing punk shows in a firehall in central Pennsylvania, using a second-hand PA system. Reflecting on those days, Kitzy notes, “Audio wasn’t really the focus, but more of a means to an end. I thought I wanted to be a promoter, but in reality, I think I just wanted an excuse to put my band on shows.”

During the early to mid-2000s, Kitzy toured with various bands, experimenting with digital recording—again, primarily as a way to support their own band’s music rather than as a central career goal. However, in 2010, after their band dissolved, Kitzy found themselves at a crossroads. With family and personal pressure to find a “real job,” they set aside their musical ambitions, entering the tech industry and climbing the corporate ladder.

By 2015, Kitzy had relocated to San Francisco for work. While there, they reconnected with a former bandmate, reigniting their passion for music. This time, Kitzy delved deeply into recording and producing, benefiting from the wealth of free educational resources available on YouTube. “I realized how much I had been missing working on music,” Kitzy recalls. Despite their growing knowledge, the tech world and life in San Francisco left them unfulfilled, prompting thoughts of a new chapter.

In their search for inspiration, Kitzy discovered Weathervane Music and its Shaking Through series, which sparked their desire to return to music production. With Philadelphia’s vibrant music scene and proximity to family, Kitzy saw it as the ideal location to start over.

In 2017, Kitzy moved to Philadelphia, where they built connections within the local music scene, attending workshops, shows, and eventually forming a new band. They recorded and released an album, and things seemed to be falling into place. Kitzy also bought a house and built a home studio, intending to focus on producing records. But the pandemic in 2020 disrupted these plans.

Undeterred, Kitzy adapted by launching a podcast with a friend, centered on independent music. They also invited bands to perform live streams in their studio, which marked Kitzy’s first significant experience mixing live performances. This work sparked a new passion: capturing live music as an integral part of the performance. Kitzy found the dynamic immediacy of live mixing deeply fulfilling.

By 2022, with live events returning, a band that had participated in the live streams invited Kitzy to mix their shows on the road. Kitzy vividly remembers the thrill of their first live show: “The power under my fingertips was like nothing else I had ever felt before. When the band hit their first note, I knew that this was what I wanted to do more than anything else in the world.” Since that pivotal moment, Kitzy has been pursuing live sound engineering with an unrelenting passion, rediscovering their love for live music with every performance.

Early Life

When did you discover audio as a career path?

It’s really only the last couple years I’ve been taking it seriously as a career path. I spent my whole life being told that I can’t make a living in music and that I need to get a “real” job.

Did music and audio interest you while you were growing up?

I’ve been obsessed with music, and by extension audio, ever since I can remember. A lot of my early music taste was a direct result of the stuff my mom was listening to, like R.E.M., The B-52s, Yes, James Taylor – stuff like that. My grandmother also had an influence on my music taste early on. She would play stuff like The Beach Boys, Jimmy Buffet, and Cliff Richard.

My mom would take me to the local video rental store once a week and we’d rent a movie to watch together. They had a small shelf of music related videos, and there were two that I made my mom rent so many times that she probably could have bought them several times over: R.E.M.’s Road Movie and Yes’ 9012Live. If you’ve never seen 9012Live, I highly suggest you track down a copy. The concert footage is inexplicably intercut with colorized footage from a 1950’s Edison Electric film for some reason and the visuals are truly bizarre.

I remember getting a karaoke machine one year for Christmas. It had a pair of microphones, and two tape decks. I think the intention was that you could play the karaoke version of a song and record yourself singing over it, but I quickly figured out that I could record my own music and then overdub myself playing and singing along with it. I was convinced I had invented this and that no one else knew this incredible secret.

In high school, I graduated to a Tascam 4 track tape machine, and I remember being amazed that I could change the volume of the things I was overdubbing AFTER I recorded them. With the karaoke machine, I had to get the volume balance right while I was recording. But now, I had the power to get the mix just right. It felt like magic.

Career Start

Did you have a mentor or someone that really helped you?

Brian McTear was a great mentor when I moved to Philly and thought my future was purely studio work, and continues to be a sounding board for me to this day.

I never really had a live sound mentor, but I’ve been lucky enough to form friendships with some other up and coming live engineers who are an amazing support system.

Career Now

What is a typical day like?

Every tour is a little different, but I’ll use my most recent tour as an example.

Wake up in a hotel room around 8AM, pack up my stuff and head to the van for an 8:30 van call. I’m sharing driving duties with the tour manager on this run, and she prefers driving later in the day, so I’ll typically take the first shift. We stop for breakfast somewhere and then it’s anywhere between a 3 and 5 hour drive to the next city.

Halfway through the drive, I switch off with the TM. I’ll use this time to catch up on a little more sleep, review the parking and load in instructions for the venue we’re heading to, read over their tech pack, etc. I’ll also bounce the recording from last night’s show and upload it to Google Drive for the band to review if they want. As I’m listening through, I’ll make myself a few notes of things I want to try differently tonight.

We get to the venue early afternoon and unload the trailer. It’s a self-contained tour, so we’re carrying backline, our own console, IEMs, and mic package, and a lighting ground package. We also have a few set pieces. As the FOH engineer and defacto Production Manager on this tour, I’m responsible for all of it. I get my big items placed on stage first, and then work on setting up FOH while the band sets up their backline.

If I have time, I’ll put up a few measurement mics and verify the PA with Smaart, and try to get the tonality of the PA close to my target curve. Then I walk the room with my reference playlist and make sure it sounds good.

If I don’t have time, I throw on some music and EQ the system by ear.

Then I move on to micing and patching the stage, and I’ll do a line check with my iPad. If I have time, I’ll pull up the multitracks from last night’s show in a virtual soundcheck and see how the room sounds. I’ll also go on stage and listen to each musician’s IEM mix while standing/sitting in their spot to see how it sounds for them. I might make some minor adjustments to their mix here if something obvious sticks out to me.

Then I bring the band on stage for sound check. My FOH mix is pretty dialed at this point, and the room is going to sound different once we fill it up with people anyway, so my main focus here is to make sure everything is working (i.e., that the timecode from the playback rig is firing our lighting cues and console automation) and that the band is comfortable with their IEM mixes. Once the band is happy, I bring the principal artist out and we run through whatever she wants to run through. Once she’s happy, we end sound check.

We have an opener on this tour that I’m not handling production for, so I’ll strike our front line to make room for the opener and hand things off to the house crew. At this point, I swap the batteries in all of our IEMs and RF mics/packs with freshly charged batteries. I deliver the IEM packs to the green rooms so that the band knows where to find them before the show.

I’ll use the time between sound check and our set to eat dinner, take a nap, answer emails, and if the venue has a shower I will probably take a shower. At the very least I’ll put on a fresh pair of socks. Something about a fresh pair of socks really makes a world of difference.

In the changeover before our set, I re-set our front line, tune the principal artist’s guitar, and line check EVERYTHING. I send the console’s listen bus to my IEM pack, and I use my iPad PFL each channel one by one with my IEMs in and make sure I’m getting the sound that I expect. I even check that the timecode channel sounds like timecode. I always do this from the stage so that if there’s an issue that needs to be addressed, I’m already there.

Then it’s showtime. Perhaps counterintuitively, I’m doing the least amount of work during the actual show. This is a pop tour with backing tracks, so the same things happen at the same time every night. I’ve automated most of my moves throughout the show, like muting the acoustic guitar when it’s not being played, and boosting the electric guitar during the big solo. I’m just there to make sure nothing catches on fire, and I get to enjoy the show.

Once the show is over, I’m in a race with our merch manager to see if I can get all of our production packed up and loaded into the trailer before she has merch packed and loaded. I do not know if she is aware of this race.

Once the trailer is packed, we head for the hotel for the night and get ready to start the process all over again.

How do you stay organized and focused?

Early on, I would get super overwhelmed with everything that I had to do, especially during set up and strike. I’ve found that the best way to combat this is to just focus on the next thing I need to do. I don’t worry about needing to strike the entire stage, I just focus on collecting all of the microphones and putting them in their case. Once that case is packed, I move on to the next one. Rinse and repeat until I look up and everything is packed.

Whenever I’m in the moment, I’m only focusing on the next thing that I need to do. I trust my planning, my prep work, and my team around me, that things won’t go too off the rails if I’m not constantly stressing over every little thing that hasn’t happened yet.

What do you enjoy the most about your job?

I love when a band is really locked in and playing well to a room full of people who are enjoying every moment. I love knowing that I’m a small part of making that happen.

What do you like least?

Chasing people down to pay my invoices.

If you tour what do you like best?

I love traveling and seeing new cities every day. I love working in new venues with new people. I love seeing how a show changes and develops over the course of a tour.

What do you like least?

How long the days are, how little sleep I get, and when house crews are shitty to me because I don’t fit their expectations of who a sound engineer should be. I also hate the grind of always having to figure out what my next tour is.

Oh and being away from my dog.

What is your favorite day off activity?

Sleep.

What are your long term goals

I’d love to have a long, sustainable career with a small handful of artists who are doing well, where I’m making enough money that I don’t have to stress about it.

I’d also love to get to a point where I’m not driving, and have enough of a production budget to hire a crew so I’m not doing everything alone. That sounds really nice.

I’d still like to work on records in my downtime between tours as well.

Oh, and I really want to mix a show at Red Rocks.

What if any obstacles or barriers have you faced?

Being both transgender and autistic has been a barrier, not in my ability to do my job well, but in other people’s ability to see my value. That said, I have been coming across a lot more neurodivergent people in the industry lately and it’s been so refreshing to be around other people with brains like mine.

I think the biggest obstacle I’ve faced has just been finding consistent work. All of the artists I work with are on really tight budgets, so even if I do a tour with an artist and they want to work with me again, there’s no guarantee that they’ll have the budget to hire me on the next tour.

I think I’m in a weird spot since I started my live sound journey so late in life. Because my live sound resume only goes back a few years, I get a lot of absurd offers like $500-700/wk, which would be fine if it was 2005 and I lived with my parents and was on their health insurance, but that’s not my reality. I know that this is an industry where you need to grind and work your way up, but I’m still trying to figure out how to survive while doing that.

How have you dealt with them?

I’m still figuring that out. I’ve been focusing on networking, making as many connections as possible, and putting myself out there as much as I can.

Advice you have for women who wish to enter the field?

If you love it, do it. Keep doing it. Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that you can’t. Find your tribe and then hold on for dear life.

Must have skills?

In my opinion, the actual audio engineering skills are only like 10% of it. They’re important, and you need them if you want to work in this industry, but I think that people skills, communication, organization, planning, delegation, and a positive attitude are more important and will take you a lot further than being the best mixer. At the end of the day, nobody cares what ratio your compressor is set to or what your reverb decay time is.

The people skills are probably the most important. The grumpy, bitter, and jaded sound tech stereotype exists for a reason. I don’t care how good of an engineer someone is, if they’re an asshole, I don’t want to work with them.

Favorite gear?

The Beyerdynamic M 201 is the GOAT on snare.

LDI is Offering Free Expo Passes for SoundGirls Members

LDI® is the catalyst that connects the entire live entertainment, design, and technology community with manufacturers of state-of-the-art gear, and professional training from industry leaders.

Offering an exclusive opportunity to demo and preview the newest gear for the next season, while providing you with the best in cutting-edge training from top industry pros that only LDI can provide.

LDI (Live Design International) is offering free expo passes for Soundgirls members. The expo takes place at the Las Vegas Convention Center December 8-10, 2024. The expo pass provides access to the following:

Discounted registration for the full conference (Dec 4-10 with over 180 classes and 175 speakers + more)
LDI Expo Hall Access
DSE Expo Hall Access
Career Day Buzz Sessions + Welcome Keynote (Saturday)
New Technology Breakfasts (x3) (Sunday + Monday)
Crew and Connect Industry Party with Diversity in Design Scholars Ceremony and Battle of the Busk Competition (Sunday)
LDI Booth, Products and Project Awards Breakfast (Tuesday)
Expo Hall and Cafe ConNEXTions – Tech Talk Sessions (Audio, Diversity, Wellness)
LDI Circle Bar
Behind the Scenes Wellness Lounge
LDI After Dark – Nightclub access and complimentary drinks (Wednesday – Sunday)

The expo hours are Sunday Dec 8 10am-6pm, Monday Dec 9 10am-6pm, and Tuesday Dec 10 10am-3pm. SoundGirls will be tabling and hosting a networking event.

Email soundgirls@soundgirls.org for the code

New Perspectives

Several weeks into this tour, I’ve come to realize how much positivity exists within this nomadic career. While it can be hard to maintain traditional relationships with friends and family, touring also presents unique opportunities to strengthen those relationships, even if they’re brief.

There are many days when I feel disconnected from folks back home, and even today’s technological advances can’t make up for differing schedules. Not only that, but my occasional lack of energy can certainly also contribute to making it hard to send a simple “hello” to a parent or friend.

Living on the road full-time is one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had in my life. It is so satisfying to be able to wake up with ever-changing views, be it a retail parking lot or the venue, or essentially the backyard of Banff in Alberta, Canada. The gig comes with constant adventure and being able to mix for a living brings me immense joy, as does being immersed among other creative individuals and people who mirror similar values and expectations to mine. Saying I’m lucky is an understatement; in fact, there are no words to describe how deeply I feel about this career.

In the midst of tour currently, I find myself settling into a groove. I love it. I love the challenges, I love the places we’ve seen, and the music I’ve been able to help make. However, as the tour continues, it’s increasingly obvious how much of a gap there is between myself and the individuals I love who are not on the road with me.

Don’t get me wrong. I love being a pilgrim. Personally, wandering and making music with my road family is the most satisfactory way to spend most of the year. However, it can be difficult to navigate the interpersonal relationships you have with people back home. I miss my pets and movie nights with my roommates. I miss giggling over failed trivia nights and losing track of time in my hometown with loved ones. Feeling like you’re constantly playing catch up with people post-tour can also drag you down, and FOMO can really bite you if you’re not self-aware and grounded.

A few weeks ago, while visiting with my aunts before a show at Red Rocks, I realized how a tour can present so many opportunities for connection. We bonded over old memories, told stories, and explored a cute town in Colorado, dreaming of adventure and making plans for the future. Many more of my friends and family have made efforts to visit me across the country since then, and because of these visits, each week has brought me someone new to look forward to, whether it’s briefly on a show day or trekking around old and new cities on off days. It’s been fulfilling and enlightening, and I feel like I’ve been able to lean into the discomfort of missing individuals and exchange that discomfort for more meaningful memories. It’s been beautiful and wholesome.

I offer this as a new outlook for anyone struggling on hard days. Beyond the physical distance you may initially see, this kind of gig presents so much room for true quality time and novel memories. We get to do what you love for a living, we get to travel the world, and we get to see so many people as you do both, time permitting.

Working at a Summer Classical Music Festival

This summer I had the opportunity to work as an audio engineer at a classical music festival – a unique experience in which I got to further hone my audio skills, work as part of a great team, and see behind-the-scenes of how a large festival is run. Here are my reflections on various aspects of the job, the skills needed, and the overall experience, that I hope might be helpful to consider if you’re looking for a similar summer experience.

Be prepared to be flexible and problem-solve

Most festival environments involve an intense schedule of many concerts and events over a short period of time. Going in with an open mind, a willingness to help out as needed, and being mentally ready for moments of intense activity contrasted with times of low activity, will serve you well. You might have little time for planning and may need to troubleshoot things quickly. I found I honed my abilities to problem-solve and think flexibly, and learned when not to fixate on something and to move on – skills that can be useful for life in general.

Be ready to give things a go and learn new skills

I finished the festival with many more skills than I went in with. It was a great opportunity to get hands-on experience in many aspects of audio engineering, in a team environment with colleagues who could help me with what I didn’t know, and with whom I could share my knowledge on aspects that I knew more about. The work that we undertook at the festival included recording all concerts for archive or for future broadcast, editing and archiving audio, audio, and video for live-streamed concerts, manual and remote camera operation, PA setup, live sound amplification, audio for board meetings and multimedia presentations, installation and maintenance of recording systems and equipment.

The challenges

Depending on the festival, the working hours can sometimes be long (due to early morning rehearsals and late night concerts) and tiring both mentally and physically, so making sure you get to rest and enjoy recreation on your time off is important. At the start of the festival, there is a lot to learn: the audio procedures and expectations specific to that festival, how to use gear that you haven’t seen before, what is involved in certain audio roles, and getting used to working with different members of staff. I found it was always best to ask for help if I was doubting something or couldn’t figure it out myself, and I would write it down so as not to forget. As with any new job, it can be challenging and a little stressful at the start, but as time goes by it becomes easier as you become more fluent in each aspect of your job – and you can focus more on enjoying the music and creating excellent sound!

An adventure in a new place with new people

One of the great perks of summer festival jobs is that they are often located in beautiful places (such as in the mountains), and you have the unique experience of living in that place for a few weeks and being immersed in a different environment. Festivals often provide accommodation for staff, and you might be sharing living spaces with colleagues, making it easy to get to know people and make friends. Spending a lot of time together with people who are all there for a new and positive summer experience creates a great feeling of community, and an opportunity to meet interesting people and make meaningful connections. It’s also fun to experience being a resident of a different town, city, or state for a few weeks or months, and to go exploring and sightseeing on your time off.

A great way to get experience

You don’t need to be a classical music nerd to work at a classical music festival! While some of the audio and other staff had backgrounds in classical music, many others came from other audio specialisations, other genres of music, or theatre. A festival is a great way to get experience in recording classical and acoustic music, learn more about how orchestras sound and are run, and hear a lot of incredible music played by top-level musicians. It allows you to experience this kind of job for a short-term period and see if it’s something you want to do more of in the future.

If you’re thinking about working at a summer music festival – classical or otherwise – I say go for it, and be ready for a memorable experience that may turn out to be a life highlight!

Gilly Moon – Audio Engineer and Podcast Technical Director at National Public Radio, freelance Sound Designer at Auralune Studios.

Gilly Moon’s experience is broad and deep, with a rich history of designing sound for theater, themed entertainment, film, and video games. Favorite past projects include attractions at Universal Studios’ Halloween Horror Nights and Comic Con, and in 2018 she co-won the Ovation Award for Sound Design: Intimate Theatre for a play about Japanese ghost stories that spanned three floors and an elevator in a warehouse. She did the sound design for the upcoming cozy game “Love, Ghostie.” She is always working on something delightful.