Time to Train

At the beginning of this year, I made a major life change

I left a tour to see what life would be like living off the road, specifically in New York City. Touring folk tend to fall into two camps: those who are planning to eventually go to NYC to live and work full time, and those who enjoy visiting, will go there for shop prep, but never want to live there. They’re either happy to head back to their home locals when they get off tour or plan to spend the majority of their career on the road. I’ve always been of the mind that touring was a phase of my career, not the endgame. I know I’ll miss it, I look forward to visiting for vacation coverage or tech periods, but I’m ready to try something new.

It’s rare that you’ll move to the city and immediately get a full-time show tossed in your lap (although there are people that move here because they have a job already lined up), so I came here with the intention to find work subbing on the mix for Broadway shows (which would provide income, but also counts towards qualifying days to help me keep my health insurance, plus getting to mix!) as well as working in the shops (for income and the ability to meet more people in the industry, so part socializing, part networking).

Thanks to my time on the road, I have some contacts here, so I came to the city with a rough semblance of a plan. Part of which was subbing on Funny Girl. The same sound design team I worked with on Mean Girls also did Funny Girl, so when I let them know I was planning to leave the tour and move to the city, they put me on their list of people they could call. It worked out that they needed to get someone up on the mix around the time I settled in, so I was able to get approved by management and start the training process fairly quickly.

When you’re learning to mix an existing show

You usually have between two and three weeks (16-24 shows) to get from watching the show to mixing it and your training is live, during performances with a paying audience. I got approved about a week before I actually started (it took time to finalize a schedule), so I was able to get the script and an audio archive recording of the show to start. It’s a much shorter process than I’ve talked about in a previous blog, but I still retyped the script, added in my own annotations (all the while listening to the recording of the show so I could get familiar with it), and practiced mixing it all the way through at least once a day, going through my script, adjusting or adding notes or figuring out how to make page turns easier.

Once I was in the theatre I set a rough schedule of goals. I try to break it down so I watch the show at least once, only to watch so I can start to connect what’s happening onstage to what I’ve been hearing in the recording. Then I’ll use a couple of shows to watch the mixer with my script in front of me and make notes or mark questions. Next, I’ll ghost mix for a few shows, which is basically the same thing I did with my practice board the previous week, just in the theatre, during the show where I can see how my timing lines up with the mixers. Usually, you can make a side fader bank on the console blank, so I can mix at the console, next to the mixer, without actually controlling anything. After that, I’ll start mixing the show, a few scenes at a time, adding on more each show, and ghost-mixing the rest. Finally, once I’ve mixed through the full show, I’ll plan it out so I have a few shows left in the training period where I’m just mixing the show, getting repetitions so I can settle in.

It’s worth noting that as a sub, my script has far more markings than when I’m the primary where I learn the show in tech and consistently mix it afterward. A sub is someone they’ll call for sick days, vacations, or possibly for a brush-up if it’s been a while. All of this means that I might go weeks or even months between mixing (hopefully if it’s months, that’s where the brush-up show would come in), so I need to have more detailed notes instead of assuming that I’ll remember some timing or nuance.

When you’re breaking down the show into sections

There are a couple of ways to do it, based on how you learn best:

First to Last: You start mixing with the first scene of the show on the first day, the second day you mix the first and the second scene, on the third you mix the first, second, and third scene, and so on, starting with the material you already know, adding new scenes onto the end.
- Pros: You start with familiar scenes and can settle in before you get to the new material. Also, you have the option to continue past what you’ve planned if you find you’re comfortable.
- Cons: You hop right in at the beginning regardless of the difficulty of a scene. In Miss Saigon, the first scene is “The Heat is on in Saigon” and it’s one of the hardest to mix, having a lot of quick pickups as well as band moves, cues, and ad-libs all happening at the same time. It’s not a great place to throw a mixer in for their first go.

Last to First: This is the opposite of first to last. You start on the first day with the last scene of the show (say Scene 10). On the second day you mix scenes 9 and 10, the next scenes 8, 9, and 10, etc. You start adding new material on the front, with older scenes coming later.
- Pros: Your stress level declines as you’re mixing because you started with the newest piece first and then get to more familiar territory as you continue.
- Cons: Like First to Last, it doesn’t account for the difficulty of the scenes. However, shows are more likely to have a complicated opening scene than a closing number. Also, there’s no option to keep going if you’re comfortable, so there’s less flexibility

Least to Most Complicated: Here you start with the easiest scenes or songs, like solos, then add on progressively more complicated numbers: next duets, then small groups, and finally large full company numbers.
- Pros: Helps to promote confidence by starting simple. Also, you have the option to continue on in a scene if you’re ready for more complicated material.
- Cons: It’s disjointed as you switch back and forth between the mixer and the trainee.

Personally, I prefer to learn a show first to last, and this seems to be the case with most mixers. After consistently mixing shows for a long period of time, I have a system for my script and notations to make busier, more complicated scenes easier to navigate. That way, jumping straight into a difficult scene isn’t as daunting. Plus, I found I don’t have to look down at my hands as often anymore. In my last blog, I talked about how I anchor the heel of my hands on the console and that muscle memory reference helps me know how far I’m throwing the fader. That means I can keep my attention on the script and what’s coming next instead of having to always check where my levels are.

However, when I’m the one responsible for training someone (usually when an A2 is learning the mix) I like to use the least to most complicated method. It tends to be a good way for people who are either new to mixing or don’t do it on a regular basis to ease into the show.

No matter how many shows you’ve learned or how comfortable you feel mixing, it’s a daunting task

The first show I started pushing faders for real on Funny Girl (I mixed almost the first 30 minutes of the show), I was so nervous: my palms were sweating, my shoulders were tense, and I was on edge the entire time. I try to keep in mind that everyone makes mistakes, especially when they’re learning, but that only does so much to ease your mind in a high-stress environment. However, as you start mixing chunks of the lives shows, the mixer is always standing by, ready to step in if you lose your place in the chaos of a busy scene or fumble a section and need a moment to regroup. They’ll gradually give you more space as you settle in because it’s also important for you to learn how to recover if you miss a pickup, but they’re still there to support you and get you back on track.

There’s a period after you’ve mixed a few shows and you’re getting comfortable: this is a danger zone. This is where you’re prone to make more mistakes than at the beginning.

The first few times you mix a show you’re laser-focused and have plenty of adrenaline pumping through your system. As you mix scenes over and over again, that adrenaline starts to fade and you end up thinking about notes you got from the last show or a mistake you made before that you need to avoid. This is when the easy things that you thought you knew to start to slip and you make more mistakes.

I call them regression shows. In high school, we called it the “second show slump” when our first show would be great and full of energy, in the second show almost everything would go wrong, and then the third would finally be solid. Regression shows happen at different points on different shows and for different mixers, but there will likely be a point where you’ve mixed something enough times to feel confident and then out of the blue you’ll make a dumb mistake. When I was training on Mean Girls, I did well as I was learning the mix and flubbed a few smaller things like band moves or cues that were just a touch late. Then, when I was mixing the full show for the first time, I ended up missing two pickups that I’d never missed before, neither of which were in the scenes I was mixing for the first time. Same on Funny Girl: the first pick-up I missed was the fifth show I mixed, and it came with the third page (so a section I’d mixed all five times) as I was focusing on a band move.

Every time, you just have to get back up and keep going. The more mistakes you make, the better you become at recovering and sometimes you’ll even be able to catch them before you miss a line or stop yourself before you take a cue at the wrong time. The more shows you do, the more you discover better ways to help yourself learn which speeds up the process. Always ask for help when you need it: if someone’s training you to mix, they already know you can do it and they want to help you succeed.

Mechanics of Mixing

Mixing is an active experience

Anyone who’s watched me mix a show knows that I’m never standing still. I’m usually tapping my toes or bopping my head to the music while timing my fader throws. I’m constantly shifting my focus as I look up at the stage, down at my hands, or at the monitors on either side of me. I’m listening so my fingers can respond to the actors or musicians while keeping a thought on what’s coming up next. The actual mixing might happen in a small footprint, but there’s a lot going on. It helps to have a solid physical foundation to make your day-to-day life easier especially as so much of our job requires repetitive motion, which can take a toll on our bodies.

The first thing to look at is how you stand or sit at the console

If you’re sitting, it makes it easier because you can adjust your chair to the right height every time and call it good. Personally, I prefer to stand: it keeps me more alert and focused, especially when I’m on a show for months or years. Also, I’m short, so it’s easier for me to reach the top of the other fader banks of the console if I’m standing rather than having to get out of my chair or slide it any time I want to make an adjustment. If you prefer to stand as well, do yourself a favor and get an anti-fatigue mat. The floors at FOH can be anywhere from concrete to carpet to plywood, and it pays down the road to be nice to your knees now.

However, standing at the console can present a challenge if people mixing the same show are at different heights. If you’re short, you can stand on a case lid or apple box. If you’re tall, you can lift the console up with wooden blocks, or (if you already know when you’re in the shop) get racks that are taller and can make the board higher. Personally, I know that 16 space racks put the console at a good height for me to mix while standing.

In some cases, you might not able to find a good solution, or the console is already set to someone else’s height (if you’re a sub or A2 and the console is already set at a good height for the A1). In these cases, I end up using a chair, even though I’d rather stand. It’s far better to have a proper position and the minor inconvenience of having to get up if you need to make an adjustment than force yourself to mix in an uncomfortable position.

For me, a comfortable position means

That I aim for a console or chair height where my elbows are bent at a relaxed, roughly 90˚ angle so there’s an almost straight line from my elbow through my wrist when my hands are resting on the console, fingers on faders. If you’re too far above the console, your elbow ends up higher than your wrist and you put extra pressure on your joints as you naturally press through your palm with the way the wrist bends. On the other hand, if you’re too far below, your shoulders have to rotate outward to get your hands on top of the console and that puts pressure on your shoulders as well as the wrists.

Any rotation of a joint, even a small amount, can create problems over time. On Les Mis, I used my index and middle fingers to move the two orchestra faders, which is fairly common for most people. However, that rotated my wrist to an awkward angle which put stress on it. Eventually, my forearm muscles started to tighten up from that strain, which made it uncomfortable to mix. Even in the mix videos for that show (recorded after maybe 50-60 shows into the run), there are a couple of times where I have to find breaks to stretch out my hand or roll my wrist to relieve some of the tension. I went to physical therapy and got stretches and exercises to help (if something hurts, always go see a professional in a timely manner), but what actually fixed it was when I realized that I could use my middle and ring fingers for the band faders instead and that would shift my wrist to a better position. This eliminated the cause of the problem itself, and as a side benefit, I had my index finger free to make verb adjustments without having to move my hand off the band faders!

No one mixes the exact same way

So what works for me might not work for you, and that’s okay. I prefer to use my middle fingers as the primary for mixing dialogue, but some people use their index. It takes time and a willingness to experiment to develop what your mixing style looks like.

Here are a few things I’ve found that have helped me as a mixer

I use the heel of my hand as an anchor point while I’m mixing: as my hands have to move back and forth to different faders, that bone at the base of my palm always ends up resting on the same area of the console, just below the faders. From there, I have a general reference for where the fader is without having to look at my hands: I know based on how far my fingers are extended because my hand is always the same distance from the base of the fader. (With any rule, there are always exceptions: sometimes I’ll have to throw further than usual, so I’ll lift up the heel of my hand and use my pinky for additional stability, or a scene might have me jumping around more than usual so I’m not in one place long enough to truly anchor my hand. When it works, use it. If it doesn’t, find something that does.)

If my left hand (usually dialogue) is free, but my right hand (usually band, some vocals, and the button for sound effects, next scene, etc) is in the middle of a band move when I need to take a cue, I’ll cross my left hand over my right to hit the GO button, similar to playing a piano. I’ve gotten skeptical looks from mixers when doing it while I’m training on shows, but it’s something that works for me. It takes a little trial and error to make sure it’s the right choice and I’m not taking my hand off a fader when I really shouldn’t or my right hand actually does have a moment to talk the cue, but when it works, it helps to simplify my mix choreography.

I’ve spent a lot of time tweaking how my script works. While the script itself isn’t a mechanical part of mixing, how you integrate page turns definitely is. As I developed my system for marking and formatting, I made it my mission to condense the script to as few pages as possible and minimize how many times I had to reach up to flip a page. While that is a legitimate strategy, I found that it put my page turns at awkward points in the mix and had me scrambling at times. Over the course of several productions, I found that it worked far better for me to make sure that each page of the script ended on an easy (or as easy as possible) turn, whether that was a pause in the action or splitting a long line up over the end of one page and the beginning of another. This added a few page turns overall but put them at much easier places in my mix.

Something I need to continue to work on is my focus. Once I’ve been on a show for a while and I have the mix down, my mind will want to wander. Another mixer told me she uses yoga and meditation to help improve her concentration and her ability to bring herself back to the present and to the show. I’m slowly improving, but it’s another skill I need to hone, especially after I lost some of that ability while I didn’t have the chance to mix on a regular basis during the Covid hiatus.

However, consistency will help you as you develop better focus. While I obviously encourage being flexible, once you find what works, set a routine. That’s taking a cue on the same beat of a song, or presetting the band on the same word, even when you could do it anywhere in that sentence, or even taking a water break during the same line every show. Just like standing helps keep me focused when my show count-ticks into triple digits, consistency builds a muscle memory that has saved me more than a few times if my concentration slips.

The most important thing is to listen to your body and your instincts. If something hurts or feels uncomfortable, find a way to change your process so you don’t have to do that. If you have an idea for something that might streamline things, try it. The worst thing that happens is you go back to what was working just fine before and try the next idea when it comes along.

How to Own Your Work Without it Owning You

Working in theatre can be full of ups and downs. You get some jobs; you lose out on others. You don’t always get to know why. Some production processes are smooth; others are nightmares. Since I resumed working in live theatre in 2021, I’ve had my share of all these experiences, and everything else in between. But one thing that has changed for me post-shutdown is how I approach those messier situations. And learning to survive them and still do my job well has helped me learn an important lesson about letting go of some of my emotional attachment to my work.

This is not to say that I don’t still love what I do! I remain deeply passionate about mixing musicals. There’s almost no place I’d rather be than behind a console in a theatre. However, working in theatre isn’t just a source of joy for me; it is also my job and primary source of income. And one of the biggest discoveries I made over the course of the pandemic shutdown when this huge part of my life and livelihood went away for a while, was that it can be unhealthy to tie my emotional wellbeing to something as fleeting as anyone show. And when I think back on how I approached my work then vs now, I can see that I am in a much better place mentally.

It turns out there is an important distinction between loving your work and being ruled by it. And my success at doing the former without falling into the trap of the latter is key to my current healthier overall psyche. Here are some tips and techniques that I utilize every day at work to stay grounded in calm and stormy seas alike.

Practicing Gratitude

Even within a dumpster fire, there is good. I try to remind myself each day, or even each hour, to take a moment to name one thing I like about my current job or situation. It could be anything from “I am grateful that I’m getting along well with my colleagues” to “I am grateful that tomorrow is payday.” Any small acknowledgment of gratitude that helps you to simplify what’s going through your head can be a great aid in re-centering oneself in moments of chaos. I use this technique when I catch myself falling into bad behavioral habits, such as getting impatient or passive-aggressive about things outside of my control.

Lane departure warnings

We may think of this as being a safety feature in fancy new cars, but checking yourself or asking others to check you when you begin to let your emotions rule your actions will help you resist the pull of the drama and tension around you. I have worked hard (with a lot of help from my wonderful therapist) to learn what my emotional defense mechanisms are and to recognize them before they get out of hand. For example, I know that when I’m stressed or low on sleep, I can turn into a bit of a control freak and micromanager. At times earlier in my career, I also tended to accidentally overstep my departmental boundaries when I thought I could help with a problem, even when the issue at hand was totally outside my responsibilities. I’ve learned that this behavior, while well-meaning, is ultimately counterproductive because it can hide flaws or issues that need to be solved by the team organically, and not fixed with slapdash “band-aid” solutions. So, learning to stay in my lane has proven to be both a gift (because it allows me to feel pride and ownership of that which is my job), and a relief (because I can let go of everything that isn’t).

Set good goals

Another way I try to cultivate a feeling of satisfaction at every job is by defining for myself what would constitute “victory” or “success” in this situation. For example, on a recent out-of-town show, my primary goal was to develop a good work relationship with a sound designer I had never mixed for before. On a different show that I supervised back in March, my goal was simply to get paid and save money for a future cycling trip. So, regardless of what happens on any of my shows in the end, I can consider them wins for me because I have met my personal goals. Anything more than that is gravy!

Work-life balance

To the left, to the left!

I’m generalizing here, but I’ve found that because of our long hours, atypical work schedules, resultingly small social circles, and overly cultivated sense of “family” or “community” among each individual theatre company or show team, we (the denizens of the theatrical workforce) are especially prone to letting the work-life scale tip in the “work” direction. Find things you value off the clock and give them the time, attention, and emotional value they deserve. Some tactics I use to maintain my balance are intermission phone calls with my spouse, taking my cat with me when I travel for out-of-town shows, going out on walks or bike rides on my days off, or cooking a simple meal at home that I can bring in to eat on my dinner break. All those things and more help me to remember what I really care about and what makes me happiest, and as a result, I am not expecting work to provide a sense of completeness (or to fill a void) in my life.

One of the great things about being a stagehand is that most of my work can only be done at work. I can’t exactly EQ a microphone or hang a speaker from home. For this reason, I try to take the act of clocking in and out very literally. When I’m at work, I commit to being there fully, doing my best, and devoting my complete attention to the tasks at hand. When I leave the theatre, I try my best not to take any of that home with me. This applies on breaks too. Of course, the existence of modern technologies like smartphones, email, and push notifications can make that hard, but at the same time, especially if you’re paid hourly, then you don’t owe your employer anything when you’re not on the clock. Try using an app timer or similar feature on your devices to limit the times of day that you can check work email. Leave your show paperwork and mix script at the theatre so you aren’t tempted to look at them after hours. If there isn’t enough time in your scheduled shift to get all the needed work done that day, then it’s ok that it must wait until your next workday. And that’s not on you.

Accept reality and measure expectations

We all know that just existing in a stressful situation is easier said than done. Here I am preaching about detaching emotionally from work, and the next moment I’ll be texting a friend to vent about how frustrating some part of my workday was. Being emotional is an extremely logical human response to stressors. It means your body is working as intended! But acknowledging emotions and then letting them go will allow you to keep a cool head and not get stuck in a state of burnout. As my meditation app put it, “Acceptance doesn’t mean apathy. It means seeing clearly from a place of calm, knowing when to act, knowing when to let go.” Someone might come up to you and say something like, “the show is so behind, we’ll never be ready in time!” And that might in fact be the case. But unless one of you is part of the show’s upper management, then all you can do is acknowledge that yes, the current situation is less than ideal, but it’s still ok. Know it’s not your job to fix everything, just to ask for what you need to do your job well. And if that isn’t available to you, at least you’ve made your issues known in a calm and rational way and can now go back to focusing on the here and now of the situation.

At the end of the day, it’s ok to walk away

This blog was intended to dive a little deeper into tactics for maintaining good mental health and objectivity in stressful work situations. However, I want to emphasize that I am not writing this to condone improper work conditions in any way. Everyone deserves a workplace where the expectations of their job are laid out clearly, where each employee is treated with humanity and compensated fairly, and where issues that arise can be brought forward without fear of repercussions or retaliation. That is a bare minimum of what one deserves when one enters the theatre to work on a show. And if your current employer is not meeting those standards, feel free to go find one that will. While not every job will be ideal in every way, you are not “weak” or “a failure” for deciding that a situation you’re in is not the best for you as an individual and that the appropriate solution for your own mental health is to extract yourself from the project. It is hard to remember at the moment, but it’s always true that the ultimate power you have as a worker is the power to walk away, and no one can take that from you or make you feel bad for using it.

Above all, take care of yourself

Theatre is a job, but theatre is also objectively interesting and fun. That’s part of why I and many others choose to put on plays for money instead of seeking employment in other fields. However, “love of the art” does not mean one has to be married to it, as the saying goes. Any emotions that come up because of work are just emotions, no different than the rest of the time. I hope this blog has highlighted ways that creating an emotional separation from your work can ultimately make you a better worker because you will no longer be counting on a show to make you happy. It may do that anyway, but that’s a perk, not a job requirement. You also won’t feel like you’re carrying so much of its baggage if it makes you sad, angry, or stressed. If you can live by the philosophy that your job is to show up, do your work, get paid, and go home, you’ll hopefully find satisfaction in yourself even in less-than-ideal situations, and feel pride in your work at the end of the day regardless of what else happens.

A great tool for making a self-care action plan, courtesy of the Mental Health First Aid Association

Let’s Load in!

One of the biggest components of a stagehand’s job on tour is load in. We often joke that we’re not paid to run the show, we’re paid to load it in and out and fix problems. (As an A1, your job is also about mixing the show, but the sentiment still holds true.) For me, I start prep work for load in even before we get to the venue: I chat with the house head and make up an advance for each city we go to. There will almost always be something that changes, but it’s easier to tweak a few things onsite than have to figure everything out from scratch.

(As a note, this is for larger tours that move once a week or less. It isn’t really sustainable to advance a tour that moves multiple times a week. Those smaller tours are the ones where your system is smaller so it’s more feasible to walk in and figure things out at the venue. That’s where you learn a lot of your problem-solving skills, which you’ll continue to use when you are on larger tours with more moving pieces that have to fit together. Tours rarely get easier; they just get bigger.)

One part of my advance is an excel document that’s an overview of the venue and how we fit into it: what the dimensions of the stage are, where the amp racks will go (this is called Ampland), and how high the theatre ceiling is over the pit so I know how far I can trim the cluster out (which also tells me how many boxes I can use), etc. The other part is a summary from speaker prediction software: on Les Mis and Saigon, I used Meyer’s MAPP and on Mean Girls, I use L’Acoustic’s Soundvision. This tells me what angle I should use for point source boxes or what I’ll need to set the splays to for the arrays.

Once we get to the venue, the first step is to take a look around and talk to the audio house head. I’ve been on the road for a decade at this point and have been to all but maybe 8 of the 68 cities that we hit on Mean Girls. So for most of the venues, I have archival photos and paperwork and know roughly what I’m walking into, but things always change. New management, new crew, post-Covid renovations, at this point I can’t assume that it’s the exact same space I came to two or three years ago.

So you get the lay of the land and try to identify any problems with the plan. If the venue left the house cluster up, now is the time to take it down or fly it further out so I can hang mine. Are the holes to run cable under the stage too small for all the cable we have? Let’s talk to the house head about running it around the pit rail.

I’ll use a disto with an inclinometer (so it can give me both distance and angle) to double-check the accuracy of the room for Soundvision and the measurements for how high the cluster will actually be able to trim out. Going back to Soundvision, I put in the new info and see if I have to make adjustments or if I have to cut (or maybe can add!) boxes on the cluster.

A normal load-in on Mean Girls has a spotting call an hour before load-in starts. This is when the Carpenters measure out where motors will go on the floor and I have some time to take the measurements of the house. Load in itself starts with a 5-hour call on Monday evening. Then we break for the night and come back at 8 am Tuesday morning where we’ll work through the day (with a lunch and dinner break) until the end of the show around 10:30 pm.

So at the end of the spotting call, load-in begins and the trucks start unloading. Most of the trucks will be packed by department: Audio has a truck for most of our gear, Electrics (LX) has one for theirs, Carpentry has one for the deck, another (or maybe two) for set pieces, Props has another, Wardrobe and Hair one more. However, the first truck is usually mixed to give every department something to get started. (On smaller shows it’s more likely that most of the trucks are mixed.) Carpentry will get drops to hang and motors to rig so LX can hang truss, Audio can hang towers, and Carpentry can build scenic pieces. Audio and LX usually get cables we can run. On the first truck, we get our FOH (Front of House) runs that will connect Ampland that’s backstage to the console out in the house. These are usually the longest and most complicated cable runs, so it’s better to throw the entire local audio crew on the project and get it done and out of the way.

When our truck is ready to unload, we’ll dump all the cases, carts, and racks and find a place to put them in the theatre, usually denoted by a color code on the case label. Some, like spares (YELLOW), just go somewhere out of the way like down the side of a hallway or a rehearsal hall we’re using for storage. Others have consistent places: FOH (PINK) will always go to the theatre lobby, and Pit cases (PURPLE) will go down in an elevator to the basement level or off to the side to eventually ride down on the pit. Cases like Ampland (GREEN) change depending on the venue and where we end up putting our amp racks.

Once everything is off the truck, it’s time to work on projects. Most of the time the A1 will take care of getting the system set up: tip the console at FOH, build the towers and the cluster. The A2 will cover everything upstage of the proscenium: running all the cable (cross-stage, towers, cluster, pit, remote musicians, etc) and setting up com stations and onstage monitors. Some things, like the pit, can fall to either one. I’ve set it up as an A2, but on this tour, it worked better with the flow of load in that I, as the A1, set it up. This is where people and time management skills come into play. On most tours, I have 6 locals on the load in crew for audio, so my A2, Sherie, and I trade off crew so each of us has enough people to complete each job.

So, with all the cases off the truck, I’ll take the majority of the crew to FOH to tip the console: taking racks out of their cases to form a table and setting the console on top. It sounds easy until you remember that the SD7 (with part of the flight case) weighs around 400lbs. So I need at least 4 people to help me set that up safely. While I have the crew, Sherie has some time backstage to get the racks set where she wants them and start patching the FOH bundles we ran when they came off Truck 1. Then we split the crew and I take three people to build the towers (stacking three sections one on top of the other and bolting them together) and cluster (taking two carts, re-splaying the speakers, and connecting them all together to fly out), while Sherie gets the other three to start working on smaller projects like tying in feeder into power the racks or starting on com runs.

Load-in for Les Miserables tour (2017-2020) in Nashville, TN. (You can see the towers being built at the 0:22-0:27 mark)

After I’m done with the towers and cluster (and get rid of the large carts that the towers and cluster travel into clear space for others to work), I can send my crew to Sherie so she has everyone and can start on the longer cables runs that go across the stage, or into the pit, or to the Dimmer Racks (for cameras and stage monitors we have built into their truss).

While they’re working on those, I’ll make sure that we are clear of the pit (it’s usually an elevator that can come up to stage level to give us more space to build large pieces like truss or the towers) so Props can take the pit down and get ready to set up chairs and stands for the musicians.

Next, I can start on smaller, solo projects while Sherie continues with the crew. I prefer to be the one who patches things into racks. I’ve had enough well-meaning local crews that have accidentally plugged in something upside down, into the wrong place, or managed to slam an NL4 into a Powercon socket, that it’s easier and faster if I do it myself. So I finish setting up my console, patch everything in (with the help of more color coding), and power up.

Then, I’ll head to the band rehearsal and work on that. This is something we only use during load-in so our show band (3 keyboards, drums, and a guitar) has a few hours to rehearse with the local musicians (2 reed players, trumpet, trombone, bass, another guitar, and a percussionist). This system consists of two speakers on stands (I get help for those, they’re heavy), and cables to run from a rackmount console to the various stations for all the electronic instruments.

This marks the end of Monday. My usual goal is to have the towers and cluster up so the pit can go down (or be ready at the top of the day on Tuesday) and most, if not all of the cross-stage runs are done. If we hit that point, we’re on track for the next day.

Tuesday morning we start our 4-hour call, power everything up, and continue working. I’ll take some time to make sure the towers sections are set at the correct angles (that disto comes in handy again) and I have sound coming out of all the right places, including any house system that we tie into to help supplement the touring system (under-balcony speakers or delays up in the balcony).

Once Props is done setting up chairs and stands in the pit, I’ll head down with a few locals to set up mics, conductor monitors, Avioms, and make sure everything is patched correctly for the musicians. While I’m in the pit, Sherie will work on deck with the rest of the crew to lag Front Fills in and continue setting up com stations as automation, the fly rail, and stage management gets set onstage.

Before we break for lunch, I’ll make sure that all my outputs are functioning and that SMAART and my wireless mic are set up for Quiet Time. (This is ideally when the Carpenters, Props, and LX are on their lunch break. I have an hour without people making noise on stage and they don’t have to listen to pink noise and loud music, so win-win.)

For Quiet Time, there are two general approaches: by ear with music and a disto, or using SMAART and an SPL meter. You use whichever your designer prefers, which on Mean Girls is the SMAART method. First I walk around with the SPL meter while a local is at the console to adjust levels and mute and unmute outputs as I tell them so I can set a consistent volume level across the house. Next, I’ll trade off with them, and give them the wireless mic to set at seats I’ve taped off so I can use SMAART to set the delay times for the matrix outputs. Finally, I’ll play music and walk the house to make sure that the delay and levels I set sound correct, making adjustments as needed.

After Quiet Time we have about 2 hours to finish everything up before the dinner break. That involves sending the local crew to strike the band rehearsal I set up the day before, getting percussion set up in the pit and our drummer set up in his booth, and checking that everything is coming into the console at the right places.

At the same time, Sherie is working on tuning RF, focusing the onstage cameras that Stage Management and Automation use during the show, making sure all the onstage monitors are set up and having the local crew neaten up or tape down cable and sending cases to get backloaded on trucks or tucked away in storage.

When we’re show ready, we break for dinner, then come back for soundcheck. Sherie will battery up and get the mics ready for the actors while I’m in the pit adjusting mic positions for the musicians as they settle in. Then we’ll do half an hour with just the band, setting levels for the local players and adjusting the mix in the house. The last half hour adds the actors onstage and Sherie will come out front to mix the songs while I walk around the house to make sure there’s a good balance between the band and vocals and it sounds consistent in all the areas of the theatre.

Once sound check is done, I’ll make sure we’re set to start the show (MIDI checks, the console is in the right snapshot, etc) and Sherie will set out any practicals as part of her preset and walk our local audio through the cues they’ll have during the show.

At this point, we’re done with load in itself and ready for the show. Post-show usually means heading to a restaurant or bar for some late-night food and a drink or two to celebrate getting the show in. Then we look forward to tomorrow and the touring stagehand tradition of No-Alarm Wednesday!

Load-in for The Phantom of the Opera tour (2013-2020) in Ft Lauderdale, FL.

Saving the Show

We all like to think we’re absolutely indispensable, especially in the theatre world. There’s the old adage “the show must go on,” so we push ourselves to get tours into theatres where they barely fit, come to work even when we’re not feeling well because who else can run the show? Once, an actress asked what the A1 and A2 would do if one of us were sick. I told her that whoever’s not sick would mix the show, so she asked what happened if we were both sick. I replied, “then whoever’s less sick mixes with a trashcan at FOH.” Thankfully neither of us ever had to do that, but everyone on the road has a war story of doing a show despite illness or injury, bragging how quickly they came back or how stoically they soldiered through.

Trying to fit the old tour life we knew into a new landscape where Covid dictates so much have proven challenging to say the least. But some good has come from it: now more than ever, we’re focusing more on our physical health. Which is wonderful, and long overdue. However, sailing in uncharted waters leads to so much uncertainty in our lives. That constant stress takes a toll on the mental health of the company. We’re on rigorous testing schedules that race against the efficiency of an ever-evolving virus that threatens cancellations or unexpected layoffs if enough people in the company test positive. Before 2020 most of us would have cheered some unexpected time off and made plans to relax, but now there’s a nagging worry in the back of our minds that our entire industry could shut down again or our show could close for good. We find ourselves half tempted to stay locked in the hotel room in the hope that somehow that will keep a positive test at bay, all the while knowing that our quality of life will suffer drastically if we try to avoid each other completely.

We’re now at a point where being indispensable is a liability, not only to the company but to our own mental well-being. Even more so for the handful of company members who have become linchpins in a Covid world: people that, if they test positive and have to quarantine, have no replacement or understudy onsite to cover, and the show will have to shut down until they can return to work. In most cases, there’s someone, somewhere that could fly out to the tour to cover, but even that would involve at least one or two canceled shows.

At the beginning of January, I ran into both of those situations. Mean Girls had an outbreak of cases and had to cancel a week of shows, which had already happened on a handful of other tours. I found myself with some unexpected time off, but that didn’t last for long because our industry is a very small one. On my first day off, I got a call at 9 pm asking if I could leave on the first flight the next day so I could fill in for the A1 on the My Fair Lady tour, and Tuesday at 10 am I walked into load in to help the A2 get the show-up and running.

This was a job that brought a lot of perspectives. It was a d&b main system and Helixnet com, neither of which I’d toured, and a Yamaha PM10 console, which I’ve never touched before (I have worked on Yamaha consoles, and thankfully that knowledge of the software transferred!), plus a design team that I’d never worked with before. Walking in, I’d toured for long enough that I was able to get the general lay of the land, and the A2 and I worked through setting up FOH and getting the system timed with a few phone calls and emails to design and the A1 to make sure we had the right patches and were getting reasonably close to the original intention of the design.

It was gratifying to see that I’d come far enough in my career that I could take unfamiliar gear in stride or at least know who to ask for help. It also showed me the gap between what we know as someone who runs the show constantly, and what a fresh pair of eyes actually see. Taking that back with me to Mean Girls, I’m starting to covid-proof my system to the best of my ability. So far I’ve added better labeling and color-coding to my FOH setup, taking more pictures of what things look like, and creating a Dropbox folder that I can send someone a link with most of the pertinent information they’d need to load in, run, and load out the show.

Luckily, this leans into one of my strengths. If you threw a dart at a collection of my blogs, you’re almost guaranteed to hit one that either mentions or completely focuses on some kind of paperwork: scripts, console programming, venue advances; I love a solid set of paperwork and some detailed documentation.

One of my projects on the post-Covid version of the tour was creating documentation of the show and my stint at My Fair Lady gave me a better idea of what I want to include:

Detailed Load In and Load Out track sheets: This includes which cases things are in, details I need to look out for, how projects get put together, etc.
A “How to” of my power up and shut down process at FOH pre and post-show.
Control Group (DCA) Assignments: A spreadsheet with details of who’s on what fader for each scene or notes if there are common split tracks (on Les Mis, there were featured roles like the Bishop or Grantaire that an ensemble member understudied, but would then go back to their normal show track. So the swing covering the person out, and the featured ensemble member would essentially “split” the two-track, hence the name.)
Case List: A general overview of the contents of each case. Fun fact, this also makes it easier to do a manifest if you go to Canada, where they require you to document everything that’s in the trucks for the border crossing.
Advance Sheets: Details about the venue showing where the plan is for racks, cases, cable runs, etc as well as what bits of the system (how much of the cluster I can hang, if we’re using underbalc speakers, etc) we’re planning to use.
Cheat Sheets: In addition to the Advance, I’ll sometimes make myself a cheat sheet so I have one easy reference for splays for an array, angles on speakers, spacing for underbalcs, etc. This is something I’d put together and send to someone if they had to load in for me.
Mixing Scripts: I have two versions: one that has all of my annotations (where cues go, CG/DCA assignments and notes), and another that’s blank except for the script so someone else could put their own notes in.
Mix Video: I record a show that has four different video feeds: the stage, the conductor, an overhead view of me mixing, and a shot of my cue light. That way someone has a reference of exactly what I do during the show, as well as a reference if I take cues off something happening on stage, the conductor, or the cue light.
Visual Aids: This might be pictures of the FOH or Pit set up, drawings of the stage, anything that might help someone visualize what’s happening. As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.

For some, this sounds like overkill, but I find peace of mind in the idea that I might give someone too much information, but hopefully never too little. I also have a lot of practice doing this kind of documentation because it’s similar to what I’ve done for some of the shows I’ve left, specifically those where I didn’t have much time with my replacement to help train them. The only difference is that this would be a temporary replacement with who I’d have absolutely no crossover, other than answering questions on the phone as I sit in a hotel room in quarantine.

At this point in the touring world, it’s no longer about job security, it’s about sustainability. Eventually, we may move to a point where Covid won’t shut shows down for weeks at a time, but we’re not there yet. Until we make it to that point, we all have to be prepared for the when — not if — of being the person who’s in quarantine. For me, that means lots of time typing on my computer so I can rest just a little easier knowing I’ve done everything I could to make my replacement and my crew’s life as easy as possible.

Production Audio

Before Mean Girls was planning to hit the road again, I got the opportunity to work on the re-start of the Cats tour as the production audio. That was a job I had never considered myself remotely capable of pre-pandemic, but as the world started to open back up, I was itching for a chance to get back into a theatre and more than ready for what I now viewed as a challenge instead of an impossibility.

I’m sure more than a few people reading this have never heard of production audio before. It’s not a job that’s billed on the front of the playbill like the designer, and they’re only with the show to get it up and running, so you’re not going to see them in the theatre when you go to watch a show. So what do they actually do?

So. Very. Much. They’re responsible for the logistics of taking a show from theory to reality. Given paperwork from the designer, they interface with production, design, and the shop to get all the equipment needed and figure out how everything goes together. How will all the gear fit into racks? What cables do you need to connect everything? Do you need infrastructure for MIDI or timecode? Networked computers so you can operate amps, consoles, or programs remotely? Who in the crew will need com and/or video and how does it get to them? Which speakers will need rigging hardware and do you know where they’re going to go or should you bring multiple options?

It’s a parade of endless questions

Which requires an extremely organized person, a good communicator, and a lot of technical knowledge. My pre-COVID hesitation had always been the last part. I knew I was organized and could keep people in the loop, but I know the tech-heavy aspects of sound don’t hold my interest nearly as much as the more artistic side of things, and I’d always assumed that meant I would be a disaster in such a job.

Thankfully, with the tour re-mounting instead of being a brand new production, the system was already built and sitting in a warehouse. That removed the most complicated technical part of the job from my plate, plus I’d worked with the original designer and production team before, so I was familiar with how they built their shows. That was actually why I got the call for the job: I may never have done production before, but I knew how to tour and what I’d be working with.

With that part already taken care of, my job was mostly coordination and improving efficiency. On a new show, the crew has two or three weeks in the shop to get all the gear, rack it up, cable, and test everything. For the remount, we took the existing system back to the shop and we had two weeks to make the changes the designer and production manager had agreed on so the show could load in and out faster. (It was going to a schedule with shorter stops and more frequent moves.) I had a list of items that were getting cut (under-balcony speakers, remote com stations, etc) and substitutions that were being made (drums mics swapping out for an e-kit, the console changing over from an SD7 to an SD10), as well as evaluating anything we could tweak to make the touring crew’s life easier.

The shop crew consisted of me as the production audio, the A1, A2, and a few locals who are audio people that work on or around Broadway. I was in charge of hiring the local crew which was something completely new to me, but I was fortunate to have friends in the NYC area who were veterans of plenty of shop builds and were both available to work and willing to help me navigate a job I had never done before. Pro tip: hire people smarter than you and listen to them. A large portion of the success of the show can be directly attributed to my shop crew. They helped me work through technical questions, pointed out when I’d missed things or might have incorrect information, and offered advice when I needed help or they knew a better solution. With their help, I didn’t have to know all the technical answers and could lean on their expertise.

At the end of the two weeks, we packed everything on a truck, and the A1, A2, and I went to tech. Now I was back in familiar territory, just in a different role. Instead of loading in the show in my usual role as the A1, my job as production was to take care of setting up anything that the road crew shouldn’t have to touch on a normal load in or out: cameras that live in electrics truss, speakers that are mounted to set pieces, setting up for an orchestra rehearsal that would only happen in tech, etc. My goal was to always be one step ahead of everyone else, whether that was having tech tables set up before designers came in, making sure speakers had the correct hardware and were ready for the crew to set up, or ordering supplies to make sure we had everything we’d need.

I liked this part of the production process the best. After almost a decade on tour, I’d tried many ways to streamline shows and I knew what worked, what didn’t, and what could make a project less of a pain. So I rigged up speakers, spiked placement, color-coded cables, and did my level best to make the system as easy as possible to move.

All in all, I consider my first go at production a success. Did I do everything perfectly? Nope, definitely not. But the fact that I was willing to ask for help and advice meant that most of the problems I encountered were minor or the crew knew it was an honest mistake and were willing to give me some grace while I fixed it. Am I going to change my career trajectory now that I know I wouldn’t be an abject failure at production? Again, no. It was empowering to try something new and I truly enjoyed the work, but in the shop I still found myself wishing every once in a while that I was the one building the racks instead of answering endless emails and phone calls, printing labels, and fielding questions. In tech, I occasionally itched to push faders instead of sitting at my tech table placing yet another online order and looking over what seemed like endless lists of projects to do and fixes to make. On the other hand, I wouldn’t automatically turn down the opportunity as I had in the past. It was gratifying to see my to-do list slowly dwindle down as we went through tech and I loved the feeling of accomplishment when I knew I’d made some part of the tour just a little bit easier to load in. Since it was the A2’s first tour, I was also able to give him advice of pitfalls he should avoid and the best ways I’d found to speed up my workflow. Touring is a very odd combination of skills, and it was good to know I could pass on my accumulated knowledge to make someone else’s life easier.

This past 18 months of pandemic gave me a good opportunity to reevaluate my skills and realize that, not only was I capable of more than I thought, but I had a wonderful community around me who wanted to see me succeed and was willing to help make that happen. So, maybe, as the entertainment world comes back to life, try something new. You might find yourself pleasantly surprised!

Tips for Touring

Within the past couple of months, life has started to pick up, and start dates for live events seem more and more like true beginnings and not the “fingers crossed!” of last year. But after a year and a half, the landscape looks a little different. People who had been on the road for decades suddenly had extra time at home and realized that they didn’t want to head back. Others who were on the cusp of starting their careers can finally see opportunities pop up and are ready to hop on the road.

If you’ve never been on tour before, here are some tips and tricks to get you started. (For clarity’s sake, I’ve only toured in the theatre world. I would assume that some of this translates to concerts, but I’m not saying that it absolutely does.)

Most of the tour advice boils down to: don’t be an idiot and don’t be an asshole

If nothing else, remember that. So much of our life is dealing with different personalities, across departments, the touring company at large, and your local crew. If you and the people around you are pleasant to work with, your day gets immediately better. So, keep in mind:

You’re going to be working with your road crew every day for the next year, maybe more. Treat each other with respect and professionalism. This also applies to locals. You will have crews with varying levels of experience and knowledge, but never treat people like they’re incompetent (unless they unequivocally prove themselves to be so and are unpleasant on top of that). You know your show, they know their venue. I’ll usually tell the local audio head “I’ll tell you what I need to happen, you tell me how it needs to gets done.”
Help when and where you can. Give a hand carrying a cable or notice that another department’s behind and see if you can work on a project that keeps you out of their way.
Learn people’s names. Every new venue you’ll have a new set of local crew members (usually 4-6) helping you load in or out. When you meet them, ask for their names. If you have trouble remembering names, make a note of it on your phone or write it down. It’s a simple gesture of respect and much nicer than having to say “hey…uh, green shirt, can you help me?”
If you forget someone’s name, ask.
Your first priority is to learn how to do your job, after that you can worry about making friends. You’ll naturally develop friendships while you’re working and interacting with your crew, but no one wants to hang out with the person who’s constantly making mistakes, slowing down load-ins, or getting in everyone’s way because they don’t know what they’re doing.
Whenever you have a disagreement, be the first to extend an olive branch. I’ve had a handful of times when I’ve butted heads with people, usually over practices a designer has dictated, which I can’t change or the circumstance doesn’t require an exception. After the show, I made a point to initiate a conversation and say I knew our interaction wasn’t pleasant, but I was still there to help, even if I couldn’t always give them exactly what they wanted. Usually, both parties are able to speak their piece in a calmer environment and everyone can move on. (Every once in a while you get blocked on Facebook and the actor tries to avoid you for a couple of weeks.) In the end, you’ve done your part and should continue to maintain a professional relationship, regardless of their response.

Moving on to the nuts and bolts of touring

When you start a new tour, you’ll have a couple of weeks of shop prep when you head up to the NYC area and get all the gear (speakers, console, com, processing, RF, cables, etc.) and put it all together.

Pay attention to learning the signal flow of the system. The better you know it, the easier it is to follow, isolate, and solve a problem when you’re under pressure.
Color code cables and their ports. It takes far less time to look at a cable, notice it’s got green tape, and plug it into the matching green label in the rack, than it is fumbling around to read the label, then looking through the labels on the racks until you find the matching one. Spare cables are usually color-coded with YELLOW. This is usually true across all departments.
Use a system for things that go together. I usually put a cool color with a warm color if I need to pair things up, with the cool color as the main and the warm as a backup (if applicable). So, BLUE and RED are a pair, PURPLE and YELLOW (in this case, not a spare), and then GREEN and ORANGE.

This also applies to cases. If you can, color code labels according to the case’s destination

It’s quicker to say “all the PURPLE cases go to the pit” or “Everything with a PINK label goes to FOH” plus it’s easier for the local crew to remember.
Also for cases, make short, clear names. On Saigon, we started with “AUTO/SM/FLY BUNDLES” which was a mouthful. Changing it to a more concise “COM BUNDLES” made it easier both for us to say and for the crew to find when we sent them looking for the case.
The first couple of times you patch your racks, redo the bundling on the cables. If you have 6 cables in a single bundle and 2 go to one rack, 3 go to another and a single cable goes to a third place, break the tape on the cable loom back to where the cables need to go in their different directions and re-tape (with friction tape) what goes to the same place together.

As you start moving the show, another set of organizational skills comes into play. You develop a flexible routine, which sounds like an oxymoron, but the reality is that there will always be a few cities thrown in the mix where things just won’t be able to follow the usual plan. However, the individual tasks in your routine should retain a flow that you follow as much as possible.

Make a checklist of everything you do during load-in. The more you move, the more you might get a sense of deja vu as you wonder if you’ve actually tested com, or you just remember doing it in the last city….
Be consistent. Especially with cables. When you have twelve cable bundles coming to Ampland from seven different locations, load out will quickly turn into a mess if you try to unearth the one on the bottom first. When running cables on the load in, have an order. Say you always do FOH runs first (these are usually the longest runs, so it helps to get them first), then Crossovers (multiple), your Towers (Far and Near), next the Balcony Rail, then Pit (also multiple), and finally the shorter com runs (Automation, Fly Rail, SM Desk) to finish the day off. If this is how the bundles (almost) always get run out, it’s easy to remember that you simply go in reverse order on the out, pulling up what’s on top first and avoiding tangling them all together.
Learn what you should do yourself and what you can hand off to the local crew. Personally, I prefer to plug in the cables at the racks myself. I’ve had enough times where a well-meaning local has plugged something into the wrong spot (or even upside down) and it ends up being quicker and less error-prone if I do it. Prep the complicated bits so you can give the crew simple instructions. Again, with cables bundles (so much of your life is about cables), I’ll unpatch and organize the ends of each bundle in various coils so I can point to one and say “that’s the next bundle you’re going to pull, it goes in the Tower Bundles box, and the other end is at the tower on stage left.” Then the crew can take it from there. Or when I would hang underbalc speakers, I’d go up to the balcony rail, measure out where I wanted things to go and mark it with tape. Then I could send the crew up and say, “hang one speaker at each tape mark” and tell them how to cable them.
In that vein, make instructions concise and clear. There’s a delicate balance between too much information (hard to remember everything) and too little (not enough to get the job done). Pictures and diagrams can be helpful if you have the time, like having a pit layout for the local crew to look at so they can which player sits where. Clear labels are a must. Re-sending a local for a case with an ambiguous name or getting a wrong case because names are too similar is frustrating and wastes time. A name could make perfect sense to you, but might not to the local crew who’s seeing your show and organizational structure for the first time. Learn the phrases that locals are used to. Pay attention to your crew members who have been out on the road longer and what terms they use. Most crew members know if I say “This cable is a half box coil, cinnamon bun,” that means I want the bundle coiled up in one half of the case, making almost a spiral to fill up the center of the cable coil as well, which looks like a cinnamon roll. Or in the truck, I’ll tell the loaders to “ninety” something when I want to rotate a case 90 degrees or “as is” if it’s on the truck in the correct orientation, and then either “driver” or “passenger” to tell them which side of the truck it goes on. In situations where something has to flip upside down on top of another case, you use “wheels to the sky” (or in some cities “wheels to Jesus”).
If you find that local crews across multiple cities are consistently having trouble completing a certain project, take a look at the instructions you’re giving them. True, some people don’t listen or don’t understand what you’re asking, but those should be exceptions. At some point, the information they receive is the common denominator and that’s what should be tweaked until you figure out the best way to explain it.
Never ask your local crew to do anything that is unsafe. If you wouldn’t do it, you shouldn’t ask them to. Also, if you’re willing to hop in and help them when you can, they tend to like you better than if you just stand there giving orders.

Finally, some general housekeeping tips

Keep things neat. Clean up after yourself, try not to put your cases and gear in other people’s way (if you can). And stay on top of this as you’re loading in. It’s a lot easier to lay all your bundles neatly at the beginning of the day than try to clean up a rat’s nest of cables currently forming its own mountain (which always just happens to be on the pathway the actors will need to use).
Keep load in priorities in mind. As the A1, your focus is making sure everything in your department is progressing as on schedule as possible, and you’re in a good position to get the system up and ready for the show. As the A2, your job is to set up the infrastructure of the show and be ready when the A1 calls for something (she’s ready to power up FOH, check the mics in the pit, turn on the speakers to check the system, etc).
Set realistic expectations and be aware of the big picture: I’ll plan to set up FOH early in the load in so I can patch it by myself and send the entire crew to the A2. Then she can do all the long cable runs which require more people. Then we split the crew so I can build the towers and cluster and she can get some smaller com projects set up. All of these jobs have to get done for the show to happen, and if we can alternate big and small projects, trading off the crew, we’re always able to work on something and keep moving.

I’ll say it again: if you follow nothing else on this list, don’t be an idiot and don’t be an asshole. Some common sense and a positive attitude go a long way in an industry that is so much smaller than you think.

Mixing a New Musical

Getting any show up and running is hard. Layers upon layers of new information are being added to the piece once the actors move from the rehearsal space to the performance venue, and it’s all happening very quickly. As a show’s A1, I am hard at work preparing my script, generating paperwork, programming the console, and in some cases also working as a hand on the shop build and/or load-in. Design elements are coming together throughout the tech process. Ideas are tried, then retooled, and tried again. However, one thing that usually isn’t changing is the actual script of the show. Not so on new work!

New pieces, and especially new musicals, come with their own set of unique challenges. Sometimes members of the writing team are present throughout the rehearsal process, making rewrites and changes to the piece as it gets staged. Rehearsal reports sent out by the stage manager will include new script pages and/or change logs, all of which can make it harder to get familiar with a show in advance of tech and previews. Songs may be moved around in the script, new scenes or characters might be added, entire sections may get cut. The entire product is constantly evolving!

Personally, new musicals are my favorite kind of shows to work on, despite all these added challenges. In fact, part of why I love them so much is precisely because of these added challenges! It’s really special to be part of a work that is being shown in its full form for the first time, and it really does keep me extra engaged when I’m in the tech and preview process. The audience has no preconceived notions of what the show is going to look or sound like, and as the mixer, my role in facilitating the storytelling is even more crucial, because no one has ever heard it before!

So, how should one approach the preparation process when mixing a new musical? In general, the process is the same as with existing work, just with a few added hurdles.

Do your homework as per usual

Familiarize yourself with the material in advance as best you can, whether it’s through demo recordings or by watching run-throughs in the rehearsal hall. The new musical I am currently mixing was meant to be produced in 2020, but due to the pandemic, it was adapted into a radio play and released on audible, with the fully staged production postponed to this summer. So, since a new musical likely won’t have a cast album yet, I was able to use that audible recording to do my “homework” of getting to know the general feel of the scenes and songs, even though I knew that the show would likely change a lot in the year that passed between when the radio play was recorded and this summer when we would finally get to do the show for an audience.

Prepare for new pages

This is probably the most labor-intensive part of the prep process on a new musical. As the script changes, whoever is tracking those changes (usually someone from the writing team or stage management) will bring you new replacement pages to insert into your book, or a change sheet with lines that you should write in on your own (some shows do one or the other, on my current show, Row, they do both). This means you’ll be doing quite a bit of transferring your notes from old pages to new ones. For that reason, it’s all the more important to develop a shorthand for yourself that you like, so that you can do all this rewriting as quickly as possible. For example, I will abbreviate my Band Master fader as “B” and my Vocal reverb fader as “V”, then I use musical crescendo/decrescendo markings for my dynamic moves. Writing “B < -5” is a lot faster than having to transfer the full words over and over again every time a new page comes in! Other little symbols I like to use are up and down arrows for pickups, slashes for when characters’ lines overlap, and my favorite, a little glasses symbol for when you should look at something specific for a cue (this is a common practice among musicians to remind themselves when they should watch the conductor).

Don’t get rid of your old pages!

As Gibbs’ Rule #11 teaches us, “Everything is subject to un-change.” A new scene might not work, and you might go back to the old scene. Keep all your change logs and cut pages handy in case you need to re-insert them or reference them for any reason. Fun fact: I once did a new musical whereby the end of the run, my stack of cut pages was basically the size of the finished script!

My current stack of old pages for Row.

Practice but don’t memorize yet

As you mix a show more and more times, you will naturally begin to develop muscle memory for making your pickups and fader moves. However, on new work, it’s important to not let habits set in too soon in case things keep changing. I have on occasion caught myself making errors because my hands got too used to doing a scene a certain way and then the scene was re-written. Pay extra attention to any lines that you use as cues for yourself in case they change!

Consult all your sources

Since we’re talking specifically about musicals, it is likely that songs will change in addition to book scenes as the show develops. Make sure that you are getting updates from the music department in addition to the ones you get from writing/stage management. Sometimes the piano/vocal will have more current information than the libretto! Also, even if you don’t read music, it can be super helpful to have access to the piano/vocal score to consult as you figure out the timings of band moves and console scenes.

Try to program flexibly

As a general rule, it’s good to leave yourself “buffer” console scenes/snapshots as you program in case you decide you need to add things or adjust DCA assignments. This is even more true on a new musical. For example, the console on Row is a Yamaha CL5, which can accommodate up to 300 console scenes. When I laid out my DCA tracking prior to programming the show, it looked like I would need about 60 scenes to do the whole show. So rather than start at Scene #1 and go sequentially, the first song is scene #10, the second song is scene #15, etc. That way I have room to add more scenes internally without having to renumber every subsequent scene. To save time and hassle, also try to program in a more minimalist way than you might on an existing show so that you can adapt to changes more easily. Inevitably you will find yourself having to go through 10 separate console scenes to make a single change to all of them because of a script/song change, but the fewer times you have to do this the better. ☺

My console scene tracking sheet for Row. Notice the skips between numbers!

The thing to remember most of all on a new musical is that while rolling with the punches as things change can be stressful, it’s all in service of the art. I once worked with a choreographer who when he needed to adjust something would say on his god mic “I’m making a change” and the whole company would reply “Change is GOOD!” I’ve made that quote my new musical motto. The reward of knowing that all of the work that the creatives are putting in (and you alongside them) is truly helping to tell the story better will make it worth it when the show finally gets “frozen” (this means no more changes are allowed) and makes its world premiere in front of its first-ever audience!

The “Gibbs Rules” of Being a Stagehand

When I was in high school, my family’s go-to TV show was NCIS. We’d put it on in the background over dinner, or watch reruns on the USA channel when nothing else good was on TV. By the time I left to go to college, I must have subconsciously taken in hundreds of episodes!

For those who aren’t familiar, the show is about a team with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service who work to solve murders of Navy or Navy-affiliated persons. The team is lead by Special Agent Gibbs, a former marine with a big heart and a sometimes short temper. He’s far from a perfect person, but he has a strong moral compass that he uses to inspire his team to do their best work to solve these mysteries. One of the ways we learn about Gibbs’ particular brand of moral code is through a philosophy known as Gibbs’ Rules. The NCIS Fan Wiki defines them thus:

“Gibbs’s Rules are an extensive series of guidelines that NCIS Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs lives by and teaches to the people he works closely with.” (Source: https://ncis.fandom.com/wiki/Gibbs%27s_Rules). Some of the rules are things you might expect to hear on a crime TV show, such as “Never let suspects stay together” or “Always wear gloves at a crime scene.” Others, however, are more universal and can be taken as good lessons for life in general. Some of my favorites of these include “When the job is done, walk away” and “Don’t believe what you’re told. Double-check.”

As I started getting more involved in theatre throughout high school and college, I started trying to figure out how to compile everything I was learning into a sort of guide for myself. Classmates, teachers, and mentors were giving me all sorts of great tidbits of advice, and I was scribbling them all down in an unorganized jumble to be able to refer back to later. I began thinking about how I could organize it into some sort of guide that I could add to and share as my career continued, and naturally, Gibbs’ Rules came to mind!

I called the document I wound up creating “Gibbs’ Rules of Stage Management,” because initially, I was training to be a stage manager. But as I got into mixing and sound design, it seemed like a lot of the rules didn’t have to just be for stage managers. And the more people I shared them within different fields of entertainment, the more I realized that a lot of them can be applied pretty universally across our industry. So here, for your perusal and enjoyment, are some annotated selections from the 2021 Gibbs’ Rules of Being a Stagehand. If you would like to see the entire collection, it will be posted on my website, beccastollsound.com, in the next few days!

2021 Gibbs’ Rules of Being a Stagehand

Rule #1: ALL HUMANS ARE STUPID (AND EVERYONE’S HUMAN).

This is one of my favorites. It speaks to the fact that people make mistakes, and it’s important to cut people slack and not hold it against them.

Rule #6: GIVE LOTS OF THANKS, EXPECT NONE IN RETURN.

Unfortunately, those of us who work behind the scenes are often not adequately recognized for our contributions, especially compared to the onstage talent. Try your best not to let it get you down or give you a bad attitude.

Rule #7: EVERYTHING IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE.

In stage management and production management, it is common to put “subject to change” in the footer of most paperwork. We’re making organic art after all, and we’re making it in the moment, so there’s no way to predict everything that will happen!

Rule #11: EVERYTHING IS SUBJECT TO UN-CHANGE

A corollary to Rule #7. Especially applicable on new musicals, where a scene or song that got cut yesterday could go back into the show today. Keep good archives, and don’t throw anything out until closing!

Rule #13: IT’S PROBABLY GOOD IF AT LEAST ONE PERSON KNOWS WHERE YOU ARE.

This one was inspired by the actual Gibbs’ Rule #3, which is “never be unreachable.” But in this age of smartphones, push notifications, and constantly feeling the need to be “on-call” for work, I think it’s important to reclaim the ability to take time for yourself and not have to immediately answer to everyone. On the other hand, if you simply stop picking up your phone, people might worry that something has happened to you because that’s the kind of world we live in now. So strike a healthy balance between the two.

Rule #19: IT’S A SMALL WORLD AFTER ALL.

In NYC theatre this is commonly known as the “5 block rule.” Meaning that if you are talking smack about someone or something within 5 blocks of the theatre, it’s going to become back to bite you. Everyone knows everyone, and no one will ever forget you. People’s friends/assistants/partners will refer or recommend you and it counts. Read the room and don’t burn bridges.

Rule #24: IF YOU CAN’T SAY YES, DON’T SAY NO.

People are going to ask you for impossible things. People are going to ask you for hints that aren’t your job to do. Saying “no” just shuts the conversation down rather than fostering collaboration. Even if something is 100% impossible, the best answer to start with is “I’ll look into it” or “let me get back to you.”

Rule #25: THE SHOW MUST GO ON (EXCEPT WHEN IT CAN’T).

This rule is credited to my stage management professor, Tina Shackleford. And wow, does it read differently post-pandemic!

Rule #26: WHEN IN DOUBT, DRESS TO IMPRESS.

My mom came up with this one ☺ If appearance or apparel is something that helps you to feel motivated or prepared, by all means, use that to your advantage! Dress in a way that makes you feel awesome on the inside but also shows you are prepared for the occasion, whether it’s a corporate interview or an arena load-in. And always wear close-toed shoes.

Rule #33: NOTHING CAN BE TESTED TOO MANY TIMES.

This rule is from Shannon Slaton, author of the excellent book Mixing a Musical.

Rule #34: KNOWING WHAT YOU’RE DOING IS ONLY 1/3 OF THE JOB.

Credit for this one goes to NYC-based sound designer Dan Miele. As I’ve outlined in many a blog post, so much of this job is people skills, improvising, and just making things work in a very short amount of time! Yes, the hard skills matter, but the soft skills (plus a good attitude and a willingness to collaborate) matter almost as much if not more!

Rule #35: ALWAYS READ YOUR CONTRACT.

Always Always Always! Read the whole thing. Top to bottom. Read all the fine print. Ask questions about anything in it that is unclear. Run it by mentors and friends.The last thing you want is to be blindsided by something you signed before you fully understood what you were signing. Just read it!

Rule #40: DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND STAY IN YOUR LANE.

It’s noble to want to help people. In theatre we all pitch in to make it work, right? The problem is that it can be easy to over-exert yourself trying to help others, and suddenly your own job begins to suffer as a result. We’ve all been there. Over the years I have come to see having my one specific job to do as an absolute blessing in disguise. It allows me to focus on the things that are mine to control, and not worry about the things that aren’t. So if it’s not your job, don’t do it. If it’s not your problem, don’t make it your problem. Not trying to be everything to everyone is not only an act of self-preservation, but it is better for the overall show if everyone is able to take on their own workload and not burn out doing the jobs of other people as well. So as often as possible, make best efforts to stay in your box. Do your own job well and trust that others will do theirs.

As always, comments and questions welcome! What are some of your personal “Gibbs’ Rules?”

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