Slow Down and Speak Up

On sound reinforcement in the theatre.

The new theatre season begins in schools and colleges, communities, and professional stages everywhere. As theatre faculty and artist I've seen and been associated with a great many wonderful productions - amateur, academic, professional - with many production concepts and approaches. I've seen performances in many venues and seating situations.

If there is one single personal frustration with my live theatre experiences as an audience member, it is the audibility, comprehensibility and sound of the dialogue. This is necessarily a theatre issue. It has little bearing on performance for film and video, which is never live and the connection between sound and performance is manipulated externally.

Sound is a mundane concern in the theatre, but often the most vexing. My hearing generally has been average, comparable to most theatre patrons. Sometimes the sound problem is the nature of the venue or the fault of the halls, but in the end it really is the job of the performers, regardless of the hall. Reinforcement can make a difference if it is "transparent," that is, not evident.

[Virginia State Theatre. Sound reinforcement is a clear requirement.] Established and working professionals in the theatre understand and correct for this. They "ring the hall" and gauge the response time, listen to fellow actors, and then adjust their performance for pace and volume. Untrained actors typically are steeped in "naturalism" and the dialogue in film and video. Compounded by anxieties, two fundamentals of live public performance get lost: pace and clarity. They speak too softly and/or too rapidly. Give them dialect and they make a run for it to show their proficiency.

As an amateur once-performer, I, too, fell to a belief that my proficiency and prowess was to be measured by how facile I could speak and act, and that this was more "natural." I thought that the internal life of the character ruled all, and that it was up to the audience to receive and comprehend it. If the art is there, the artist has done his job.

Just ... Wow. This is never the failure of the audience. Ever. Ever.

Excellent directors will give the note, but in terms of directorial concerns, "is it loud enough" doesn't make the list. Speaking too rapidly usually is overlooked as well, with the actor perhaps getting an occasional note questioning the choice to do so, not considering it an error. The director is preoccupied with interpretation, relationships, timing, staging, and leading the production team. Typically, she also is the production executive, tasked with logistical planning, promotion and public relations responsibilities. An experienced director may have no experience at teaching acting or voice production, the actor's most fundamental competence. It IS the actor's job.

(Manchester England - "All My Sons") Student actors at university level often are quite wound up. Remembering, relating, reacting, and investing in character is a challenge. Working in dialect further complicates matters. Still, they also need to slow down, speak up and shape their voice to be heard and understood clearly - in character - on their own. It is the final and most fundamental aspect of performance - what the audience receives aurally.

Reinforcement is a complicated answer. Even the best systems generalize the source and homogenize the character of the sound. It is pointedly louder than the actor, while changing the vocal quality and usually the spatial placement significantly. In musicals reinforcement usually is necessary simply to sing over the orchestra. Many large halls were never built for natural stage voice. Sophisticated audio imaging systems can be timed to allow the natural voice to lead the reinforcement by micro-seconds and balance multiple speakers to place the voice in the space. These systems are an elaborate answer to a human problem.

One common failure of reinforcement occurs when the actor relies upon it: "I don't have to speak up because I am mic'ed." Perhaps we'll hear you, but it won't sound "transparent," as most efforts to sound natural seek. It won't really come from where you are on stage, and the sound quality will contain frequencies that would be lost with direct voice at a distance. Over-driving the mic can distort, but it does need solid sound input. Often weak vocal performance by the actors results in hideously overdriving the reinforcement and everything comes from speakers at movie theatre volume levels. These and other factors influence performance audio quality.

People more qualified than I in voice production and directing may find my concerns misplaced. Nevertheless, character voice and song are fundamental competencies for stage actors. Whether I can hear and understand them well often deserves more attention, and reinforcement can be both a benefit and a crutch. It is not a matter of my competence as a play-goer. Ever.

Arthur Dirks

October 3, 2017