May Issue - Stage Directions Magazine

By Jerry Cobb
Covering Your Tracks
Backing tracks should ideally complement,
not overwhelm, what the audience
perceives onstage. A handful of
singers producing a thunderous chorus can
come off as overreaching. A massive wall of
orchestral bombast emanating from a jazz
band might elicit unwelcome chortling.
Conversely, a dinner theatre with no visible
musicians might be able to pull this off
without a hitch. And overblown orchestration
may be used intentionally to humorous
effect. It’s all in what you’re trying to
project from your stage. And, of course,
what you can get away with.
Sound Judgment
While shoving a microphone in front of
a cassette deck and playing tapes through
the school P.A. may be okay for a kindergarten
show (actually, it’s not even okay there),
your facility needs to have a decent sound
system — and someone to run it — in
order to pull off a musical. This becomes
especially important when considering
adding musically dense tracks to a P.A.
that’s already struggling. P.A. Audio professionals
call this “headroom,” which you’re
going to need. If your company is portable,
you’ll need to bring along as good a P.A. as
you can afford and/or carry, or hire a pro
sound company locally. When it comes
to sound reproduction, the adage “garbage
in, garbage out” is especially apropos.
Keeping it simple is fine; using audio junk
is not. Musicals should be a treat for the
ears and not a headache-inducing distortion
fest. Make sure your audio gear is up
to the task.
With the addition of prerecorded tracks
to the mix, the musical director’s job gets
more complicated. Performers need to
rehearse more intensely with the tracks and
memorize purely musical cues, because
once the track starts, it will play through
with no mercy. This is equally true for any
live musicians, as they must now synchronize
to a harsh taskmaster. And everyone
must be able to clearly hear the tracks at
all times, making placement of monitor
speakers crucial both on the stage and in
the pit. These monitors will play a different
mix from the one the audience hears,
which should be a subtler blend of live and
canned music than that which the performers
need to hear.
All this necessitates thoughtful sound
design and competent sound persons running
the show.
Types of Tracks
Backing tracks come in a variety of flavors,
each with its own pros and cons. If
your theatre is already equipped with a
particular playback device and no budget
to buy anything different, guess what you’ll
be using? But if your company is new to the
tracking game, you have choices:
CD
Perhaps the simplest plug-and-play
solution are prerecorded CDs. Many online
sources offer complete plays recorded in
the original show key and tempo. These
albums are re-recordings of the original.
Each song appears on the album twice:
once with music and vocals, and once with
accompaniment tracks alone. This allows
the performer to learn a song by singing
along with the vocals and music, then to
practice their technique accompanied only
by the background tracks.
Pros: Good audio quality, familiar format.
Cons: Can skip or develop “dropouts”
over time, can be a bit futzy to stop and
start, especially on less expensive gear.
Minidisc (MD)
While not as sonically detailed to some
ears as a CD or DVD, MDs are nearly bulletproof
when it comes to ease of playback
and skip-free dependability. CDs may be
transferred to MD format using an MD
recorder or having it done for a fee by many
of the retailers who offer showtune CDs.
Pros: Reliable playback, easy to stop and
start, creates playlists.
Cons: Slightly less audio fidelity than CD,
fewer pre-recorded titles available for purchase.
Equipment not as readily available
(or repairable) as more popular formats.
iPod
Yes, of course you can transfer other formats
to play on an iPod or an MP3 player.
A karaoke collage of backing tracks from Broadway Best
It’s not the most professional way to go,
but it is doable.
Pros: Massive song storage, ease of
access, ability to create song lists. Instant
downloads available.
Cons: Less audio fidelity than CD, small
connectors can be troublesome in a darkened
theatre. Never trust batteries in a live
situation.
MIDI
Think of a MIDI sequence as an old-fashioned
player piano roll; it’s a series of zeros
and ones telling your sound card which
virtual instrument to play, how loud and
what notes. Standard MIDI Files (SMFs) are
widely available and varied in quality. On
many songs the instrumentation will sound
fake, and none will contain backup vocals.
MIDI files can be played back by some
synthesizers, dedicated hardware players
or directly from a computer.
Pros: An expert musician can tweak
existing MIDI files to sound good. Song
keys and tempos can be changed, and specific
instruments may be muted or made
louder.
Cons: Instrument sounds are only as
good as your sound card. MIDI files found
on the Internet range from horrible to just
okay, depending on genre and the skill of
the original sequence artist. SMFs rarely
sound as good as other formats without a
lot of talented tinkering.
A Legal Note
Just because you purchase music doesn’t
mean you have the legal right to perform it
publicly. Remember to check on licensing
before pressing play for an audience.
Jerry Cobb is the sole proprietor of
Videografix/LA, a video boutique specializing
in music video, corporate and
entertainment reels, and professional
voiceovers.
www.stage-directions.com • May 2007 33
www.stage-directions.com • Aprilr 2007 33