Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre, Broadway, New York City
Almost Famous' Sound System and Acoustics
"The ‘Big Little Show’ of ‘Almost Famous’
By: Bryan Reesman , November 2022, Theater Sound
Front of House Magazine - https://lnkd.in/eww7Mi7T
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FOH engineer Ron Sinko mixes the show on a DiGiCo SD7T Quantum . The inputs are not maxed out, as the instrumentation for Tom Kitt’s score is straightforward and compact, as it would have been in a ‘70s rock band. In the covered pit are drums, bass, three guitarists (electric and acoustic), two keyboards (including the conductor) and a small string section. Part of the approach was contemplating what the ‘70s sound would be with modern technology and give it a little more oomph in the theater.
The electric guitars use tube Fender amp heads routed into a load box. AKG 414s capture the acoustic 6-string, 12-string, steel and nylon guitars and a mandolin. On drums, Hylenski uses his standard fare, like Mojave MA200s (Mojave Audio) overheads and an SM57 (Shure Incorporated) and a condenser mic on the snare. “We change the sound of the snare from number to number for a different blend between the midrange of the 57 and the crisper top- and low-end of the condenser,” he says.
Cast members wear Sennheiser 6212 transmitters with MKE 1 mics that are traditional headworn, as opposed to headsets. Mic-wise, Hylenski wanted less isolation and more interplay between the characters who often move around each other onstage.
The System
For the P.A., Hylenski is once again using Meyer Sound, “but mostly based on point-source boxes like standard UPQ trapezoid boxes, which is a fantastic sounding speaker,” he says. “We’ve got quite a few of those in the room, and low-end is all Meyer 900 LFC. The delays are Meyer’s new ULTRA-X20s.”
There are some Meyer Leopard line arrays for the mezzanine and balcony coverage. But box seats close to the proscenium prevented using a line array or getting speaker positioning exactly where he would want it.
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The Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre itself presents its own challenges. “The theater is not that large, yet it’s very reverberant,” notes Hylenski. “It doesn’t have many absorbing surfaces in the room — especially upstairs. It’s sort of like Grand Central, so trying to do this show in a room like that is challenging. It’s not forgiving in terms of reflections. The back wall is a hard plaster parabolic reflector. The sidewalls are hard plaster, upstairs has vaulted plaster ceilings and parallel plaster walls,” he says.
“As much as I’d like to walk in and put up any P.A. I want and the room will be pretty sounding, this is tough because the harder you push, a lot of midrange comes back off the walls. That was a battle, trying to keep the show sounding smooth while pushing enough level into the room to make it exciting. What you put in is always affected by the acoustics.”"
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