With two prior Olivier Awards nominations, it was it was third time lucky for sound designer Gareth Owen and Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along – and his philosophy of ‘the right tools for the job’. In this case, that meant putting a Yamaha PM5D digital console at FOH for the show.
‘I’m not one to always use the same equipment – no ‘cookie cutter’ specs, if you will,’ he says. ‘I believe in picking the tools that are best for each production and not spending a lot of the producer’s money on gear for the sake of it.
‘Merrily We Roll Along is all about sonic clarity and fast operation,’ he explains. ‘It needed a straightforward system to deliver a sound which was very clear and true to the original. Three of the main reasons why I chose the PM5D was because it has great audio quality, it is the right size and it’s super-reliable – I have never been let down by one.’
Although the console’s inputs and outputs were all in use, Owen maintained the clearest possible signal path, just using internal reverb for the nine-piece band’s drummer and a couple of ‘old school’ Lexicon PCM reverbs for outboard. Another advantage of the PM5D was that Merrily We Roll Along is a complex show to mix, which meant operator Dave Palmer had his hands full.
‘It’s a tricky show, even by Sondheim standards,’ Owen confirms. ‘We needed a console that would respond immediately and have an intuitive workflow to make the operator’s job easier. The show moves so quickly that it was difficult to take his hands off the desk, even for a few seconds and, as a result, the ability to quickly reach over, tweak the sound and get back to the faders really came into its own.’
With the Olivier Award in the bag, Owen is able to reflect on how Yamaha consoles fit musical theatre: ‘In this day and age, programming and operating digital consoles for musical theatre is often complex and time-consuming. Yamaha desks give you the ability to do what you need, quickly and simply. You don’t spend half your life wrestling with the desk, making it do what you want it to do. Rather than wasting precious hours programming, they give you the time to just get on and be a sound engineer.’
