After four decades, The Wiz is back on Broadway. This updated version of the funky ‘70s take on L. Frank Baum’s classic tale The Wizard Of Oz is filled with joyous performances spanning R&B to gospel, colorful set pieces and a dazzling video wall that features richly detailed environments. This new production, which features the Scarecrow’s song from the movie adaptation, was recently on the road and brought to Broadway through a quick transition by sound designer Jon Weston and his audio team, which includes veteran FOH mixer Carin Ford. Although she takes working on this epic musical in stride and finds it a fun show to mix, Ford’s 30 years of experience certainly make the show’s sound flow smoothly.
The Road Back to Broadway
To prep for the move to the Marquis Theatre, Ford went out to L.A. for three weeks to learn the mix on the show’s tour. “I mixed the show a little bit without the strings, without the augmentation,” she says. The Broadway production added a string section — two violins, a viola and a cello. “It’s amazing how adding live strings and the additional horns make such a big difference.”
The L.A. expedition was wise because the team had limited time to get the show ready for Broadway. “The show toured for six months before,” Ford explains. “So they figured, you can just redo the system in two weeks. But it was actually a little harder to redo the system for Broadway — dismantle, redo, and rearrange from the tour and set it up.”
While touring venues tend to be bigger or wider than those on the Great White Way, Ford notes there are more speakers in the Marquis Theatre than there were on the tour. Weston used d&b audiotechnik’s Soundscape system to boost the audio “because that house is very dead,” Ford said. “The walls are soft. Soundscape helps to give the room some liveliness, give it some air. Because he’s using that, there are a lot more speakers to help give the room some liveliness as well as a series of microphones that are hung throughout the room.”
A Non-reverberant Space
She adds that that the Marquis doesn’t have any sound reflections, which makes it feel “like being in a padded room, and I feel badly for performers if nothing is done to help them, because they don’t get anything back. That’s the purpose of the Soundscape system — to help give some kind of reflection and reverb back to the stage so the actors have something to come back at them. So that they can hear themselves a little bit better, hear the band, all of that. Soundscape works on stage and in the house.”
The Wiz is mixed on a DiGiCo SD7 Quantum board with approximately 230 channels, 100 channels of groups and aux outs, and about 40 matrix outs. Ford says there are more than 100 sound effects cues in the show, and many of them are triggered by electrics or SMPTE timecode. The Soundscape program gets a good workout, including during the tornado sequence in which the surround sound makes it sound like the band is being swirled up in the windy maelstrom with everything and everyone else.
The Sound Effects
The most challenging sequence to mix takes place in the castle of Evillene (this version’s Wicked Witch of the West.) While Ford says The Wiz is relatively easy to mix, Evillene’s Castle has a lot going on sonically. When Dorothy and her friends arrive there, the gospel number “No Bad News” is sung, then the villain puts a spell on the Scarecrow, Lion and Tin Man, which involves sound effects.
“Some of those sound effects are played by lighting because everything is synced,” Ford said. “But I have to mix the dialog, and there are a couple of sound effects where one of Evillene’s minions throws Dorothy into the cage. When they close a gate, I have to watch him take her up the stairs, toss her in, and do a gate cue. It’s at a distance” — the Marquis’ orchestra section is deep — “and it’s dark up there. It’s hard to see that person close the gate. That’s one sound effect which is a little difficult, and there’s another where Evillene comes back just before she melts. Again, that gate opens and I have to watch her struggle to get up those stairs and reach for the gate and open it. That’s probably the most difficult part.”
One of the final songs of the show, the exuberant ensemble number “Everybody Rejoice / A Brand New Day,” features many people singing individual lines going into it. “Trying to catch those people, because they all sing at different levels, and still keep the balance with the band and the rest of the ensemble, is a challenge,” Ford states. “With this cast and their vocal range, it’s so different. Some people are very strong and others are not. The hard part is trying to just keep a decent balance between those people.”
Other Projects
The Wiz is one of several shows Ford has worked on with sound designer Jon Weston. Others include An American In Paris, Big Fish and The Color Purple. And even though Ford likes learning about new technology, there are some things that remain steadfast.
“What I really love about working with Jon [is] he will just stick with dependable standards that work,” Ford said. “He loves using Sennheiser MKE 2s, and they do sound better. They can sweat out, and we have that issue, especially with our Lion. The good thing is that he has a strong voice, and all the leads are double-miked. They have one MKE 2.” Their backup mic is the Point Source CO-8WL omnidirectional waterproof lavalier. “Even though the second mic is different, it’s less likely to sweat out.”
Ford has worked regularly with a number of different sound designers, among them Scott Lehrer, for whom she mixed Shuffle Along in 2016. That equally ambitious ensemble show presented an unusual challenge because of all the tap dancing on stage.
“I believe we had about 72 microphones under the deck,” Ford recalls. “Scott worked with [choreographer] Savion [Glover] to figure out know how we were going to pick up the sound for the taps. Savion did not want the cast to wear microphones on their shoes, so we picked them up under the floor. It actually worked really well. Scott worked his magic, and it allowed me to be able to then just mix the show. I programmed the console in such a way where whatever tap dancing was going on, especially with the ensemble, I could mix and move from one section of the stage to the other as the cast moved around.”
Beyond the stage, Ford has kept busy with a variety of interesting projects over the last few years. She did some work for the Museum of Broadway which opened in November 2022, generating sounds that were piped into different parts of the museum.
“They wanted a soundscape of what it would be like to be backstage on a Broadway show,” Ford recalls. “I created a soundscape — from the time you would walk into the stage door and sign in and hear the announcements and the show calls, to hearing actors or singers warming up, or dancers that are tap dancing. Stagehands talking, sets moving, doing presets, all of that. Then they asked me to also pull together some music from different shows, so as you go from one room to another, from one show to another, it goes from the beginning of Broadway through present day. There are Broadway songs from different shows. As you move through, you hear the songs and the music from that time and that particular show.”
Another project done during the pandemic was a filmed streaming presentation of the musical The Last Five Years which was inspired by the 2014 musical movie. This production was actually shot in a New York apartment to echo the intimacy of the story. Ford was asked to do sound editing for the film, and it was her first time in that role. The vocals were recorded on the set with band members in a remote location.
“I got the band tracks, and then the vocals were recorded on the set,” Ford said. “I asked the production sound person to make sure that whatever microphones you use [for dialog] on the set, use the same microphones to record vocals so that they would all match. I actually mixed it without having a video. It’s just like mixing music. It turned out pretty good, and I really enjoyed doing it. But I wish I had a video while I was mixing it because I would have done some things differently.”
Ford is also a founding member of Black Theatre United, which was created by LaChanze and Audra McDonald during the pandemic. The organization supports the Black community in theater and grants work opportunities to people who might not normally get the chance. Ford serves on the mentorship committee, and she says their current mentorship program involves placing people with advertising agents. Black Theatre United has an upcoming gala in September.
Already having a rich and varied career, with still more projects coming up, Ford offers some advice for those following in her footsteps. “The most important thing is just to be good at your craft,” she says. “Study everything, be willing to always learn because things change. Technology changes, so just learn as much as you can. Learn how to deal with people. This is still an industry where you have to deal with your cast, crew and management, and it’s really important to communicate with the people that you work with and respect everybody. We’re all working together to accomplish a show.”
