Prospect Theater Company in New York frequently re-interprets classic plays and musicals when creating new works, and such is the case of The Iron Curtain, a new musical comedy set in New York City, Moscow, and Berlin in 1954 about two struggling songwriters kidnapped by the KGB to fix a clunker propaganda musical.
Performances of The Iron Curtain late last year took place in The Rose Nagelberg Theatre at the Baruch College Performing Arts Center, with Andy Leviss, a New York-based freelance audio engineer, serving as the show’s sound designer.
Leviss deployed a 16-channel Lectrosonics wireless microphone system consisting of three Venue Series receiver mainframes, four SMQV dual battery beltpack transmitters, eight LMa beltpack transmitters, and four UM400a beltpack transmitters. All equipment utilizes Lectrosonics proprietary Digital Hybrid Wireless technology.
“Prospect Theater Company is just transitioning into the large scale use of wireless microphones,” Leviss explains. “They previously relied on performers’ voices to project or overhead miking. They’re relatively new to this level of reinforcement, so the ability to maintain natural sound quality was vitally important. I’ve used Lectrosonics equipment on a number or previous projects, and I find the equipment’s sound quality is far more natural than other competing wireless systems.
“The company’s Digital Hybrid Wireless technology doesn’t employ companding, so you don’t experience the sonic artifacts common in other wireless equipment. Sound quality is right on par with cabled microphones. Knowing this, I felt the Lectrosonics system would be ideal for this show.”
Leviss selected the SMQV, LMa, and UM400a transmitters and the Venue receiver system because size was yet another important consideration on this project.
“Most of the transmitters were placed in the small of the performers’ backs,” Leviss reports. “The SMQV’s are particularly compact, so they were a great choice. Similarly, both the LMa and UM400a transmitters are relatively small and easy to conceal in wardrobe. The combination of these transmitters with the Countryman B3 Omni Round lavaliere mics—placed in the mid center of the performers’ forehead among the hair or over the ear— resulted in a wireless setup that was essentially unnoticeable.”
“Backstage space—where we positioned the wireless receivers—was at an absolute premium on this project,” he continues, “so the ability of the Lectrosonics Venue receiver system to house sixteen wireless channels in three rack spaces was a tremendous help. For this show, we had two fully stocked Venue mainframes—each with six VRS receiver modules—while the third unit had four modules. The ability to have that many wireless channels occupying so little space is really impressive.”
