Setting the Stage All the different perspectives of how a music performance is run By Wyllis Washam
W
hen you step onto the stage you hear the crowd roar with excitement as they see you. You’ve practiced your music and know it by heart. Before the show you made sure everything sounded good and all the lighting was ready to go. As you take a deep breath and let it out you start the show. Musicians, sound engineers, and lighting technicians all need to work together on the stage to make a performance sound good. If somebody doesn’t do their work or makes a mistake the whole show could fall apart and which could be a big disappointment to all the fans. The Austin Arpeggio - 23
Stephen Yates has been doing lighting for about 26 years and currently does lighting for the band Modest Mouse. He says that he is constantly busy and has to work hard everyday. “We are the first in as lighting guys,” says Yates. “Lighting has to go up before anything else can go on the stage.” Carlos Sallaberry is a sound engineer and has worked with all sorts of bands like Maroon Five, Bon Jovi, The Rolling Stones, and many more. When he was young his two older brothers were original members of a famous boy band called Menudo. One day when Carlos was nine he went to a recording studio with his brothers and was blown away. “When I went to
the recording studio with them I was blown away,” says Sallaberry. “This is what I want to do, I want to be a sound engineer.” Lighting and sound don’t have much interaction between each other, but they need to work together to be able to get things set up. Over the years, there has been a bad relationship between lighting and sound. “Unfortunately, throughout the years there has been this rivalry between sound and lights. I don’t know why. I never played a part in that rivalry because we are together and we have a show to do,” says Yates. Louis Svitek is a guitar player who
