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INTERVIEW: HELEN GODDARD, AMS ACOUSTICS
November/December 2017
‘Once I had discovered acoustics it soon became a calling’
Helen Goddard with Ed the Head, a head and torso simulator used for acoustic measurements – simulating the acoustic field around a person
More than two decades on from the start of her career, AMS Acoustics principal and MD Helen Goddard remains a prominent and passionate advocate for the wider understanding of electro-acoustics. And as she tells David Davies, modern architectural practices and increased levels of hearing damage mean that the surrounding debate is set to become even more acute…
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elen Goddard is describing the way that “people just seem to fall into acoustics” rather than deliberately seek it out, underlining her point by noting that “we have a room full of musicians here, with the exception of one team member from a telecoms background, but even he studied the cello.” But once people have ‘fallen into’ acoustics, there is often no stopping them: “It can very quickly become a passion – it certainly did for me.” Having determined that a full-time career as a classical pianist wasn’t her destiny, Goddard began working as a junior technician at AMS
Acoustics in 1995. Thereafter, her ascent through the ranks was rapid; she became the owner and MD in 2000 and oversaw the expansion of the company to its current 10-strong team of full-timers. She is also very active in industry bodies such as the Institute of Sound and Communications Engineers (ISCE), and has been involved in helping the organisation to achieve the right to assess and issue Electrotechnical Certification Scheme (ECS) approval for sound engineers – more of which anon. But the starting point for Installation’s conversation with Goddard was her own
unexpected initiation into the world of acoustics back in 1995… So how did you come to enter the world of acoustics? I trained as a classical musician, studying piano, but I came to realise that I would eventually have to get a ‘proper job’ at some point to sustain me and be able to do all the things my ‘grown-up’ friends could do! I was good at music, but not marvellous at it, and in terms of a career the reality was that it wasn’t going to take me anywhere. I could have become a music teacher, but to