 Tel: +886 (0)2 77260088 Fax: +886 (0)2 7726 0808 email: secretariat@oistat.org |
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Tel: +886 (0)2 77260088 Fax: +886 (0)2 7726 0808 email: secretariat@oistat.org |
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OISTAT Sound Design Working Group - Webinar #3 Sound Effects Recording on Location John Leonard
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John Leonard
John Leonard was born and educated in
Bristol, in the south-west of the United Kingdom. His involvement in
technical theatre began during his time at Bristol Grammar School and
was developed at The Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. In 1971, he
joined the Bristol Old Vic Theatre Company as a stage technician,
moving to the sound department in 1972 and becoming head of sound for
the company some six months later. At that time, the Bristol Old Vic
was running three theatres in four weekly rep and John was responsible
for providing sound for them all. As these theatres comprised The
Theatre Royal - the oldest theatre in Europe with a continuous working
history,built in 1766; The New Vic, - an adaptable space studio
theatre and The Little Theatre - a mid-sized single tier theatre, he
gained a great deal of experience in working in different theatre
environments. This, together with the wide range of work presented –
everything from Greek Tragedy to newly commissioned work – gave him
an excellent grounding in the many forms that theatre can take.
During his time at the Bristol Old Vic,
John introduced many innovative practices, including the use of
stereophonic sound effects and surround-sound many years before these
became commonplace in theatre. Towards the end of his time there, he
co-designed, with his colleague Alastair Goolden, a revolutionary new
theatre sound control system, which saw commercial success as the
Libra Theatre Sound Desk, winning the prestigious ABTT Product Of The
Year Award in 1979.
After a period spent working freelance,
John was invited to join The Royal Shakespeare Company where, in 1984,
he was to become Head Of Sound and an Associate Artist of the company.
He worked on most of the RSC’s most successful shows during his
ten-year period there, transferring many to Broadway and touring
others around Europe. He also developed one of the first
computer-assisted theatre sound systems for the company’s Pit
Theatre at The Barbican Centre and initiated a concept design study
for a digitally controlled assignable theatre sound console in 1985,
once again, many years before the idea became accepted as standard
practice. Sadly, the finance for developing the idea could not be
found, so DAISY (Digital-Analogue Interface SYstem) never saw the
light of day.
John left the RSC in 1989 to pursue a
freelance career, with which he continued with great success,
eventually forming a partnership with other like-minded designers
under the banner of Aura Sound Design. During this period, he became
sound associate for The Almeida Theatre, received an honorary
fellowship from The Guildhall School Of Music & Drama, for which
he is a visiting professor of Theatre Sound, won a Drama Desk award, a
Sound Designer Of The Year award and wrote an acclaimed textbook on
theatre sound which is now in preparation for its second edition, as
well as contributing to other books, journals and radio programs. With
his associates in Aura, he designed sound systems for The Almeida
Theatre at all of its temporary homes and for the refurbished theatre
in Islington, for the new Hampstead Theatre in London, and exhibition
installations for Madame Tussauds at Warwick Castle, Amsterdam and New
York. In 2000, with his long-term colleague John Owens, he designed
the sound for the Millennium Mystery Places in York Minster Cathedral,
the first time the plays have ever been performed in the Minster,
which presented an immense technical challenge.
In 2002, John was invited to join the
Broadway Entertainment Technicians Union, IATSE Local 1; an honour
accorded to very few non-Americans. In addition to all of this and in
addition to producing numerous soundtracks for shows in the UK and all
over the world, John has found time to visit The Hong Kong Academy of
Performing Arts as a guest lecturer, as well as lecturing in the USA,
South Korea and The Philippines.
At the end of 2004, the partners decided
to lay Aura Sound Design to rest, and, back once again in the
freelance world, John is as busy as ever with exhibition projects in
the UK, North America and China and with shows in London’s West-End,
The National Theatre Of Great Britain, The Royal Shakespeare Company
and The Lincoln Center Festival. He was part of the creative team for
Druid Theatre Company’s acclaimed cycle of six plays by J. M. Synge
and continues to work with them on other projects. He is also busy
recording and producing his own library of sound effects in
surround-sound format, the first of which will be released later in
2006.
Some of the highlights of John’s career
in theatre sound include Piaf, Nicholas Nickleby, Les Liaisons
Dangereuses, Much Ado About Nothing and Cyrano de Bergerac, all for
the Royal Shakespeare Company and all later seen in New York on
Broadway: Medea, Hamlet, Plenty, Coriolanus, Richard III, Phedre and
Brittanicus, all for The Almeida Theatre Company and also seen in New
York; all but two plays in the Shakespearean canon for assorted
theatre companies; work for The Norwegian National Theatre, for The
Deutsches Shauspeilhaus in Hamburg; many productions with directors
Howard Davies, John Caird, Michael Bogdanov, Trevor Nunn, Terry Hands,
Kathy Burke, Michael Blakemore, Michael Attenborough and Mike Leigh,
amongst others, and a continuing involvement with new writing in many
of the UK’s leading theatres.
John is married to the ‘cellist Andrea
Hess and they live in London.
Sincere
gratitude goes to Davin Huston at Kirkegaard
Associates for helping to make this webinar possible.
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Whilst every care has been taken to ensure that information contained within this web site is correct, OISTAT, WSD2009, Steven Brown/Listen Hear Sound Projects or anyone else involved with the creation, or hosting. of this web site cannot be held liable for any inaccuracies, or disputes arising from the copyrighted material, contained within it. All rights reserved. No part of this web site may be reproduced, stored on a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written consent of the individual exhibitor or webmaster. All rights reserved.
April 30th 2010
