- The Other Palace, London (studio space)
Year
2019
Roles
- Sound Designer
The brief for this show was to “bring musical theatre to a wider, pop audience”. An immersive, unusual workshop in an intimate space, this piece of theatre fused more traditional orchestrations (albeit quirky ones, with sampled noises of breakfast cereals) with contemporary East London popular music – loud, drum ‘n bass, dance-heavy, surround-heavy music.
To achieve the headroom and contemporary sound desired, we augmented industry-standard DPA4066 headsets with Sennheiser 2000-series microphones and e965 capsules for the louder, poppier numbers. The whole show was mixed on a DiGiCo SD9, leaning on MIDI automation through Figure53 QLab, and using d&b PA, fills, and surround speakers. The band was all silent – electric drums, guitar, bass, and keys were all run through software synthesisers and IEMs, which allowed for some unconventional creative moments; e.g. an underscore being played live but made to sound as if it was very quiet, tinny background music from a portable radio!
The show did five workshop performances in 2019 with hopes of a larger-scale production in 2020.
About the show
Based on the childhood fantasies of two young brothers, an extraordinary café is opening on the vibrant streets of East London. But its presence will result in unimaginable consequences. In a threatened neighbourhood, fighting to survive gentrification and rising property prices, something so simple as cereal will divide the community.
Encroaching re-development is threatening residents in one of London’s poorest and most culturally diverse neighbourhoods. But when two young brothers arrive from Northern Ireland with an idea for a cafe that stimulates childhood nostalgia, members of the community are brought together to fight against the loss of all that they hold dear. While many turn to the new cafe for comfort, its arrival is feared by some in the community. Tensions build and feelings boil over. This fictional story, inspired by a café which became the focal point of the Shoreditch anti-gentrification riots of 2015, explores how people with conflicting views can come together in very unlikely places during the most challenging of times.