As a musical actress by myself I‘m fascinated every time I see such footage. The conductor/musical director is capable of sooo much things simultaneously! On stage you‘re not able to notice all that stuff that is going on in the orchestra pit! Great work!!!
I loved seeing how the song really comes together, and especially the bits where there’s dialogue in between the measures so seeing those little signs of when to go was so cool!! We played a medley of this in band as well (although we didn’t get to perform bc of the pandemic lol)
It’s really cool to see the interactions on a large production while in the pit. I never got a chance to do it myself but I wish I had - what an experience 🥰
That’s not how the conductor works… everyone follows the musical no matter what. Sometimes a conductor will take cues to start or de-vamp from actors cues but that’s it. Everything else is under their control except the start of the show. The Stage manager will give them a cue light for them to start. I guarantee he’s watching the people on show just to keep entertained as it looks like he’s quite into his run as conductor.
@@DavidCherrie That's how conductors in shows I've danced in worked. The tempo was set by the conductor but if we got behind a beat or two he would slow it down until we caught up, not vice versa.
@@llc9721 this doesn’t happen with professionals. Your conductor was just being nice. Dancers don’t dance like you play music. If you’re a dancer and you’re r behind, you don’t have to speed up, you just need to skip to a point you know you can hit your marks. If you’re behind as a professional dancer, you will be the only one behind and you’ll be given notes or even be taken back to rehearsals by the dance captain. And if you keep getting behind, we have a saying in live performances: if you make the same mistake twice, then you should probably think about a different career. Sometimes though singers will come in on the wrong beat which is very obvious, and only then the orchestra will kind of instantaneously somehow skip to the singer. But never for dancers.
@@DavidCherrie Yes it is true that it's up to the dancers to stay on time with the music. However even professional conductors/orchestras can get a bit excited during a show and speed up the tempo, which makes it almost impossible for the dancer to keep up depending on the choreography. Maybe it's different in musical theatre, but in the professional ballet world, our conductor will still keep an eye on the dancers because if they speed up too much it makes the dancers look bad which isn't their fault.
@@amycool14 a one off show or concert where an orchestra may not be used to playing together, it is true that they can be overzealous and conduct faster in the moment, but long running shows like musicals, this is not the case. We time each act of a show and that goes into a report which has who played who and who was the conductor. It is quite common when having a different conductor, show lengths may change by minutes but that’s all. As you notice, this show uses a metronome to assist in conducting whilst the conductor plays the keyboard and doesn’t need to conduct every beat. This ensures the timing of songs is exactly the same all the time. Shows with metronome use like this run exactly on time no matter what conductor or orchestra is playing. There is no chance for the orchestra to slow down or speed up.
This is one of the most impressive things I've ever seen. I would love to see the rest and also Rent from this POV as it's a similar set up where the conductor is also the keyboardist.
Her mike isn't relayed into this track, so all you hear is the "bleed" into the mike in the pit from the auditorium. The audience hears a much better track
That's just a metronome, (via the keyboard) isn't it? As opposed to click-track (meaning some of the orchestrations are pre-recorded that the live players play along to?) It looked like he was starting the metronome before the number and then counting off to it to keep the tempo consistent.
Click track can be used on a lot of shows also to generate what's called "Timecode" which is like a clock keeping things like lighting, video and sound cues all in sync for complex songs. So while the band is all playing live the click track makes sure they're playing the same speeds each night so things like video and lighting effects line up.
Depending on the theatre/set up? You can see the orchestra from any seat in the house. The last time u saw Wicked on tour, I could see practically the entire pit, but before that I saw Hamilton and I couldn’t see them at all. It just depends on your set and how the show is set up. I hope this helps!!
@@ehfos it’s right above his head, on the middle of the balcony rails. A lot of theaters have them (some have two, one to the right and one to the left), so the actors don’t have to look down into the pit for cues!
Does anyone know how this pit is set up in reference to the stage? is it just, like, in the middle of the stage, or did the stage get extended around the pit for more acting space? I've played in a few school/college theater pits and have never seen one like this where the actors can jump over so I'm really curious!
Usually, the stage is ontop of the pit and the orchestra members can't see what's going on on the stage. Only the conductor can see the actions on the stage some times through a mirror or he/she could be elevated enough to see the stage from the pit.
Wait is he playing the keyboard? And if so do all conductors do that cause..... when j was in pit for my high school production of putnam we had a separate pianist
@@phillgreenland2390 And often the show's budget -- I think South Pacific was the last time I saw a show where the conductor didn't also play main keyboard.
Nina Vinterová most of the shows I’ve worked on have the conductor playing keys 1, that’s why they’ve got the metronome to keep the rest of the orchestra in time while he’s playing and sometimes he’d have to use his head or hand to drop out of a vamp or start the music on a particular cue
