Sound designer Jonathan Deans received the 2025 Tony Award for Best Sound Design in a Musical July 8 in honor of his complex, layered work on Buena Vista Social Club. In the press room for the Tony Awards, Deans explained the most difficult part of his design, and how the production is breaking new ground in the sound design field.
"What gave me the most trouble wasn't just one thing. This show is very, very tight, like dominoes, and for sound, finding a way to be able to give the cast and musicians exactly what they need to play from the heart was my number one challenge... there are 10 musicians on stage with the cast who all needed their own monitors so they could hear their own mics, and their own instruments as they played, as well as what the cast was doing. And they're moving around on stage. So, their positions are being tracked, and their own mics follow them around the stage, which is a very unique thing that I don't think has actually been done to this scale before. We have 27 speakers on the floor, following them in their personal way, so you hear the sound coming from them. If a musician moves closer to your side of the stage, you hear that reflected in the stage speakers, so the audience focuses of who's playing where. It tried the patience of everyone, but it really worked."
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Natalie Venetia Belcon, Mel Sem茅, and Wesley Wray
Isa Antonetti
Justin Cunningham, Marco Paguia, Renecito Avich, Natalie Venetia Belcon, and Rom谩n Diaz
The company of Buena Vista Social Club
The company of Buena Vista Social Club
Company of Buena Vista Social Club
