Sound design

Sound Design is a technical/creative field. Theoretically, it covers all no-compostional elements of a film, a play or any other multimedia project.

Theatre

Sound design is a the youngest field in technical theatre. The idea of sound design has been around since theatre started; however, the first person called sound designer was probably Dan Dugan in the late 60's. The first sound designer credit was given to Abe Jacob in 1971 for his work on Jesus Christ Superstar. Since then the field has been growing rapidly.

Although sound design in sometimes done by the composer there is not tie per se to the composition itself. In theatre the sound designer's has two fields of responsabilities: technical and creative. Technically, she has to ensure maximun quality of the sound system (for example deciding what speakers and microphones should be use). Creatively a sound designer decides with the theatre director and sometimes the artistic director what sound effects will be use, what songs, etc.

It's known that in India and China around 3000 BC there were theatre productions accompained of music and sound. The Commedia Dell'arte also used both music and sound effects.

The first production that used recorded sound, as cited by Bertolt Bercht, was Resputin (1927 ) a play by Piscator that included recording of Lenin's voice. It would not be however until the 1950's, when Hollywood directors started directing Broadway productions, that sound design will start growing. Still, there was no sound designer in those plays; it was the stage manager duty to found the sound effects and an electrician played the recordings during performances.

The MIDI and digital technology helped the field to move fast during the 90's. Still, in 2004 sound design is still struggeling to obtain acceptance as there is no Tony award yet for sound design.

Film

Sound design