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An unmissable piece of theatre sound history – from four decades ago – is making a rare appearance at PLASA Show at Olympia, London (1-3 September), thanks to Autograph.
As part of the Show’s Classic Gear Live zone, the original Cadac mixing console – designed and built for the first production of Andrew Lloyd-Webber’s Starlight Express back in 1984 – will be on view.
(Then . . . The Cadac console pictured in situ at The Apollo Victoria Theatre for the original Starlight Express, in 1984.)
Opening at The Apollo Victoria Theatre and directed by Trevor Nunn, the show was a milestone in West End theatre sound production. Central to its ground-breaking sound set-up, the Cadac was specially commissioned by the show’s sound supplier Autograph, for sound designer Martin Levan. As Rob himself says, this desk “pioneered the computerised assignment of channels to VCA faders which is still used to mix every theatre show to this day”.
. . . and now . . . Rob Halliday pictured with the console in the Classic Gear Live zone at the PLASA Show.
The must-see Classic Gear Live zone, which gets its name from Rob Halliday’s brilliant regular column in Light&Sound International (LSI) magazine, sees a popular return this year, again displaying a broad range of technologies of times past. The Cadac console, marking the 40th anniversary of a seminal moment in the history of musical theatre sound, is one of the absolute highlights.
You can read more about the 1984 production of Starlight Express, and the role of Autograph’s founder Andrew Bruce, here – and look out for Rob Halliday’s forthcoming feature marking Starlight’s 40th anniversary in LSi magazine.