Why musicians are being replaced by KeyComp technology as production costs rise
Australian orchestra musicians dropped from Disney’s highest-grossing musical The Lion KingAs theater productions across the country buckled under the pressure of rising costs, they gave way to technology.
Music productions are rapidly turning to cost-cutting technologies like KeyComp to replace live musicians. Eddie Perfect’s national tour suddenly canceled Beetlejuice the Musical It’s just the latest example of how cost-of-living pressures are affecting the industry.
violinist James Steendam, federal chairman of the musicians’ branch of the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance The Lion King Since the show’s last tour in 2013, that is, there were 17 musicians, had six musicians not been pulled from the pit.
Four of those cut were string players and two were trombonists. These sounds are now produced by KeyComp, a technology used mostly in musical theater that requires a single keyboard player to replicate the size and dynamics of a full live orchestra using pre-recorded sounds.
“It’s definitely conceivable… I would be working on that musical,” Steendam said.
“[Instead] In Germany, our jobs are being replaced by musicians… The irony is that where it was recorded in Hamburg, Germany, they are not allowed to use this technology in their local stages.” Its use is also Banned from Broadway.
Jeremy RoseSession musicians, who often play on stage or act as commercial composers, are the first victims of companies implementing new technologies, said a music industry lecturer at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.
“This has been very frustrating for musicians who have been displaced by certain technologies,” Rose said.
While the music industry is used to technological disruption, particularly due to the rise of streaming, Rose said unions have been successful in maintaining the size of orchestra pits on Broadway in the US, in London’s West End and in Germany.
A number of musicals came to Australia with less orchestration compared to their Broadway counterparts. Lion King, It has 12 fewer musicians than the Broadway staging, which is now playing in its third Australian run at Sydney’s Capitol Theatre, and has been replaced by KeyComp technology. Back to the Future And Beauty and the Beast There are eight fewer musicians here than on Broadway.
The Phantom of the Opera, Hamilton, Rent And Book of Mormon it retained the same number of musicians as the original Broadway versions.
Steedham said it was difficult for him to accept these tickets. The Lion King While the band was 35 percent smaller, it was about 35 percent higher than in 2013.
Trombonist Ben Gurton, who recently played in his comeback season Book of MormonHe said the “erosion” of musicians in the pits due to technologies like KeyComp has been happening for almost a decade.
says it was given The Lion King Disney, which receives financial support from Destination NSW, should offer audiences discounted tickets to the orchestra pit, which has sold out significantly.
“Local jobs being lost to technology has a pretty big flow-on effect in the music industry,” Gurton said.
Steendam agrees: “Ticket prices are still going up and up… [Disney] “Destination receives funding from NSW, so we believe they have an obligation to protect local jobs, not just send that money overseas.”
A spokesman for Destination NSW said it was not responsible for the production of major events in which it invests. Disney has been contacted for comment.
Rose said that audiences should be informed about the cuts made to musicians in order to put pressure on the market.
“[Audiences] They need to know that taxpayer dollars are going to these productions, but they are still cutting costs by reducing the size of their ensembles,” Rose said.
“If we continue to systematically fund the professional part of the music industry, we will diminish human musical development, and over the last 10 years extraordinary musicians are now being trained and they need a suitable ecosystem to thrive.”
This is a lived reality for musicians like Steendam, who has been playing his instruments since the age of eight. The musician, now 34, says it took him years as a child to perfect the movement required to play vibrato, a vibrating note that brings emotional textures such as love, intimacy and tension to productions.
“When I do a handful of shows Beauty and the Beast A play a few years ago using KeyComp… it’s often out of tune,” said Steendam. “It’s hard to play. “It’s like I have to change my tuning to be wrong to match what I’m hearing.”
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Kayla Olaya is a culture reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email.
