A compilation of Transitions from my sound design for STOP KISS, by Dianna Son.  Produced at The Studio Theater Tierra Del Sol in 2018. 
My touchstones for this production were:
- Compliment the text with a balance of tension and sweetness
- Establish NYC as an ever-present character
-  Communicate the movement through time by using the language of fast forwarding and rewinding. 

There's an infamous recurring sound cue in the script of the upstairs neighbors doing something loud and nondescript described as "teaching horses to river dance".   My solution is a little nod to my days working with Portland Experimental Theatre Ensemble and Third Rail Repertory Theater and all the Suzuki stomping I listened to.

Voices in order of appearance:
Sara French, Damany Omar Riley, Eric Van Tassell, Roberta Emerson, Mary Ellen Moreno

Stopkiss Reel

Selection of sound design from  NEIGHBORS: A FARI TRADE AGREEMENT by Bernardo Cubria, produced at the Studio Theater Tierra Del Sol in 2019.

This is a clown show about two neighbors  across a creek from one another, who enter into a business agreement when they discover "energy" (an analog for oil) on one of their properties.  The sounds you're hearing are the sounds of the extraction machine. Since this play is based in clowning, I wanted to give the machine a cartoonish, anthropomorphized character.  The machine would burp as it pollutes the air, and throw temper tantrums when it overheats.

Neighbors Machine Noises Reel

Sound design excerpt from NO. 6, by TJ Young, produced at the Studio Theater Tierra Del Sol in 2022.
A Black family takes in a white police officer without knowing who he is during the Cincinnati Riots in 2001. 
This is an example soundscape for an outbreak of the riots outside their apartment.
The design for this production was highly immersive, and relied heavily on the sound system design to place sounds "downstairs", "just outside their door", "down the street", or "in the apartment".  some of that spacial sense and movement was lost in the transfer from to audio reel.

NO.6 Reel Riot Outside

Original music and transition selections from PIPELINE, by Dominique Morisseau, Produced at the Sharon L Morse Performing arts Center in 2021.

My touchstones for this production were:
- the setting is urban, contemporary, and occasionally dips from reality into an abyss-like liminal space to describe the mental state of the main character.
- The environments themselves are malicious, and all suggest a prison without explicitly being one.
-The music is based on lo-fi hip hop (aka the best study music ever), and is full of harsh, institutional, sounds of failure and broken infrastructure.  
- With the director's blessing I highlighted Black joy and peace wherever they they show their face.

Pipeline Reel

During lockdown The Studio Theater went virtual, producing a Zoom Play Reading a week.  

These grew from being quite minimalistic to being  not-quite fully-produced plays.   Selections from:
A Woman of No Importance : a deep cut from Oscar Wilde about a woman who tells her manipulative ex to fuck off.
Qualia: A post-apocalyptic exploration into whether AI can be human enough to fall in love.
The Squirrel Plays:  A tryptic of plays addressing a woman's right to choose, protesting BLM and police brutality...  except they'er all represented by squirrels.
Eat Your Heart Out:  A family of Sirens struggle to fit in to the mortal world.
Cosmo St. Charles Is Dead... : A suspenseful whodunit comedy, and a love letter to Clue

Virtual Play Reading Series SFX Reel

The final Project for Theatre for the Ear class at CMU Spring 2017 was for a sound designer and a writer to work together to make a radio play.  "The Gate" is a mixed-up memory play about a dispute between two neighbors who share a driveway. 
Written by Lauren Wimmer
Starring Safia Harris and Sam O'Byrne
Directed, recorded and edited by me.

The Gate

Assignment for Developing Themes and Melodies from the Composing Music for Video Games class i took in the winter of 2024.

Wizard's Tower: Dancing with Death

Track written as an exercise in writing for a soloist for the Composing Music for Video Games.  The prompt was to do something for a Jetset Radio reboot with an "updated retro" sound.  I didn't win the lottery to get a real soloist to play on my track but one day I will!  It's still one of my favorites!

Jetset: Radio Remix

The first part of the final Project for my Composing Music for Video Games class in the winter of 2024. The prompt for this project was to write an original score in your own style for Hollow Knight, Animal Crossing, or Red Dead Redemption 2. Full Rescore here: https://youtu.be/vjk8xHhNb50

Title theme for Hollow Knight

Qualia is a sci-fi thriller written by Ashleigh Ann Gardner.

Synopsis: Five years. Alex has been stuck alone in her underground lab for five years, ever since the wave of nuclear explosions destroyed the United States. She passes the time trying to build a body for Dominic, her sentient computer system and only companion. It's slow going.
Until one day, Seth locates the bunker. He's a biologist, an A.I. expert, and an old friend.
Soon, Alex must make a choice: to escape, braving the remnants of life above ground, or to stay with Dominic, facing an uncertain future.

The script has a moment that calls for a long pause where no one is onstage for at least 30 seconds. As a production team, our challenge was to communicate to the audience that the show isn't over, even though the characters are shutting down the bunker and walking away. I also wanted to communicate the how the (accelerated) passage of time and the deterioration of the bunker might be perceived by a computer in stasis.

Qualia @ Renaissance Theatre, was honored to be named one of Orlando Sentinel theater critic Matthew J. Palm 2024 top picks for best sound design.

PC Ashleigh Gardner

Qualia-Bunker Shutdown

A section of The Not 
Written and performed by Ashleigh Ann Gardner.

This recording used the sound recorded by the tape onstage in the March, 3 2023 evening performance. 

Rural Missouri, 1994. Over the past thirty years, Sasha has been stalked by an mysterious entity that changes its shape each time it is seen. Despite attempting to avoid the entity, Sasha has been unable to escape its harassment and sits at their kitchen table on a Friday night, recording their suicide note in a final effort to convince others that their experience is real. An unsettling hour and a half during which the roots and effects of trauma, abuse, neglect, and self doubt are examined through the lens of psychological and paranormal horror.

Link: https://timucua.com/event/the-not/2023-03-05/1/

The Not - Stage tape

Going Under

TImemachineproject Pinging Infintely

PC Kinetic Theatre Co.
Transition segments for COCK (THE COCKFIGHT PLAY) by Mike Bartlett
For this play about grappling with identity, I wanted to create an overwhelming crush of messages from all sides that combine to create who we are.  To do this, I sourced snippets of sound from the year the play was written, the year it was first produced, the year of our current production, callouts to every film or song referenced in the play, and things suggested by my collaborators in rehearsal and crammed them all into the medium of a channel surfing AM radio.

Cock Sound Demo

The Hound of the Baskervilles
by Steven Canny & John Nicholson for Peepolykus
adapted from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

For this comedic adaptation of Conan Doyle's classic novel, I wanted to call back to the radio dramas of the 40's with sounds from contemporary sound effect libraries in order to walk the same tightrope between thriller and comedy as the script.

Hound of the Baskervilles Sound Demo

PC Action/Adventure theatre

Mars One 
Action/Adventure theatre
Directed Nick Fenster
October-November 2014

Action/Adventure Theatre specialized in semi-improvised, serialized, sitcom theatre.  MARS ONE, was about the daily trials of a small group of ordinary people who happen to be living in the first space colony on Mars. 
This show featured a full environmental soundtrack in which every part of the space station needed to be brought to life: everything from life support, doors, leaking pipes, to their precious 3D Printer and the communication system.

MARS ONE Sound demos- Environments And Space Station Sounds

PC Action/Adventure theatre

Mars One 
Action/Adventure theatre
Directed Nick Fenster
October-November 2014

Action/Adventure Theatre specialized in semi-improvised, serialized, sitcom theatre. MARS ONE, was about the daily trials of a small group of ordinary people who happen to be living in the first space colony on Mars. 
Of course, one of the hazards of living on a planet without an atmosphere is regular meteor showers.  This is a particularly bad one that took out the station's power generator.

MARS ONE Sound Demos - Meteor Shower Takes Out Power

PC Theatre Vertigo
School for Lies
by Charles Ives
Theatre Vertigo Portland, OR
Directed by Joanne Johnson
May 2015

The Charles Ives "transladaptated" sequel to Moliere's 'The Misanthrope' drops modern slang into iambic pentameter and rhyming couplets. 

These are some 'updated classical beats' that were later deconstructed to build the underscore the play, and give character's entrances more pop and swagger.

School For Lies Classical Music Mashups

I am a sound designer and composer.  Here you'll find mostly selections from theatrical sound designs with a few collaborations, grad-school projects, and other odds and ends.

Popular tracks by nickericksound