Score, rehearsal and the calling of a show

Most of the technology in this section is not on stage and is not seen by an audience. It sits on music stands, in rehearsal rooms, in headsets and in the corner where a show is called from, and it shapes the performance more directly than anything with a lens on it.

The articles here cover scores on screens, learning material and what it teaches by accident, click tracks and where they place authority over tempo, the cue lights and communications that actually run an evening, show control and when linking cues is wrong, keeping versions straight on a score that keeps changing, and generative tools in composition and staging.

The through line is authority. Every one of these tools moves a decision from one person to another, or from a person to a machine: from the conductor to a click, from the performer to a track, from the deputy stage manager to a linked sequence. None of those moves is wrong in itself. All of them should be made deliberately, by someone who noticed they were making one.

Where a question belongs to another profession, we say so. Vocal technique belongs with a singing teacher, and hearing belongs with an audiologist.