The International Student Blog

If you are an international student who has ever wondered what you can do with a show production degree, ask yourself these questions: how many pounds can the pipe above hold? How high can something be hung from the ceiling? How will the stage look if it’s doused in red light versus blue? How loud do the microphones need to be for the person in the last row to hear everything that is happening on stage? These are just a few questions that a production staff at a concert hall must consider when planning an event.

When you attend a show you buy your ticket, show up a few minutes early, purchase the appropriate refreshments from a vendor and sit back to enjoy the spectacle that is about to take place before your eyes. If it is a good performance, you will probably be impressed with how smoothly everything seems to go. If it is a great performance, you will probably be too focused on the act at hand. Individuals on the show production team have to balance a thousand tasks at once to make sure that the audience perceives smooth excellence. When you come to the US as an international student who wants to know what show production is, you will have ample chances to witness this in person.

At Washington DC’s Constitution Hall for example, production teams work on sound, lighting, audio/video coordination, telecommunications, piano tuning, catering, transportation, decoration, and more to make sure that a concert goes off without a hitch. With over 3,000 seats, this is no easy task. Staff members at this venue work on an array of events from concerts and plays to graduation ceremonies, dinners, and press conferences. The teams must be able to readily adapt to the needs of the customer.

A show production degree can help you prepare for working in this type of environment. As an international student, you can seek out concert halls in whichever US city you are studying and work on a contract or short-term event basis. What is show production? It is more than shining a spotlight; it is the combination of thousands of details coming together to achieve a desired outcome. What is show production? Go to a concert hall and check it out to get first hand knowledge.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 19th, 2016 at 9:15 am and is filed under International Student, International Student Study Section, Study in the USA. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Written by Bryanna Davis

Bryanna joined EIC in 2011 after returning to the United States from teaching English in China. Her interest in international education, sparked initially by her own study abroad experience in Wales, led her to the company. Bryanna is originally from Missouri and is a graduate from the University of Central Missouri.

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