Join Meyer Sound for free half-hour seminars at our booth presented by leading audio industry professionals. Throughout the day at the Meyer booth, guest speakers from all facets of the audio industry will discuss the challenges of sound design for touring, studio, theater, and consulting applications. Hear about their current projects and the technology they’re employing to ensure their success.

About Our Guest Speakers

John Adams

John Adams is one of the best known and most often performed of America's composers. As Andrew Porter wrote in The New Yorker, Adams is the creator of a "flexible new language capable of producing large-scale works that are both attractive and strongly fashioned. His is a music whose highly polished resonant sound is wonderful." Le Monde says that his music "...gives the impression of a rediscovered liberty, of an open door which lets in the fresh air in great gusts."
His creative output spans a wide range of media: works for orchestra, opera, video, film, and dance, as well as electronic and instrumental music. Such pieces as Harmonium, Harmonielehre, Shaker Loops, and The Chairman Dances are among the best known and most frequently performed of contemporary American music.
His music has also been choreographed by numerous dance companies including Dance Theater of Harlem (Garth Fagan) and the New York City Ballet (Peter Martins). Adams's two operas, Nixon in China (1987) and The Death of Klinghoffer (1991) have been among the more controversial and widely seen stage events in recent history.


Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson is an accomplished sound system designer, and co-owner of Technical Support, a company that provides sound alignment services and instruction out of Oakland, CA. Currently he’s working for UltraSound sound company of San Rafael, CA as the SIM System Engineer on tour with the Dave Matthews Band. Jamie has extensive field experience using SIM, having been a certified engineer and SIM School instructor for the past six years. With an M.F.A. in Technical Design and Production from the Yale School of Drama, Jamie has earned a strong formal education in electrical engineering, physics and technical theater.


Brant Biles

Brant Biles is a leading sound engineer specializing in DTS 5.1 surround. His “discography” includes surround mixing and mastering works for artists including Johnny Gil, The Eagles, Boyz II Men, Marvin Gaye, and Seal. He also mixes traditional albums for clients such as Stevie Wonder and Malo, and live television productions for Time Warner and Fox TV. Based in Studio City, CA, Brant has been a guest contributor to EQ Magazine on surround technology.

Jonathan Deans
Jonathan Deans has designed over 120 productions of musicals, plays, operas, Las Vegas spectaculars. Recent credits include “Fosse,” “Parade,” “Ragtime,” Rio Hotel’s “Masquerade Parade,” “King David,” “EFX,” and Cirque du Soleil in Orlando, Las Vegas’ Bellagio Hotel and Treasure Island. Jonathan is involved with the development of Digital Sound Processing technology for mixing live (real time) performances and automation (timed) performances. He has been working with live theatre sound for more than twenty-five years.

Dave Dennison

Dave “dB Dave” Dennison is Meyer Sound’s Technical Support Consultant. As a live and studio engineer by trade, Dave has accumulated over 15 years of sound mixing experience. While working with Jerry Garcia during 1989-1995, Dave recorded the Grammy Award-winning album Garcia/Grisman with Garcia and mandolinist, David Grisman. He toured as Audio Engineer with Mickey Hart's Planet Drum Orchestra, and the Gyuto Monks Tantric Choir. Dave has over 16 albums to his credit, and is a certified SIM engineer.


George Duke

George Duke is a man of myriad talents. Over the last thirty years, he has proven an accomplished keyboardist, composer, writer, and producer. George will release his 31st solo album “After Hours.” In 1990, George was named “R&B Keyboardist of the Year” by Keyboard Magazine for the second consecutive year. He has been Grammy-nominated for productions including “We Are the World” by Children of the World: “Sweet Baby” by the Clarke/Duke Project: and “Let’s Hear It for the Boy” by Deniece Williams.


Roger Gans

For the last 20 years, Roger Gans has been the sound designer for the San Francisco Opera. Other work encompasses system design for large-scale classical music concerts around the world, including those for artists Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, Jose Carreras, and Kiri TeKanawa. In other arenas, Roger has designed touring systems for “Disney on Ice” and Ringling Bros. Circus, and permanent systems for the Concert Hall in Melbourne, Australia. Currently, Roger is working with Walt Disney Entertainment on systems for a new theme park in Tokyo, Japan.


Mark Grey

As a sound designer, engineer and electronic music technician, Mark Grey’s talents have led to work with a multitude of organizations and artists. Recently he acted as sound engineer and assistant sound designer for the opera “Ceiling/Sky,” as well as touring engineer for the Grammy-nominated Kronos Quartet. At Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd., Mark served as their only technical consultant worldwide, designing sound productions for composers such as John Adams, Steve Reich, and Jacob Druckman.

Mickey Hart
Mickey Hart is best known for his nearly three decades with The Grateful Dead. As half of the percussion tandem known as the Rhythm Devils, Hart (with Bill Kreutzmann) has transcended the conventions of rock drumming. Their extended polyrhythmic excursions have long been highlights of Grateful Dead shows, introducing the band’s audience to an ever-growing arsenal of percussion instruments from around the world. The album, Planet Drum, received the “Grammy” for Best World Music Album in 1991 (the first “Grammy” ever awarded in this category,) and was #1 on the Billboard World Music Chart for 26 weeks.
Hart has composed scores, themes, and soundtracks for movies, television, and home video including “Gang Related,” “Hearts of Darkness,” “Apocalypse Now,” and “The Twilight Zone.“ Mickey Hart’s lifelong fascination with the history and mythology of rhythm is documented in two books: Drumming at the Edge of Magic (written with Jay Stevens and Fredric Lieberman); and Planet Drum (with Fredric Lieberman and D.A. Sonneborn), both published by Harper, San Francisco.

Bob Hodas

Since entering the studio scene in 1971, Bob Hodas has made excellence in audio a primary goal - from live mixing with The Doobie Brothers to remixing “Aladdin” for Walt Disney’s “World on Ice.” For the past five years, Bob has been using SIM™ System II to analyze and correct hundreds of recording studio control rooms across the United States, including A&M Studios and Saban Entertainment in Los Angeles, and Daddy’s House and Chung King in New York City. He is also a contributing editor for Mix Magazine.

Abe Jacob
Abe Jacob pioneered and introduced the field of sound design in Broadway Theater. His original designs for musical theater include “Hair,” “Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Chicago,” “A Chorus Line,” and “Evita.” A native of Tucson, Arizona, he created concert sound for such legendary artists as Jimi Hendrix, The Mamas and the Papas, and Peter, Paul & Mary. In 1967, he designed the sound system for the historic rock celebration, The Monterey Pop Festival.

James LeBrecht

James LeBrecht is an award-winning sound designer working in film, theater and multimedia. At the Saul Zaentz Film Center in Berkeley, California, he has supervised or edited sound for projects that include “Barney’s Great Adventure,” “Twin Peaks - Fire Walk with Me,” and the yet-to-be-released “Existo.” James was the resident sound designer at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre for over ten years, and his sound designs have been heard at The American Conservatory Theatre, The Old Globe Theatre, and the NY Shakespeare Festival. He co-authored the book “Sound and Music for the Theatre: The Art and Technique of Design” with Deena Kaye.

Roger Nichols
Over the last 35 years, Roger Nichols has been an Engineer/ Producer, earning himself 3 Grammy awards and 6 Grammy nominations. He has engineered albums for artists including Steely Dan, Frank Sinatra, Motorhead, John Denver, Rosanne Cash, Exile, Lee Greenwood, Gloria Estefan, Bela Fleck, Placido Domingo, Jim Messina, The Beach Boys, and Rickie Lee Jones. For the last 15 years, Roger has toured extensively, giving seminars on digital audio and recording techniques in Hong Kong, Buenos Aires, Singapore, Sweden, and the US. He set up the recording curriculum for the Musicians Institute in Hollywood, and chaired master classes at Berklee School of Music, Musicians Institute, Recording Workshop, and University of Miami. Roger writes a regular column, and equipment reviews for EQ Magazine.

Tuck & Patti

Tuck Andress & Patti Cathcart have achieved one of those rare symbiotic relationships that send critics scrambling for a reference point. They have been compared to every legendary duo you can imagine - Fred and Ginger to Ashford and Simpson. Since their meeting 20 years ago, they have achieved a smooth, affecting blend of jazz and pop, a unique and scintillating mixture that finds Patti swooping, belting, purring, scatting and shouting in and around Tuck’s octopus guitar lines. Since releasing the Epic album “Learning How to Fly,” Tuck & Patti have returned to Windham Hill to release their seventh album under the label.


Alexander Yuill-Thornton II
For more than three decades, Alexander “Thorny” Yuill-Thornton has been practicing sound reinforcement system design, installation and optimization for medium-to large-scale concerts and presentations. His credits include Andrea Bocelli’s “Tour of the Americas,” 1998: “The Three Tenors” on tour 1997/98, at Dodger Stadium in 1994, and in Paris in 1998: and most of Luciano Pavarotti’s large venue concerts in the US, Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, South America, and Australia over the last fourteen years.