Come From Away - Matthew Lovelace

Matthew Lovelace's setup for Come From Away at the Blue Mountains Theatre in Springwood, New South Wales, Australia.

Write-up and gear list below photos.

Matthew:

"Being amongst the first crop of community groups to do this show in Australia, I really wanted to do everything as closely as possible to what the score calls for. That meant no instrument substitutions, no 'I can't be bothered setting that up for two bars' situations (ahem, snare cajon) and definitely no electronic instruments. I did have to purchase a few small pieces to achieve my goal, I'm embarrassed to admit I'd never seen broom brushes before!

For this production, and I assume many others, the band was on stage, scattered throughout the set. Except for me, up in a remote room at the opposite end of the theatre. It was great to have plenty of room to play with. In this venue, the band/orchestra is often in a remote space away from the stage, but this was the first time the drums alone were separated from the rest.

The drum book calls for a fairly standard five piece drum kit setup, with a few auxiliary items: djembe, snare cajon, triangle, high and low finger cymbals, and shaker.

For this show, I used my trusty Pearl Session kit. I've had this kit for about 20 years, and I just recently had the rack toms cut down from their 'power tom' depths to more reasonable ones. They really sing now in a way that almost feels like I have a new kit. I also have installed legs on the floor toms instead of the suspended mounts they used to have (why were suspended floor toms ever a thing?) This kit also has a 16"x16" floor tom, which I did not use for this show. I used Evans Coated G2 Heads on the toms for a warmer sound. I tuned the toms pretty low, and wide open except for the floor tom which I muffled with a ring to reduce the sustain a bit as there are sections where you ride the floor tom and you can lose your definition if there's too much sustain. I had a medium amount of muffling in the kick, and two dots on the snare.

I chose a mix of cymbals which I felt blended nicely with each other, but wouldn't overpower the vocals. I put a couple of smaller/brighter crashes on the left, and the larger and/or darker sounds to the right for rolls and swells. Every cymbal hit or roll in the entire show was carefully considered to match the mood and volume of the moment. So I gave myself lots of colour options to choose from. I set them up in a wide spread so I had easy access to any cymbal at any time. I had plenty of room to play with, so why not!

There is quite a bit of rod work in the book, so I chose two different pairs. One lighter pair, for a brighter sound in the more cymbal focused passages, and a heavier pair for a more solid drum sound in sections that needed that. There are lots of quick changes, so stick/mallet choreography is an important consideration, and was almost the biggest challenge for me. If you are going to play the show, I highly recommend going through the book and marking where and when to prep your next change, e.g. sticks to the right, or rods to the left. At one point I was delicately placing brushes on the edge of my snare with one hand while playing a groove with the other. I then had two beats at about 140bpm to drop my sticks and pick up the brushes. Not atypical for music theatre, I suppose!

Come From Away is a book that you want to play the ink for, at least 95% of the time. There are a few moments here and there where you can add your own bit of flair, but for the most part, the book is written very thoughtfully and sympathetically. Your standard pop grooves do not apply here. One of the biggest challenges is really nailing the dynamic changes. A huge portion of the playing is underscoring dialogue, and I had to be careful not to overpower the vocal performances. Aside from that, it is a very dynamic book with lots of unexpected markings. You'll often find yourself crescendoing through a Forte fill, then hitting the next downbeat at Piano.

I've been working with this group for 25 years now, and Come From Away was my 46th production with them. We have been very lucky that they have never asked the musicians to compromise the music for practical or financial reasons. We've never had to reduce orchestrations or cut books, I've never been asked to play electronics to reduce volume etc, which seems to be a rarity for a lot of community groups these days, and it's something I definitely don't take for granted."

Drums: Pearl Session Series

• 10"x7" Rack Tom
• 12"x8" Rack Tom
• 14"x14" Floor Tom
• 22"x14" Kick

Snare

• 14"x5.5" Pearl Sensitone Steel Snare

Cymbals

• Zildjian 22" K Constantinople Renaissance Ride
• Sabian 20" Artisan Crash
• Zildjian 19" K Constantinople Crash Ride
• Sabian 18" HHX Complex Thin Crash
• Paiste 18" Giant Beat
• Zildjian 18" K EFX
• Zildjian 17" A Custom Crash
• Zildjian 14" K Custom Dark HiHats
• Ufip 10" Classic Series Splash

Percussion

• Okecajon Square Table Cajon
• Cruiser 13" Djembe from Guinea
  
• Miller Machine with Grover 4" Bronze Piccolo Triangle
• Zildjian Thin Finger Cymbals
• Zildjian Thick Finger Cymbals
• LP Twist Shaker Medium
• Meinl Percussion Table
• Hercules Mallet Table

Snacks

• Chocolate Coated Almonds
• Allen's Strawberries & Cream

Hardware

• Sonor Jojo Mayer Perfect Balance Kick Pedal
• DW 5000 HiHat Stand
• Ahead Spinal Glide Throne
• Various DW, Gibraltar and Pearl Straight/Boom Cymbal Stands

Electronics

• Pacific Ears Custom In-Ear Monitors
• Apple iPad with Piascore, facial gestures (winking) to turn pages

Sticks/Mallets

• Vic Firth MJC4 Sticks
• Headhunters Soft Corn Brooms
• Vic Firth Jazz Brushes
• Innovative Percussion John "JR" Robinson Brushes/Mallets
• Rohema Swizzles
• Home-Made Rods I found on eBay many years ago (two sizes)
• Zildjian Vibraphone Mallets Medium
• Grover Pro Triangle Beaters (two sizes)

Come From Away - International - Matthew Lovelace
May 24, 2025, thru June 8, 2025