Broadway producer Michael J. Moritz shares audio secrets: "I'm a total tech nerd!"

In Michael J. Moritz Jr.’s time as a producer in Broadway and musical theatre, he has won several awards, including a Tony and an Emmy, and has worked with many renowned theatre personalities like Lin-Manuel Miranda and Bernadette Peters. Here, he shares how his passion for music technology and using Lectrosonics’ M2 Duet kit for various purposes – including in-ear monitoring, IFB, comms, and talent cueing – has been a huge asset for his career.

“I’m usually the showrunner or producer or wearing the musical director hat — or all of them,” Moritz said. But where production personnel that far ‘“above the line’” are usually passive customers of the sound department, Moritz is entirely hands-on. “I’m a total tech nerd, and that’s what sparked my interest in Lectrosonics.”

Moritz appreciates that the M2 Duet components can interface seamlessly with the Dante audio-over-Ethernet protocol, particularly useful in live-switched TV broadcasts. He also appreciates the system's physical density, which allows for two stereo channels in a half-rack space. RF integrity is crucial for Moritz, and he reports he has used the system in challenging environments like Times Square without facing any issues.

“I work on many live-switched TV broadcasts,” he said. “Where [the M2 Duet system] has recently found a home in my production work is, because it has Dante, it can interface directly to anyone’s intercom frames. I patch the M2T units right into Dante, which can then bridge out to Telex or ClearCom or any other type of intercom. And it just works. I also love the density, physically speaking. The fact that you can fit two stereo channels in a half-rack space is amazing.”

“There’s this two-hour live broadcast from Times Square called Curtain Up,” he said. “Multiple Broadway casts perform numbers from their shows. It’s a free event open to the plaza, and thousands of people show up. Amber Ruffin and Jesse Tyler Ferguson were the hosts in 2022, and I gave an M2R pack to each of them. Times Square may be the noisiest RF environment on the planet, and Lectro was not the only brand of RF equipment onsite. But we had no problems with our end — no range issues, crosstalk, dropouts, or anything like that. We just dumped a trailer into the middle of Times Square, and set up the audio on a folding table about 100 feet from the stage. No issues.”

As a musician, Moritz understands the importance of audio quality, which is why he appreciates the quality of Lectrosonics.

“What initially kept me away from digital in general was, everything else I had tried as a piano player and singer, I would hear the comb filtering as a result of latency. I grew up in the studio and my ears are very fussy. The quality of Lectrosonics is fantastic; it’s the first digital wireless I find to be truly usable in musical applications. It sounds like an analogue system, in the best way. I don’t hear compression artefacts and that’s a first.”

Moritz believes that Lectrosonics will continue to make inroads into the musical side of the creative world due to its time-tested and trusted technology. He considers Lectrosonics an aspirational brand for most and thinks that its audio quality is beyond good enough to be used in musical theatretheater, rock concerts, and recording studio applications.