A LIFE IN SOUND

Today, we welcome Thomas Guly s to the Rycote On Location series. He chats about his fascinating and exciting career in professional sound, from childhood to present day.

Thomas Guly s Production Sound Mixer

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Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where are you based, and what you do? I'm just an ordinary sound engineer: a sound guy'!

I'm based in Copenhagen. Originally, I'm from the southern part of Denmark, near Germany. I grew up there and then moved to Copenhagen in 89, and at that stage I was totally clear about what I wanted to do. I was 21 at the time, and I wanted to do sound for television.

It all started when I was 10 years old. I saw something on TV: a big, indoor concert. Everybody was there, like Bowie, Duran Duran I was sitting there watching, and I asked my mother, Who's in the tent in the middle of the stadium?'

At that young age, were there any significant factors or anything that happened when you were growing up that made you feel that way? Can you pin it down to anything? It all started when I was 10 years old. I saw something on TV: a big, indoor concert. Everybody was there, like Bowie, Duran Duran I was sitting there watching, and I asked my mother, Who's in the tent in the middle of the stadium?' She said, That's probably a sound guy,' and I said: Okay, I want to be a sound guy!'

I started building my own speakers when I was 12-13 years old, and was really interested in music and sound. My plan was to be a radio technician in a TV repair shop, and then I switched. In ninth grade, we have this week where you can visit a company. You can learn all kinds of things: what it's like to work there, the job market, and so on. I went to a musical instrument shop and they offered me an apprenticeship after school. I learnt about business and how to be a salesman for musical instruments and professional audio equipment.

When I was 19, we did some commercials. Some professional guys were there with TV broadcast equipment, and I was just like, Hey, that's exactly what I want to do.' I quit everything else at that point, and had an eye for just one thing: to be a sound engineer. So I had no job for 6 months. I think I sent about 50 letters to radio stations, TV stations, TV production companies, commercial companies. I had lots of experience with microphones, but nobody wanted me because I hadn't done any location work with boom poles and so on.

Then I was a volunteer with a company in southern Denmark, and they had some contacts with a company in Copenhagen. They hooked me up, and I phoned them all the time, because that's really what I wanted to do. They said, Okay, come over and let's have a talk.'

Shortly after, I got a job with the biggest production company in Denmark at the time, Nordisk Film. It's the world's oldest, continually producing film studio, and I started directly as a sound engineer: so it was really an opportunity for me to jump into it. You hear about people getting into the business as a production assistant, runner, gaffer, or photographer assistant, but I started as a sound guy. They just let me jump in.

We climbed in Nepal, and it was 4980 metres high. For three weeks, my Rycotes were either on a boom pole or on the end of my backpack and there were never any problems.' Thomas Guly s

I also did a programme about four girls with Down's syndrome, showing their day-to-day lives: all the really positive things as well as some of the challenges. That was very rewarding.

Are there any productions you've worked on recently? Mostly documentaries. I don't do studio work anymore.

Since I started, I think I've done about 250 documentaries. Some of them were post-production sound, but I did some light reality programmes such as Spoilt Girls, where five girls travel to Nepal and have to go through a lot of things that they wouldn't normally have to deal with in their everyday lives.

I also did a programme about four girls with Down's syndrome, showing their day-to-day lives: all the really positive things as well as some of the challenges. That was very rewarding.

Is there anything that sticks out as an accomplishment? Not necessarily the thing that was most popular or successful, but something you've worked on that you are particularly proud of? I think the programme with the girls who have Down's syndrome.

Unlike most of the projects that I've worked on, they actually wanted to ask me lots of things. It wasn't like I was hidden behind my equipment; I'm a real person when I am with them, not the sound guy'.

With my equipment, I have one thing in my mind all the time, and that's keep it simple'. I do not have time to do anything complicated, and if problems arise, I have to sort them out quickly. I need to have a setup where I can do anything within reach of my hands.

Do you have a particular approach or ethos to your work? Well, I certainly have to think on my feet. I do that a lot!

With my equipment, I have one thing in my mind all the time, and that's keep it simple'. I do not have time to do anything complicated, and if problems arise, I have to sort them out quickly. I need to have a setup where I can do anything within reach of my hands.

It has to be right and you have to be adaptable, so the purity and simplicity of things is massively important because you have to make it work quickly.

For a documentary about a famous explorer, I went with Sennheiser as part of a completely different setup with my 8060s, and two 8050s in a stereo set. And to do that detail, I needed to be able to switch from the mono to the stereo boom immediately.

I built small boxes so I could connect it all with one cable only one switch because for that job, I knew that when I&

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