Professor of theatre sound design receives honor

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Richard K. Thomas, composer, sound designer, author, playmaker, and Purdue Theatre professor, will receive the 2017 Distinguished Achievement Award in Sound Design and Technology from the United States Institute for Theatre Technology.

This award honors individuals “who have established a meritorious career record in a specific field of expertise in any area of design or technology in the performing arts or entertainment industry.” It is the mission of USITT to “connect performing arts design and technology communities to ensure a vibrant dialog among practitioners, educators, and students.”

Thomas is a Fellow of USITT, where he was awarded the 2008 Joel E. Rubin Founder’s Award, an elected member of the National Theatre Conference, and a certified sound designer in the United Scenic Artists Local 829. He has composed scores and designed sound for more than 100 productions all over the globe, including Hong Kong, Dublin and ESPN television, among others. Thomas has lectured extensively as well, including the Broadway Sound Master Classes, the film institute at Babelsburg, Germany, World Stage Design in Korea, the Acoustical Society of America, the Audio Engineering Society, American Theatre in Higher Education, the United States Institute for Theatre Technology and many universities in the U.S. and abroad.

He created the first known public exhibition of a theatre sound score for the 1984 USITT National Conference in Orlando. He was first to publish articles in 1987 and 1988 drawing attention to the need for copyright clearance and sound designer unions in theatre. He co-created the first Scenofest at the 2003 Prague Quadrennial, introducing sound to the legendary exhibition, and went on to co-create the inaugural World Stage Design in Toronto in 2005, in which he also curated the sound exhibition.

Thomas has been recognized at Purdue University with the Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award in Memory of Charles B. Murphy in 2007, and was featured in the Book of Great Teachers at Purdue in 2008. Thomas was Purdue’s first graduate of a Master of Fine Arts program in sound in 1980, and has since gone on to develop the MFA program to include separate tracks in sound design, audio technology and audio engineering. He has worked with the colleges of Engineering, Technology, and Liberal Arts at Purdue to develop audio-related curricula for various programs.

Among his various awards and achievements, Thomas has pushed the boundaries of the theatre with his original works: “Awakening,” “The Creature,” “ The Life of Umbrellas,” and many more. Most recently, he collaborated with Grammy Award-winning American singer and songwriter, Carrie Newcomer on “Betty’s Diner: The Musical,” which premiered at Purdue in September of 2015.

On receiving the Distinguished Achievement Award, Thomas said, “This award is particularly meaningful because it comes from my peers and colleagues in both education and the industry. You hear it said by seemingly every award recipient, but when it happens to you, you realize that it is true: it is truly humbling to realize that the people that I respect and admire the most in my field have chosen to honor me with this award.”

Thomas will be honored with the other Distinguished Achievement Award recipients at USITT’s 2017 Annual Conference and Stage Expo in St. Louis, March 8-11. 

Media contact: Howard Hewitt, hhewitt@purdue.edu