Lighting is all about mood and emotion. ... It's like painting in light in some ways. And you add further dimensions with contrasting colors, and intensity, and shadows.
- Name
- Heather Michaelson
- Title
- Tech coordinator, Shriver Hall
- Divisions
For every performance that graces the stage of Shriver Hall, you can typically find Heather Michaelson up at the top of the balcony, at work in her control booth. As tech coordinator of the 1,100-seat Homewood campus venue, she's in charge of making sure everything you see and hear when you're in the audience is on point.
"Anything and everything for lights, sound, and AV falls under me," says Michaelson, who started the job in early 2019.
It's a new position at Johns Hopkins, created to coincide with the recent $14 million renovation of the historic campus performance space. Michaelson comes to this job with a varied background that includes theaters, classrooms, cruise ships, and, most recently, a stint at Baltimore's Live! Casino & Hotel. In Shriver Hall, she's overseen dance shows, student-run speaker series, The Nutcracker, and comedy.
"There's really no such thing as a typical event," Michaelson says. "For any performance or speaking event that happens here—whether they need full lighting programmed or they just need a microphone—I'm taking care of that. My big thing is making sure everything is prepped beforehand, so I coordinate with event organizers."
