Orlando, FL (March 18, 2025) — Rick Alexander’s four-decade career as a freelance production mixer began in music, working with the likes of songwriting legend Rod Temperton and Temperton’s former Heatwave partner Johnnie Walker Jr. Alexander’s sound-for-picture portfolio includes aerospace launches for NASA, SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Lockheed-Martin; auto races such as the Daytona 500 and Rolex 24; and ESPN’s docuseries The Last Dance, which chronicles Michael Jordan’s tenure in the Chicago Bulls. A Lectrosonics user since the early 1990s, he maintains a Digital Hybrid Wireless kit that’s ready for anything. It includes SMV, SMQV, and SMWB transmitters, UCR411a and SR-series receivers, and LT–LR pairs for hops and communications. In situations where RF transmission is simply impractical, a PDR timecode recorder rides with the subject.
“Chains like House of Blues and Hard Rock Café started inking exclusive deals with artists to play only their venues in any given city,” says Rick of his pivot from music to sound-for-picture. “That killed the scene for the kinds of clubs I had been working in. I didn’t want to go on tour. Television Mobile Resources was a company in Florida, and [we] did a lot of government work, including at Kennedy Space Center. We’d cover rocket launches, patch into NASA’s robotic cameras, and do internal news segments for aerospace contractors. Then I hooked up with the Golf Channel, and all their wireless was Lectrosonics. They kept renewing my contract until the economic crash of 2008, but I came back some years later. I also had my own kit, finally — eight channels of Lectrosonics, [including] SRa and SRb receivers.”
Rick is no stranger to hurricanes ravaging Florida, and neither is his Lectrosonics wireless. “I was with [reporter] Matt Gutman from ABC covering hurricane Irma,” he recalls. “I had him on a lavalier mic under his raincoat, but the network wanted viewers to see the ABC mic flag on the handheld, so we used a plug-on HM transmitter. We’re talking about over 100-mile-per-hour winds and rain going sideways, so some water got in there and it shut off, presumably to protect itself. A couple of days later, I had put it in a bag of rice, but now I took it out, opened the battery door, and put it on the car dashboard to bake in the sun. It dried out completely and just fired up and worked. That’s been typical of Lectro transmitters on the rare occasion they’ve taken on water. I’ve never had to send anything in for replacement.”
When Rick is not documenting natural disasters, other gigs have put Lectrosonics’ long-range performance to the test. “I did a [racing] documentary at the Daytona International Speedway,” he explains, “and production wanted in-car audio for a vehicle that had a bunch of GoPro cameras on it. When the car is on the far side of the track, it’s almost a mile away, and there’s a building in between where they have the media center. I affixed an SMQV transmitter where the A-pillar of the car meets the dashboard and pumped it up to 250 milliwatts [output power]. Even when the car was at its farthest point away, and even when it was blocked by the building, I had clean audio that didn’t degrade even when the RF meter dropped to one bar.”
The SMQV similarly saved the day on a production involving a glider plane. “They wanted conversation inside the aircraft and asked me to put a Zoom recorder in there,” says Rick. “I told them, ‘No way. You’re going to hear nothing but noise.’ Instead, I miked the pilot and passenger with DPA 4071s, which have excellent background rejection, and once again used SMQVs at 250 milliwatts. My receivers were UCR411a. With the glider about 2,000 feet up, we got crystal-clear audio. I played it back for the talent when they got back on the ground, and they were blown away. They could hear each other on the playback better than when they were originally talking!”
Ultimately, Rick is a Lectro loyalist because of the brand’s durability and consistency. “You can throw these things against a wall, and they’ll still work,” he observes. “When I need everyone on the same page in a high-stakes production, I’d never use anything else.”
About Lectrosonics
Well-respected within the film, broadcast, and theatre technical communities since 1971, Lectrosonics wireless microphone systems and audio processing products are used daily in mission-critical applications by audio engineers familiar with the company’s dedication to quality, customer service, and innovation. Lectrosonics received an Academy Scientific and Technical Award for its Digital Hybrid Wireless® technology and is a US manufacturer based in Rio Rancho, New Mexico. Visit the company online at www.lectrosonics.com.
