The Awakened Voice: Vocal Empowerment through Song
An Introductory Workshop

Instructor: Zhenya Lavy, Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director of Akropolis Performance Lab, with support from other APL Artists
Date: November 22, 2015, 6:00 – 9:00 PM
Location: Akron OH Address Forthcoming
Enrollment: 4 min, 12 max
Tuition: $50

Akropolis Performance Lab (Seattle, WA) partners with Wandering Aesthetics’ Open Door series to offer “The Awakened Voice: Vocal Empowerment through Song,” an exciting workshop to introduce Northeast Ohio performers to the vocal practices developed and practiced by Artistic Director Zhenya Lavy through 25 years of in-depth investigation of voice work. Together we will work to expand your essential instrument and amplify your trust of the body and its responses. With an emphasis on process over prescription. APL’s methodologies open up a means for tapping into artistic potentiality and move the participant toward a single fundamental objective:

Living Impulses shaped by Deliberate Form piloted by an Engaged Mind

Drawing on APL’s laboratory practice, as well as the individual practices and the Central & Eastern European artistic heritage of APL’s directors, participants can expect to work primarily with traditional song to awaken their voices and empower their capacity to listen, respond, and connect with others by means of the voice. Searching for the point where the performer transcends technique and experiences song as a simultaneously living and historied force, participants will be introduced to

• exercises in partner and group relation to develop physical sensitivity, communication, and dialogues (rhythm, resonance, sound, impulse, space)
• principles of vocal pre-expressivity, especially the organization of vocal behavior through resonance, sound association, articulation, pitch and modulation, consonance and dissonance, mood, vibratory quality, and voice-movement-space relationships
• techniques for engaging the vocal imagination through sound-making as a physical process
• daily practice strategies for the mental and physical tuning of the body/mind through precision, focus, and discipline

The singing will be a cappella and will incorporate both monophonic and polyphonic work. The songs, which originate from a variety of cultures and are sung in a variety of languages, will be taught by ear.

Preparation: Participants should bring 1-2 traditional folk songs they know by heart in any language they choose. Come prepared to sweat and to sing durationally, with few pauses. Dress comfortably for movement and bring water. We work in bare feet and stand while working. Some physical activity accompanies the vocal work.

Previous vocal training is not required. However, if you are not accustomed to physical, expansive, durational vocal work, we recommend that you spend 1-3 hours humming lightly each day during the week leading up to the workshop.

“The Awakened Voice: Vocal Empowerment through Song” is open to performers of all experience levels who are interested in exploring the essential elements of vocal craft in a dynamic, creative, and supportive environment. We look forward to working with you!

Representative responses to APL’s vocal work

“The Music was to die for!”
~ Marie Bonfils, Drama in the Hood | Uncle Vanya

“Musical interludes devised by [Zhenya] Lavy are admirable. […] The crunched harmonies and the singers’ vocal assurance are amazing.”
~ Joe Adcock, Seattle P-I | Dream of a Ridiculous Man

“Interspersed are marvelous songs. . . sung without accompaniment. The four-part harmonies are uniquely unsettling and thrilling, saturated with devotion and longing. . . . music director [Zhenya] Lavy achieves a kind of perfection.”
~ Joe Adcock, Seattle P-I | Song of Songs

Zhenya Lavy was one of three greater-Seattle artists to receive a 2014 Gypsy Rose Lee Award nomination from Seattle Theatre Writers in the category of Music Composition for Theatre.

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