Flowers

Lipsyncer: Sarah Hanses

Song: Flowers / HaBanot Nechama

Supporters: Amina Avdić, Ģirts Dubults, Hannah Johnson, Lana Hosni, Lena Kunz, Omer Keinan

Videographer: Saga Ivéus Wenglert

Proposition: Support my fantasy of being together in a bubble bath with this song.

Lipsync Party / Ģirts Dubults

Warm-Up

Ģirts proposed a preparation to get us moving, voicing, and emoting. Standing in a circle, we activated two ‘classic’ theatre warm-up exercises:

Zip Zap Zop. A group game in which players pass a ‘ball of energy’ by making a gesture+sound to one another.

At base, the players sequentially voice “Zip” and gesture sending-the-ball to their right – the energy travels counter-clockwise. “Zap” is then added, allowing a player to reverse the flow clockwise, sending-the-ball to their left – the energy is passed around the circle, shifting between counter/clockwise. Then we get a bit more advanced: “Zop” allows a player to send the ball across the circle to any other person; that person can then choose a new counter/clockwise direction (with Zip or Zap, respectively), or exclaim “Boing!”, bouncing the energy back to the Zopper, who then chooses a new direction.

[In some versions, if, as the game accelerates, a player confuses the gesture+sound combination – saying “Zap” while gesturing to their right, for example – they are ‘out’ of the circle; we decided to keep it friendly and to gloss over such ‘mistakes’.]

Emotional Gesture. Working similarly, passing a gesture+sound around the circle, we shift to the idea of an ‘emotional gesture’ [which I am familiar with from Michael Chekhov Technique].

One practitioner proposes an emotional-gesture towards the practitioner to their right/left: a gesture+sound that expresses a certain physical-relational charge. For example, raising your arms while growling, on swaying while humming. The practitioner receiving this emotional-gesture attempts to replicate it, repeat it as closely as possible, and sends it along the circle. As the initial emotional-gesture is iterated, it morphs and transforms, often in surprising and whimsical, even grotesque, ways.

After one such emotional-gesture ‘runs it course’, the process is reset and another practitioner initiates a new round.

Lipsync Party!

Playlist. We begin with each practitioner choosing a song they want to lipsync to, to become with, today. We then create a playlist [on Spotify] of these songs. [For practicality’s sake, each song was around 3-minutes.]

Stations. We prepare several stations, each allowing a different way to interact with the lipsync, to support the lipsyncer in their moment with compassion:

·       Stage. A mic-stand with a (not connected) microphone, where each lipsyncer, when their song plays, performs.

·       Dancers. Other practitioners can join the stage as backup dancers.

·       Audience. Practitioners can support the lipsync/er by becoming audience, witnessing and even cheering them on.

·       Camera. One practitioner is the camera-person, filming the lipsync.

·       Drawing. Papers, pens, and markers. A practitioner can trace the lipsync through drawing.

·       Poetry. A soundboard, a speaker, a microphone, and a poetry book. A practitioner can speak alongside the lipsync, freestyle or by reading from the poetry book.

·       Letters. Papers and pens. A practitioner can write letters to the lipsync and/or the lipsyncer, which they receive after the party.

·       Lights. Various light-fixtures which can be played with. [This station wasn’t included in this session due to a lack of equipment.]

Party! We activate the playlist and so the lipsync party begins. The practitioner whose song is playing becomes the lipsyncer, while the others are free to shift between the stations and/to support the lipsync.

The party unfolds as lively and convivial. Generally, the Stage-Dancers-Audience becomes a source of intensity and centrality with the other stations serving as satellites, allowing for a feeling of both collective chaos and personal contemplation.

Unfolding

After speaking through the structure of Lipsync Party, we float possible ways to alter it. Some of the alterations are driven by ambivalence – a relatively technical experimentation with variability – while others are driven by desire – repurposing the shared form following a practitioner’s wants. Some possible alterations were:

·       Random song selection

·       Multiple lipsyncers / everyone lipsyncs together

·       Lipsync battle

·       Placing the stations closer together

· Shifting the ‘protagonist’ / focus of the lipsync to the supporting stations

·       Removing the possibility to witness (Audience station)

· Clarifying the witnessing, so the lipsync has clear frontality – perhaps also placing all supporting stations at a clear front

· Playing with ‘filters’ for how the lipsync is performed (ex. volumes of expression)

·       Working together to compose the lipsync

We then formulate two experiments:

1. Compassion

Compassion: the lipsyncer is (more) actively directing their collaborators so to fulfill the lipsyncer’s fantasy. Likewise, the collaborators are more active in supporting – responding to and being stewards of – that fantasy.

Bringing all stations closer together; maintaining the roles, albeit more softly.

[See videos: Flowers, All By Myself]

2. DJ Random

A DJ [new role] changes songs based on a simple score: they feed words / phrases into Spotify, and choose a song that comes up; these words can be ‘random’ or emerge in response to the party. Everyone else lipsyncs together, supporting the song itself.

Open composition (secret score: lipsync battle)

[See video: DJ Saga]