The Potential of Song Workshop : A Masterclass with Thomas Richards
Malcolm X Abram
On March 22-24 and March 29-31, The Center for Applied Theatre and Active Culture (CATAC) at the Balch St. Theatre in Akron will play host to “The Potential of Song,” a pair of Masterclasses for the performer led by Thomas Richards, theatre director, author and former Artistic Director of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards in Pontedera, Italy.
Richards began as the protégé and then essential collaborator of famed director and performing arts theorist Jerzy Grotowski, who pioneered and refined the concept of Art As Vehicle, which envisions art as a practical means to "work on oneself" through a specific approach to song and action. Richards has been continually developing Grotowsky's original concept for 35 years.
The two three-day work sessions are not performances but rather an exploration of "a work on songs." Participants, or doers, will engage in practical sessions using songs from the African and Afro-Caribbean traditions to explore the potential impact that certain songs of tradition's rhythmic and melodic qualities can have on the persons who sing. There are also a limited number of spaces for interested people to observe the workshops without participating.
In addition, at 8 p.m., on Thursday and Friday, March 25 and26, and 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, April 1 and 2, Richards will direct one of his workshop assistants, Hyun Ju Baek, in the play "Han!" The play features Baek handling three roles: a young Korean woman, her mother, and her grandmother as they discuss the complex and uniquely Korean concept of Han, roughly translated as a feeling of sorrow, oppression, resentment, and grief that many consider an essential element of Korean identity.
Richards was kind enough to elaborate on some of the theories and ideas behind the workshop and the play.
EQD: Why did Mr. Grotowski pick songs from the African diaspora? What is it about their construction, melodies, and rhythms that are vital to the "Art as Vehicle" process instead of songs from another culture?
Thomas Richards: First, I think it's important to say that I don't believe that any culture has a monopoly on songs of a certain quality. I think very special songs, songs that we consider to be kinds of tools, can be found in many countries around the world. So why songs from the African Diaspora? Of course, I can't answer for Grotowski what led him to that—I have my own suppositions. And my suppositions, after working as his apprentice for 13 years, lead me to relate to you something about how he viewed himself and his capacities as an artist. He was, in a very deep sense, an expert of work on the voice. This is something that is evident from his work in theatre. He had developed the work on voice throughout his life—it was a very living element of his craft. On the other hand, he was an expert, let's say, of organicity, which has to do with the flow of the body, the body's engagement in action. And also, he was an expert in action.
So when the moment in his life came to dedicate himself to what he did after his theatrical period, which was to research different traditions around the world for different approaches to the interiority of the human being, he was attracted to the African diaspora. He found in the Caribbean islands, for example, that the interiority of the human being is approached through song, through action, through organicity, through the body in a flow, rather than, as he would say, in certain other traditions, such as yoga in India, where the body is rather stabilized, and the body is not in action, and the interiority of the human being is approached through a "staticity" of the body. So I believe that this made a very natural juncture between him and the African diaspora.
I should also note that for many years he worked inside of the Vodou tradition in Haiti. He told me he worked inside that tradition principally in two places of worship, or what are called hounforts, over a seven-year period.
Are any of the songs well-known? If not, was that also a conscious choice? For example, would it be more difficult for someone to properly approach their interiority if they sang something popular, such as "The Banana Boat Song?"
Whether a song is well-known or not is not really the point in this kind of work. The point rather has to do with the melody itself – its quality and what, potentially it can serve. You bring up the question of "The Banana Boat Song," which I remember from my youth - I believe it was Harry Belafonte that I heard singing that - and I know very little about that melody, and I've not worked with it. I need to say, however, that song is vibration - it's organized sonic vibration - and there are certain songs that are created with a certain vibrational possibility. So the combination of the melodic form, how it dips and falls and rises - because basically in these traditional songs, it's a division of the octave, right? So the song is flowing from one "do" to another "do" and working inside that territory between one "do" and another "do," fundamentally speaking. So it's an organized, structured flow inside of an octave, let's say, and the way the song is sculpted potentially can have an effect on the interiority of the human being. It can have an effect on what we can call "energetic seats" or territories - let's say territories hidden inside of the human being - and it's obvious, I suppose, for everyone that a certain tool will have a certain efficacity for that kind of work and another tool maybe not.
Do these song actions help Doers become better performers? Can they also help them become better collaborative performers?
Becoming a better performer is a quite interesting and difficult task for anybody, I think, and no structure or song in and of itself is going to make anybody a better performer. I think the only thing that can help someone in that regard is practice. There's the old saying: you get into a cab in New York City, and you ask the cab driver, "How do I get to Carnegie Hall?" and the cab driver says, "Practice."
What can Observers take away from watching the doers? Do you encourage participants and observers to use these techniques at home or rehearsal?
Well, I have a hands-off attitude with regard to an audience. I mean, I think that part of the beauty of a performative experience is actually that I don't tell people what they should feel or what they should take away, but rather that they're free to take away what they can. So, far be it from me to tell someone what they can take away or can't take away. But of course, there are possibilities, as anyone knows, when you listen to music when you listen to song, there's a chance that it engages something inside of you. And this kind of process actually can be very strong. It's a possibility that the doer, the actor, the singer, what have you, is singing and a kind of energetic stream is awoken - a stream of life - and it can be so potent, so palpable, that echoes of it can even appear inside of you when you're listening or when you're seeing. And somehow, you can become in some sort of unity or in some sort of connection, some deep connection, with the artwork, or the act of art, that's in front of you.
In terms of participants who come to a workshop, that's a very interesting question because we work with people here in the United States in very short workshops, like three days, and we'll have only a few hours each day to work on songs. That is a moment to bring people close to this work that I've been inside, working on daily for the last 35 years. So it's like giving somebody a taste of something. And then everyone will have a chance also if time permits, to lead songs and learn songs and I will guide them in a kind of beginning process like what would be our first days of work - which can be very, very rich- if we were to work together. Far be it from me to tell somebody in that circumstance what they should take away from it. I mean, both in a performing sphere and in a pedagogic sphere, I think I tend not to calculate exactly what someone will or can take away.
Can these exercises bring benefits for participants beyond just becoming better performers?
Well, yes, there is something potentially that someone can come close to. This is a work that's been going on quite seriously for 35 years. It's a practice, a daily practice, and so there's a kind of momentum in this practice, and also a knowledge that's developed over the years. I think in the performing arts field, such a dedicated and concentrated research is seen rarely. It's sometimes seen in traditional performance practices around the world, in traditions that have been going on for many, many years. But what is taking place over these 35 years is a kind of a new approach, let's say. Grotowski said that the utilization of these songs is not, and has never been, an attempt to reconstruct rituals that exist in different places around the world. Rather, it is trying to find in our modern-day world - which is a multicultural world, with people working together from many different traditions and backgrounds - trying to find something that through art, and through sound, and through vibration, and through action, can somehow be multicultural. That can have an impact, an effect, a resonance that works for somebody from the United States, somebody from New York, somebody from Africa, somebody from Italy, somebody from Japan, somebody from Korea. I think coming close to that - people will take away from it what they can - but they come close to something that is a practice to which certain individuals have been dedicated for a good amount of time. And potentially, it can be a very resonant and rich experience for someone.
How do these performing structures help in the "development of the ability to repeat performing scores hundreds of times" and achieve the magic mix of precision and spontaneity?
Yes, that's the mystery of all living, creative processes, right? You're asking about how an actor or a singer arrives to repeat their score, as one needs to in theater, 1000 times, 100 times, 500 times and be alive every time, and that's the mystery of craft. Meaning there is absolutely no - and this is very important - there's no structure that can help you to be alive. It's not, "If you put your foot on point A and then put your hand on point B, then you're going to be alive." It doesn't help. It's an enormous effort, and that effort starts when you realize that you're unable to repeat an action in a living way. Then you meet your own inertia, you meet your own laziness, you meet your own lack of capacity to do, and then the work begins. That's what craft is about, and craft is something that one needs to try to conquer again and again and again.
You're directing the local performances of "HAN!" What about Hyun Ju Baek's play spoke to you as a theatre lover and director?
Well, in fact, we wrote the play together, with the creative team that worked on the piece. Meaning I was more interested in Hyun Ju as an individual. She came to work with us in several workshops, and it was clear she had extraordinary talent as an actor. She has an incredible capacity of transformation. She's like a cloud. If you look at a cloud in one moment, it's a certain form, then you look away for three seconds, and then all of a sudden, it's another form. She has this capacity of transformation that's absolutely extraordinary. So myself and my creative team were very attracted to this, but we needed to think about and find the subject that would be really pertinent for the work with her. So through years of elaboration and work, we found the theme of han, and we helped her in the writing process. We created something that was both interesting and meaningful for her and for us as well, and it has to do with this concept of han, which is a Korean concept. It's very hard to put it into words. Is it sadness? Is it suffering? Is it some sort of place in the soul? Yes, it's all those things. It's something that we accumulate in life. Is it a kind of weight? Yes, but at the same time, it's potentially a kind of lightness. I think part of the key is how one deals with the weight and the suffering that one has in one's own existence: is that something that is somehow eating you in your life, or is it something that somehow you can eat? Does it become like a fire that motivates, drives you forward, and somehow becomes a force of transformation? And that theme was, and is, very attractive for us.
What:
The Potential of Song Workshop: A Masterclass with Thomas Richards
When:
1st session (3 days): 6:30pm-9:30pm, March 22, 23, and 24
2nd session (3 days): 6:30pm-9:30pm, March 29, 30, and 31
Where:
Balch Street Theatre, 220 S. Balch St., Akron
Fee:
$250 per three-day session; $100 to observe a three-day session
*Each session is three days, sold separately - participants expected for all three days. All fees are non-refundable.
Photo by Piotr Nykowski.
Malcolm X Abram is a recovering reporter and music writer and a proud 40 year guitar noodler. He lives, works and plays in the bucolic dreamland of Akron, Ohio in an old house with two dogs who don’t really like each other and way too many spiders.
