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University of Cincinnati - College Conservatory of Music
June 28 - July 2, 2009

WORKSHOPS
Viewpoints and Suzuki Training
Michael Chekhov Technique
Alba Emoting – Effector Pattern Training 

Location: Cincinnati, OH
Cost: $1,210
Housing/Meal Plan Available ($345)
Deadline to register:  May 20, 2009

Viewpoints and Suzuki Training: Physical Language for Empowering the Actor and Ensemble:  Viewpoints Training, as developed by Anne Bogart and the SITI Company, is a technique of improvisation that allows a group of actors to function together spontaneously and intuitively and to generate bold, theatrical work quickly. The training develops flexibility, articulation, and strength in movement and speaking, and makes ensemble playing a reality.

Viewpoints Training:

• is rigorous, but possible for all; actors learn to communicate through the vocabulary of expressive physical movement free from intellectual constraints of what can and cannot be done.
• is accessible; virtually anyone can learn it.
• enables creation in the moment free from personal censors and habitual blocks.
  
• teaches creation with deep ensemble connections.

Suzuki Training is a rigorous physical and vocal discipline created by the renowned Japanese theatre artist Tadashi Suzuki. Designed to regain the power and perceptive and expressive abilities of the human body, the training enables exploration of acting outside naturalistic conventions and offers a rigorous daily practice and principles. The training is demanding, precise and extremely technical, but paradoxically this allows the trainee great freedom.

Suzuki Training:

• is rigorous, but possible for all: concentration and strength of will are as important as physical commitment.
• is accessible; virtually anyone can learn it.
• enables recognition of the physical tensions that cause disconnection from a powerful center.
• allows the actor to work on him or herself rather than a character in a powerful fictional context.

Instructor:  Richard E. Hess has been chair of the CCM Drama Department at the University of Cincinnati for the past 14 years. Recent directing credits include Spring Awakening and Anon(ymous) at CCM,  Doubt and  I Am My Own Wife for The Human Race Theatre Co. in Dayton, The Kid in the Dark for the Cincinnati Fringe Festival, The Barber of Seville for Cincinnati Opera Education, Don’t Make Me Pull This Show Over: Dispatches from the Front Lines of Parenting for the Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati, and the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park production of The Catholic Girl’s Guide to Losing Your Virginity. His work has been seen from New York to Los Angeles, with a focus on the creation of original works. He began studying Viewpoints and Suzuki Training in 1997 with Anne Bogart and the SITI Co., and has been a loyal practitioner, in demand nationally as a Viewpoints and Suzuki teacher, ever since. Associate Member: Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers.

Michael Chekhov Technique:  The nephew of playwright Anton, Michael Chekhov became one of Russia’s most celebrated actors of his time, while his contribution to actor training has been of the best kept secrets of the theatrical world. A physical “outside in” approach to a richer inner life, Chekhov techniques & philosophies focus on unifying the entire actor—mind, body, voice and will.

Regarded the “Objective Method”, the Chekhov technique is an imaginative attitude to the possibilities rather than the probabilities of creative behavior and character construction. In this approach, the HOW is greater than the WHY. Rooted abstract movement, these impressive tools open actors toward Inspired Acting; a playful, creative, and powerful alternative to a complicated psycho-analytical process.

This course will introduce the use of Qualities, Atmosphere, and Psychological Gesture.

• Qualities are the How: How our character not only moves, but thinks, speaks, listens--- expresses.
• Atmospheres govern character behavior: Either the Objective or Subjective atmospheres, it is the air they inhale and exhale - feed and make strong.
• Psychological Gesture is the What: PG’s build pressure within the body that deepen the connection to our characters’ actions and feelings.

The Chekhov Technique training:

• Opens the participant to non-linear objective thinking
• Inspires actors toward artistic, creative aims
• Develops flexibility, physical articulation and strength
• Increases a physical vocabulary of Creative behavior
• Leads actors to recognize that human behavior, in and of itself, is limiting in its artistic effectiveness.
• Strengthens the idea that through Doing we gain understanding.
• Lifts actors’ choices away from their habits—both mental and physical.

Instructor:  K. Jenny Jones, Associate Professor of Drama at the University of Cincinnati, and Master Acting Teacher with a specialty in Chekhov Technique.  BA, Thomas Moore College; MFA, U. of Cincinnati. Certified fight director, Society of American Fight Directors. Certified teacher, Society of American Fight Directors (SAFD). Taught at U. of Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky U. and ThomasMoore College. Taught in nonacademic institutions including Bard Alley Studio (owner and director), Salle du Lion, Webster Movement Institute, The Lost Colony, Louisiana Tech Stage Combat Regional Workshop, Cincinnati Opera Outreach, Opera of Central Kentucky, Ensemble Theater of Cincinnati, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park Acting Academy and many others. Did fight directing and choreography for many organizations, including Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Ensemble Theater of Cincinnati, Cincinnati Opera, Cincinnati pops Orchestra, Portland Opera, Kentucky Opera and CCM’s productions of “Cyrano,” “Giulio Cesare” and “Don Giovanni.” Faculty, CCM since 1999.

Alba Emoting – Effector Pattern Training:  Alba Emoting is a non-psychoanalytic alternative to emotion memory and other psychological techniques for releasing, maintaining, and controlling emotional states on stage; the result of more than 20 years of empirical research by neuroscientist Dr. Susana Bloch with professional and student actors in Europe and South America. 

Alba Emotion identifies six “basic” emotions: anger, joy, sadness, fear, tenderness, and erotic love.  Each of the basic emotions has its own specific set of effector patterns; emotional neutrality is also precisely patterned in the body. By establishing three aspects of these patterns – breathing, facial expression, and posture – an actor can enter and leave an emotional state at will.

Effector Pattern Training:

• guides you in exactly how emotion works in and through your body.
• is accessible (virtually anyone can learn it)
• is never forced (respect for physical and emotional well-being is intrinsic to the work)
• is actor-controlled (no physical or psychological manipulation by the instructor is involved in learning the technique)
• enables you to recognize the muscle tensions of specific emotions
• ultimately frees you to create and express genuine emotion easily on command.

Instructor:  Rocco Dal Vera is a Professor at the University of Cincinnati's College-Conservatory of Music. He is one of a handful of certified teachers of the Alba Emoting technique and lectures internationally on vocal violence and the effects of emotion on the voice, most recently as the keynote speaker at RADA for a conference on the topic. His book, The Voice in Violence (ed.) is a standard text in the field. His book, Voice: Onstage and Off, co-authored with Robert Barton, is in wide use by College and University theatre programs. His newest book is Acting in Musical Theatre: A Comprehensive Course, co-authored with Joe Deer. Together they have a regular monthly article in Dramatics Magazine called "Acting in Musical Theatre." Rocco is also the founding editor of the journal Voice and Speech Review for the Voice and Speech Trainers Association, and has edited the first three books in that series: Standard Speech and other contemporary issues in professional voice and speech training and Film, Broadcast and e-Media Coaching…. For the last eleven seasons he has been the resident vocal coach and Associate Artist for the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company, and the Tony-Award winning Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park and works as a voice and speech coach at numerous theatres around the US.