Workshop with Jorge Parente, assisted by Zoé

Mon–Thu 18–21 April 2016, 9:00–13:00

Laboratory Theatre Space

The workshop will be conducted in French and English

Contact and application

Fee: 100 EUR

We invite participants to discover and experiment with their vocal identity through an exploration of their body and voice. The workshop is based on the physical actions developed by Zygmunt Molik (1930–2010), co-founder and actor of Jerzy Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre, where he played a crucial role in developing voice training.

In the workshop, participants will learn the essential principles of the ‘Voice and Body’ vocal training:

• opening up their voice and body through very precise physical actions called the Body Alphabet;

• personal exploration based on associations of different Body Alphabet elements, a sort of improvisation around the participant’s personal stories; what then emerges is an unexpected, unpredictable resonance, the source of bodily vibration;

• exploring and harmonising breath and movement; the spontaneity and naturalness that emerge during the work are put at the service of singing and speech; the aim is to speak as one sings and to sing as one speaks, to find unity between the depth of exploration and the lightness of execution, to combine the necessity and happiness of performing.

The workshop is open to professional actors and singers.

For four days, five hours a day, participants will explore the sung and spoken voice focusing on the links between movement, breath and voice. Each participant must learn a text and a song that he/she will explore in the workshop.

The workshop will include:

• learning and rehearsing specific physical actions of the Body Alphabet (involving the whole body and activating vocal impulses)

• individual and collective voice work

• application of the principles learned in working on a text and a song – individual work

Jorge Parente is Portuguese and has been living in Paris since 1971. He graduated in acting from L’école d’art dramatic de Daniel Postal: Le Joueur Requarde in 1989. He later trained with Jean-Paul Denizon (CITI, Peter Brook), Guy Freixe (former member of Théâtre du Soleil) and Gennadi Bogdanov (Meyerhold biomechanics), and studied with Iseult Welsch (2000–2001), master of Marie-Louise Aucher’s Psychophony.

Jorge Parente is an actor and director with more than thirty years of experience. Alongside his artistic work, he dedicated himself for nearly twenty years to voice work under the guidance of Zygmunt Molik, a leading actor at Jerzy Grotowski’s Laboratory Theatre, creator of the Voice and Body voice training. He teaches theatre through a playful and living pedagogy, stimulating various forms of expression. Jorge Parente teaches ‘Voice and Body’ workshops to theatre, music and movement professionals in Brazil, Croatia, England, France, Norway, Poland, Portugal and Thailand, and takes part in the FORCCAST project (Future Investment/National Research Agency, 2011–2019). Since 2005 he has lectured on the art of public speaking at Sciences Po in Paris. Since 1990 he has been involved in many theatre productions in France and Portugal as a teacher and director.

More information: www.jorgeparente.com

Zoé Ogeret was born in Paris. For three years she trained at L’école d’art dramatic de Daniel Postal: Le Joueur Requarde. Between 1989 and 2003, she performed in a number of theatre performances directed by Jean-Pierre Amiel, Eric Auvray, Bernard Beuvelot, Christian Fregnet, Dominique Guilhard, Aldo Magno, Gilles Misrahi, Jorge Parente, Didier Patard, Claude-Alice Peyrotte, Tiago Porteiro and Emmanuelle Weisz. All along she was training with Zygmunt Molik. She worked at the CNRS from 2004 to 2011, first as assistant to the General Secretariat of the National Committee, then as Communications Officer at the Laboratory for Psychology of Perception at Paris Descartes University in Paris. In 2012, she returned to the stage and accepted Jorge Parente’s offer to become his Voice and Body workshop assistant in France and abroad. In 2014, she was assistant director to Jorge Parente on Five Men by Daniel Keene.