Award-winning composer, pianist, and vocalist Clarice Assad takes her workshop VOXPLORATION online for the first time, in a series of video lessons exploring the human voice as an instrument capable of reproducing a multitude of sounds, colors, rhythms, and moods. Participants use the voice and the body as an instrument in an interactive and intuitive way covering vocal techniques such as beatbox, mouth percussion, scat singing, and many other concepts, including effect-based sounds.
No music theory or notation knowledge is required, as everyone relies on their ears to incorporate the ideas into their musical vocabulary.
The class is for those interested in music in creative ways. Composers, songwriters, improvisers, arrangers, music lovers, and singers may benefit from the class's concepts. It is also useful to vocalists interested in improvisation, or for those who are open to exploring their voices' full potential by going beyond singing lyrics in a particular musical genre.
The class features several examples of how the techniques and tools explored can be useful in real-life performance and recording situations. These tools can be integrated right away into any musical productions, no matter what they may be.
This class is the first installment of a series that will later cover more complex sound productions such as overtone singing, and techniques on how to combine mouth percussion and nasal chanting to give the impression that two people are singing. Later installments will cover vocal pedals and other latest technologies for vocal production, including machines like the TC Helicon and the vocal-to-midi technology developed by the company Vochlea.
The class project involves producing an existing song or an original composition, using at least three of the vocal techniques taught in the course. It can be as simple as an a capella song or as epic as an arrangement for multiple voices. The final video includes an example where participants watch the creation of a short arrangement of a well-known tune in a multitrack recording setting from beginning to end.
For the final project, depending on the student's direction, they will need the minimum requirement of having a recording device (It could be anything, even a phone) for the a capella choice. If they decide on the multitrack option, several affordable apps are simple to use. (FourTrack, StudioMini or MultiTrack DAW, for example). There is also the option of recording on a computer (GarageBand, Logic, Pro Tools, or equivalent) that can be used with an audio interface or a USB microphone.
