Voice Box
An academic opera role-play about voices in boxes and outside of them
Composer Miika Hyytiäinen_ Concept, Composition, Libretto
Singer Mia Heikkinen_ Voice analysis on the video/”Prof. M.H.”
Flutist/Soprano/Circus Artist Jacintha Darmström_ Laboratory assistant
Pianist Maija Parko_ Keyboards
Voice Box: “Larynx” [ˈlaːrʏŋks] – “Der Kehlkopf” – “kurkunpää”
If there is one thing that does not fit in any boxes, it’s human voice.
And yet we do try! Professional/unprofessional voice, female/male voice, Fachsystem and the registers: endless lists of exotic and contradicting names!
Voice Box opens these boxes, analyses them and makes brutal fun of silliness of all this. The final box explodes like piñata and the coloratura soprano becomes an actual human being: “I’m not my Fach, I’m me!”
Not only the human voice crows outside the boxes: In Voice Box also the roles are in continuous flow. At least we know this: The composer Miika Hyytiäinen is writing his artistic PhD and makes a computer-based analysis of the vocal possibilities of the voice of the coloratura soprano Mia Heikkinen. This is the starting point of the whole vocal massacre.
There the poor singer is on stage, trapped in a glass box, as a video. The most dominant voice belongs to Professor M.H., a nosy besserwisser with the voice and body of the trapped soprano Mia Heikkinen, but the gestures and words of the composer Miika Hyytiäinen. Everything is accompanied by videos and a sleepy laboratory assistant, who seems to fall in the most uncomfortable sleeping positions even while she is accompanying the crazy professor with flute and voice.
Performances:
Helsingin oopperakesä/ Helsinki Contemporary Opera Festival
Premier
Musiikkitalo Helsinki, 18/5/2017 / 19:00
Duration_ 60 minutes
Further performances_ to be announced
Special thanks for the logo to Ulla Sainio / gentil.fi
PRESS:
Auli Särkiö-Pitkänen, Rondo:
Se on älyllisesti stimuloivaa ja usein kutkuttavan humoristista uuden ajan esittävää taidetta, joka kytkeytyy saumattomasti ympäristömme ilmiöihin, kuten sosiaaliseen mediaan. Voice Box oli piripintojaan myöten täynnä kieli poskella komiikkaa: se irvaili akateemisuudelle, sivalsi siekailematta oopperamaailman jäykkiä rakenteita ja revitteli sisäpiirivitseillä, kuten oopperaaiheisilla nettimeemeillä ja ääniteoreetikoilla. Tämä kaikki oli tehty tavalla, joka otti yleisön mukaan, ei sulkenut sitä ulos.
“Intellectually stimulating and teasingly funny art of our time.”
“Voice Box was full of tongue on cheek […] that allowed the audience to fully join in.”
Voice Box in Rondo and HBL
Trailer of Voice Box
Other projects:
Degrees of Freedom
a sound and video installation for four coloratura sopranos about voices and identities
Ensin
A song cycle for vocal students in early stages of their studies
Voice is Voices
a sound and video installation for four coloratura sopranos about voices and identities