VOXPLORATION
YOUR VOICE IS AN INSTRUMENT
Developed in 2015, VOXploration is Clarice Assad’s award-winning class on spontaneous music creation, theater, and improvisation. It’s open to musicians, actors, dancers, and non-musicians alike with all levels of experience. Participants use their voice and their body as an instrument. They also explore the integration between various forms of art, including theater, dance, music, and visual arts, all while composing scenes and musical numbers in a highly interactive, powerful, and intuitive way.
An acclaimed music educator, Clarice teaches vocal techniques—beatbox, overtone singing, and other effect-based sounds—as well as body percussion, employing rhythmic notation that is accessible to anyone, even with no music theory training. Watch some of Clarice’s videos on these techniques.
People learn quite a lot about their voices, their bodies, and how to listen to each other to create musical numbers and theatrical improvisations that are worked out during the class in smaller groups and then presented to the entire class.
Participants become more connected and may have deeply transformational experiences because the course is rooted in being in the present moment. In a world filled with distractions, VOXploration serves as an empowerment tool for self-discovery, connection, and unmatched levels of creativity.
“Clarice took over the classroom with her infectious excitement for real, in-class music making. Within minutes, previously timid student composers were in sync with her intensity and you could feel them stretching and growing.”
—Ray Lustig, composer, The Juilliard School
VOXploration Podcast
When the Covid-19 pandemic happened, it created an opportunity. Though my ability to conduct in-person VOXploration workshops was affected, it allowed me the freedom to start the VOXploration Podcast in September 2020. I go behind the music in a series of interviews with astonishing singers, musicians, and scholars from around the world who share their musical expertise, tips, technique, and unique styles. Episodes explore the vibrant worlds of beatbox and freestyle hip hop, as well as the improvisational systems of jazz, art song, maqam, South Carnatic music, and much more.
VOXTOPIA – The 2023 debut in São Paulo, Brazil was a huge success!
An international festival focusing on the voice as an instrument, VOXTOPIA Fest’s mission is to expand the awareness of the diversity and plurality in vocal music by delivering dramatic performances by extraordinary artists from around the world.
Over the course of four days in São Paulo, Brazil, in 2023, vocal artists from Brazil and abroad will meet to perform, collaborate, and engage in educational projects. Stay tuned for VOXTOPIA 2024 !
VOXploration on SkillShare
Clarice has taken her workshop online to SkillShare with a series of video lessons exploring the human voice as an instrument capable of reproducing a multitude of complex sounds, colors, rhythms, and moods.
Find a Class Near You
To bring VOXploration to your school or organization or to find a class near you, contact us.
VOXploration has received awards from Brazilian foundations such as CAIXA CULTURAL and SESC, as well as American grants from New Music USA and the McKnight Foundation. It has traveled to Brazil, Qatar, and Europe, and has been taught extensively in the United States, creating ripples of positive and lasting effects in many people’s lives.
PAST WORKSHOPS
