The work will include:

• Kokyu training. This is a precise structure, enabling you to concentrate on movement and breathing in unison, in order to improve focus, strengthen the body and prepare for work with the voice.

• ‘The herd’, or contact running, which is used to build group awareness, to ‘tune’ the group. The process awakes the global listening of the body, requires attention as well as being in the present moment.

• Partner training, work on acrobatics in pairs, as well as on the more subtle relations involved in following/leading, communication through physical contact and channels.

• Aikido elements, aikido is a Japanese martial art, based on the idea of exploiting and diverting the energy received from your attacker. You will be working both on physical elements of training and with weapons such as the bokken, wooden jo, Japanese sword and stick.

• VoiceInProgress, an original research program combining techniques for unleashing the voice through intense breath training along with techniques for body self-awareness and imagination (derived from the Kristin Linklater, Jo Estill and Roy Hart methods and the work of Emma Bonnici).

• Breathing–voice–singing, rediscovering your natural habitus of your own voice as a communication tool: how it works and its possibilities in our everyday life as well as on stage.

• Resonators–vibrations–voice, introduction to the resonating spaces of our bodies; making them vibrate as a single sound, as well as in consonance with others.

• Harmony of Common Singing, practice of meeting one another in polyphonic song, songs that act both as an individual channel for expression and improvisation, and as a united experience of spending time in polyphony. Storytelling: disappearing in polyphonic unity.

• Improvisation and creation of voice/movement-based structures which can be used as performance material.

The primary goals of the training include: deep back-to-the-source exploration of aikido practice, research in the field of voice (freeing and strengthening the voice) and attentive laboratory work inspired by these experiences. In order to explore the possibilities of practicing oneself in action using tools derived from the domains mentioned above, we will practically interrogate the work of the performer on her/himself. The work will inhabit a space between precise form and improvisation, tradition and creation.

Education Research Program: Spring Edition

Studio Kokyu’s research programme in the 2021/2022 season will focus on the multi-pronged role of the performer’s physical and vocal training. The area of investigation will continue to stretch between physical theatre tools and vocal techniques (with an emphasis on the Kristin Linklater method) on the one hand and classic Birankai aikido on the other. Exploring these practices, the Studio will attempt a creative synthesis which may open a new work perspective. The programme is intended to be a continuation of the research undertaken by Przemysław Błaszczak as part of Body Constitution, first with the Two Paths Studio, and then, together with Joanna Kurzyńska, with Kokyu Studio.