Vocalography

Peggy Baker coined the word vocalography to describe the compositional work I do with dancers. Vocalography is acoustic painting with “expanded” vocal sounds inspired by the dancers’ movements. These sounds are not the obvious sound that a dancer might make when executing a certain type of move but rather a companion or counterpoint sound to what their bodies are doing. I watch the choreography and feel musical impulses in my own being. After teaching these textural sounds to the dancers I refine compositional values – shape and balance. The felt worlds of moan and groan and shriek and shudder are held by musical form.

Fides has made 5 vocal scores for Peggy Baker Dance Projects: land/body/breath, 2014/17; locus plot, 2015 (Dora Mavor Moore nomination for composition); phase space, 2016 (Dora Mavor Moore award for composition); who we are in the dark, 2019; and her body as words, 2021 (premiere postponed from 2020). She has coached new works for dance companies Adelheid, Lua Shayenne Dance, Kaeja d’Dance, Jaberi Dance and Kemi Dance. She has directed and devised vocally with Louis Laberge-Coté (The Art of Degeneration, 2018) and Jessica Runge (Uncollected Works, 2019.) Fides has devised vocal material for Chicago theatre companies Walkabout Theatre (2019) and Erica Mott Productions (2014/15).

Vocalography CV

2021   her body as words, Peggy Baker Dance, The Theatre Centre, Toronto, CA.
2019   The Ravelling, Walkabout Theater, Links Hall, Chicago, USA.
2019   who we are in the dark, Peggy Baker Dance Projects, Canadian Stage & CA tour.
2018   The Brink!, Walkabout Theater, Links Hall, Chicago, USA.
2016   phase space, Peggy Baker Dance Projects, Betty Oliphant Theatre, Toronto, CA.
2015   locus plot, Peggy Baker Dance Projects, Betty Oliphant Theatre, Toronto, CA.
2014/15   3 Singers, Erica Mott Productions, Crickoteka, Krakow, Poland & National Museum of Health and Medicine, Chicago, USA.
2014/17   land/body/breath, Peggy Baker Dance Projects, AGO & National Gallery, Ottawa, CA.
2008/9   Abattoir, Kaeja d’Dance. VANOC Cultural Olympiad & Fleck Theatre, Toronto, CA

LOCUS PLOT
Peggy Baker Dance Projects

LAND BODY BREATH
Peggy Baker Dance Projects

3 SINGERS – A DAY IN THE PROCESS – FIDES KRUCKER Erica Mott

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