“SCARYOKE!!!” Exhibition
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SCARYOKE!!!
An inquiry into the joy and terror of singing in public, with snacks.
Singing can be joyous. Research shows that music produces a wash of chemicals to the brain—endorphins and serotonin and dopamine—and lowers stress-related cortisol levels.
Singing can be terrifying. Reporting a New York Times Magazine story about the fertile karaoke scene in Portland, Oregon, journalist and editor Dan Kois watched several groups of friends play a game they called scaryoke: A singer gets on stage; her friends pick out a song for her; the singer, surprised, must do her best.
SCARYOKE!!! is a lot of things. It’s a six-week party: a chance for New Yorkers to sing on a Saturday night, on their lunch hour, or after a morning jog. It’s an experiment, encouraging visitors to explore the outer boundaries of their own performative instincts and capacity for risk-taking. It’s an exploration of the different modes of public and private singing, from the tune whistled in the shower to the ballad belted out in a bar after three vodka tonics. Basically, it’s a joy factory. Get in line!
John Brophy of Portland’s innovative Baby Ketten Karaoke will supply the exhibition’s songs, and will KJ the opening reception, his first-ever New York appearance. Other events will feature the pipes of New York journalists, writers, and comedians to help set the mood and encourage everyone to sing. And at exhibition’s end, we’ll screen a movie of the whole experience.
Dan Kois © 2013
Dan Kois is a senior editor in Slate’s culture department and edits the Slate Book Review. He’s also a contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine. He was a founding editor of Vulture and has also written for New York, The New York Times, The New Yorker, the Washington Post, and the Awl. He is the author of Facing Future, a book about the late Hawaiian musician Israel Kamakawiwo’ole. He lives in Arlington, Virginia, with his family.
Media
Schedule
from November 07, 2013 to December 21, 2013
Opening Reception on 2013-11-06 from 20:00 to 1 day, 1:00