Professional workshop
Christopher Willes – Collaborating through scores
07 ⇾ Jan. 09 2026 (Wednesday – Friday)
10:00 to 16:00
Weekly rate:$95
Drop-in:$48
Every day
Teaching Language: English
Questions can be asked in:
French, English
Categories
#Creative process #Interdisciplinary #Music, voice or sound #Somatic
#Creative process #Interdisciplinary #Music, voice or sound #Somatic
© Susie Richard
Objective
What is a score and what exceeds it? Beyond a means of preserving an author’s ideas, a score invites other people to interpret those ideas into new experiences. A score asks its readers to become curious, to listen, play, take action or break the rules, and in the process develop shared questions and navigate agency. A score has living in mind. And so, in a way, a score always has some kind of collaborative process at its core.
Collaborating Through Scores is a workshop that explores the interdisciplinary possibilities of scores within collaborative art practices. Through reading, discussion, and hands-on experimentation, participants will examine diverse approaches to score-making and the ethical, practical, and aesthetic questions they can draw out. The goal of this gathering is for each participant to reflect more deeply on the formal aspects of their own working contexts, and to come away with new ideas about collaborative work.
Collaborating Through Scores is a workshop that explores the interdisciplinary possibilities of scores within collaborative art practices. Through reading, discussion, and hands-on experimentation, participants will examine diverse approaches to score-making and the ethical, practical, and aesthetic questions they can draw out. The goal of this gathering is for each participant to reflect more deeply on the formal aspects of their own working contexts, and to come away with new ideas about collaborative work.
Content
This workshop will involve practicing scores together—both collaboratively and for one another. The activities will incorporate reading, writing/drawing, discussion, sound-making, and movement, however no prior experience in these is required. The workshop is devised with the forms and traditions of experimental art making in mind, but it can be applicable to other fields as well (education, community work etc).
My facilitation approach is shaped by my background in experimental music, dance, and interdisciplinary performance, as well as my current studies in Conflict Coaching at the University of Waterloo.
The workshop will be conducted in English, but I will actively encourage collective translation and will gladly slow down as needed to ensure accessibility for all participants.
My facilitation approach is shaped by my background in experimental music, dance, and interdisciplinary performance, as well as my current studies in Conflict Coaching at the University of Waterloo.
The workshop will be conducted in English, but I will actively encourage collective translation and will gladly slow down as needed to ensure accessibility for all participants.
Workshop Rhythm
~ Adaptable to the group’s needs
~ Variable
Accessibility Features
~ ASL interpretation might be possible
~ Exercices are adaptable
~ High music or sound level
~ Physical contact between participants
~ Sub-groups exercices
~ Visual support (i.e.documentation, texts…)
~ Wearing masks on request
Biography
Christopher Willes (He/him) is an artist, musician/composer, and facilitator based in Toronto and Montreal. His interdisciplinary artistic work centers on the subject and practice of listening. Working with people, sounds, musical instruments, places and embodied practices, he researches forms of participation, cooperative action, dissent, and shared authorship in and through art. He has worked as a dance dramaturg and sound designer in so-called Canada for over a decade. Since 2013, he has co-created several works with Montréal based artist Adam Kinner, including the one-to-one performance MANUAL which has toured extensively. He is a former company producer and associate artist with Public Recordings (Toronto), with whom he developed numerous projects since 2014 including Resonance Gathering, a collectively authored publication on Pauline Oliveros (Art Metropole, 2023), and the itinerant workshop What’s Collective?. He studied music at the University of Toronto and received an MFA from Bard College. He is currently studying Conflict Coaching and Meditation at the University of Waterloo.
“A complex galaxy of questions, tensions, values and strategies held by Christopher, with his usual care and ability to make time feel spacious. very grateful.” Miranda
Partners
This workshop is supported by the Conseil de la formation continue arts et culture de Montréal (CFC) in collaboration with Studio 303 and REPAIRE. The CFC’s continuing education activities are supported by the Intervention-Compétences program, thanks to the financial participation of the Quebec government.
