Queer Voices
a creative community workshop series - movement, voice, writing, music
with Guy Harries (composer, multi-disciplinary artist, psychotherapist)
in collaboration with: Westminster LGBT+ Forum, Queer Spaces and the University of East London
Queer Voices is a creative workshop series exploring movement, voice, writing and music, with space for both individual and collective approaches to the work.
Across four sessions the group builds week by week toward a short "queer opera" film made together. You're welcome to join the full series and take part in shaping that piece from first ideas through to filming, or to drop in for a single session and work with the material in your own way, whether that's alongside others or more independently. Both approaches are held within the same room and the same process, so people can move between them as it suits them.
Each session draws on movement, voice work, creative writing and music-making. All levels of experience are welcome, from complete beginners to professionals, and no performing experience is needed. The main thing required is a willingness to explore, play and try things out.
If you attend the full series you'll take part in developing a piece collectively with the group, working alongside other LGBTQ+ people and allies who are curious about what a group can make when it makes something together, letting queerness guide how. If you drop in for a single session you'll still take part fully in that day's work, using the same tools and exercises, with more freedom to follow your own thread through them.
The emphasis throughout is on process rather than polished results. What the group creates across the series will be filmed and shared publicly, with a possible launch event to follow. Material from drop-in sessions may also feed into this, depending on how the sessions develop.
Open to all levels and backgrounds.
About the organisers
Guy Harries is a London-based composer, therapist and senior lecturer at the University of East London. His creative work spans electronic music, cross-disciplinary performance and opera, with a particular focus on community-devised and politically engaged practice. His recent operas SINGULAR (2022) and QueerLove (2024), produced for Tête-à -Tête Opera Festival, centre LGBTQ+ lives and stories and are created collaboratively with queer artists. He has run community opera devising workshops across London and convened the Opera and Politics symposium series at Trinity Laban Conservatoire.
Alongside his arts practice, Guy works as an integrative psychotherapist specialising in LGBTQ+ and creative clients. He holds a PhD in Music from the University of London and a postgraduate diploma in Counselling from the University of Westminster. He is a registered member of the BACP.
Westminster LGBT+ Forum: https://www.westminsterlgbtforum.co.uk/
University of East London: https://www.uel.ac.uk/
Queer Spaces - https://www.queerspaces.co.uk/