Objective: Singers frequently experience improvisation as anxiety-inducing due to the intimate connection between voice and identity, leading to self-censorship and avoidance of artistic risk. Unlike dancers and actors—who are trained to normalize mistakes and integrate embodied risk-taking into their practice—singers often lack somatic pedagogical tools to navigate vulnerability in experimental performance. This study will investigate how group free vocal improvisation, augmented by cross-disciplinary somatic methods from theater and movement practices, influences singers' willingness to take artistic risks.

Methods: Ten to fifteen graduate-level vocalists will participate in four weekly 90-minute sessions structured progressively: (1) collaboration and group sensibility, (2) body and movement exploration, (3) spoken text and expression, and (4) integrated vocal expression. Drawing on Pauline Oliveros' Deep Listening, Viewpoints, Alexander Technique, Lessac Kinesensics, Gaga Movement, and theater improvisation techniques, each session will combine guided theatrical, vocal and movement-based improvisation. The Intellectual Risk-Taking Scale (IRT; Beghetto, 2009) will be administered pre- and post-sessions. Participants will also complete post-session reflective journals, and facilitator field notes will document observed behaviors. A graphic score will be performed in Session 1 and Session 4 to measure changes in exploratory willingness.

Results: Data collection is ongoing. Analysis of pre/post IRT scores, qualitative journal reflections, and facilitator observations will reveal thematic patterns in participants' evolving relationship to vocal risk-taking, embodied awareness, and collaborative confidence. Video documentation will capture shifts in vocal expressivity and group attunement across sessions.

Conclusions: This practice-based study will demonstrate whether integrating somatic methods from theater and movement into vocal pedagogy can reduce performance anxiety and cultivate artistic risk-taking in singers. Findings may suggest that embodied, collaborative improvisation provides a supportive framework for singers to engage with experimental and interdisciplinary contemporary works.