First Person Singer

The First Person Singer (FPS) project aims to experimentally create prerequisites for a new operatic format offering the audience first-person perspectives from individual characters through personalized streaming. By equipping opera singers with body cameras and microphones, the project allows beholders to experience the plot through the eyes and voices of individual performers. This approach enables multiple musicodramatic experiences and performances can be revisited sequentially from different point of views to provide new empathic insights and emotional depth over time. 

Key to the project is the development of a prototype, set to be tested in 2025, which will explore the technical and creative challenges of integrating first-person perspectives into opera. Furthermore, questions about how technology can expand and support the role of the opera singer in a digital context are in focus. Unlike many interactive operas that minimise singers’ achievements or replace them with avatars, the concept ensures the singer remains an active, multimodal agent at the centre of the performance. 

The project also sparks philosophical and societal discussions, aiming to challenge traditional opera norms and audience expectations. Connecting to broader societal shifts, fostering access to art and inviting reflection through multiple perspectives, it aims to engage new audiences, promote viewpoint diversity, and encourage critical reflection on the complexities and ethical issues of the human digital experience. 

Participants:

Hedvig Jalhed is director of the research infrastructure Inter Arts Center at Lund University. She is a professional opera maker and her research focuses on conceptual exploration and multi-sensory composition for human live performance in the field of music drama.

Sara Wilén is a classically trained singer and a senior lecturer at the Malmö Academy of Music, where she is course leader for the degree project within the performance programmes, faculty coordinator of digital teaching, teacher of improvisation and stage performance, supervisor and examiner. 

Alexandra Huang-Kokina is an academic, pianist, and creative director whose work bridges music, literature, intermediality and digital humanities through critical and creative practices. 

Ingar Brinck’s research is interdisciplinary in cognitive science and psychology from an embodied, dynamic and distributed perspective.

Further information about the participants and the project can be found at ArtCollab – A platform for collaboration between art, science and society at Lund University.