Beyond Cookie Cutter Songs: Developing Song Structures & Having Fun

Instructors: Sean-Joseph Choo & Jose Ver (Honolulu, HI)

Tired of improvising the same cookie cutter songs you always do? Does adhering to structures you know feel like it constrains your creativity and sucks out the fun? If so, this workshop is for you!

In this workshop, Sean Choo and Jose Ver from Honolulu will help you to learn how to spontaneously create interesting songs with distinct melodies that don’t follow traditional song structures.

Students will learn how to craft lyrics and melodies without worrying about structure, relying on their own intuition and sense of joy to steer their choices from beginning to end.

Student Information

All Levels: This workshop is open to students with some improv performance experience.

Workshop Capacity

To ensure the quality of the student experience, this workshop is capped at 14 students.

About the Instructors

Sean-Joseph Choo is a queer, multi-ethnic, multi-hyphenate artist, born and raised in Hawaiʻi. He is the Lead Steward and Head Jester of Kamamo House, an artist and new works cultivation group, theatre advocacy organization, and podcast, named after his fierce grandmother, Eloise Tsuru Matsuno Choo. He’s excited to be back at the Bay Area Musical Improv Festival!

His sketch, improv, and musical comedy work has been featured with On the Spot Improv, Improvaganza, improvhi, and Polynesian AF at the Hawaii Comedy Festival. Sean has been making up silly songs since he was small, sometimes with a piano (and sometimes with audiences) for over a decade. He also occasionally clowns around and has taken very silly workshops about it with Aitor Basauri, Noah Bremer, Virginia Scott, and Amrita Dhaliwal.  His most recent clowning around was done for Robert Farid Karimi’s Game Night at Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Culture & Design, where he was also a featured artist at the museum’s 8x8: Source exhibition.

Jose Ver is an actor, comedian, and all around performer based in Honolulu, HI. He is also an original player and instructor with Improv Hawaii. Other creative credits include: Magnum P.I., Hawaii Five-0, and the award winning web-series Waikiki PD. He is a regular cast member of The Hawaii Comedy Festival, The Original Jams Improv Show, and has done various theatre productions in Honolulu. His latest credit is Video Game Voice Actor for the game Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth. Jose is a member of the musical improv comedy troupe Thoroughly Modern Biggie. He produces and hosts the popular, monthly Improv Nerd Nite, and also watches A LOT of “Star Wars.”