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The creative team for Blindspot Collective\u2019s world premiere musical \u201cKaraoke Dreams,\u201d from left, director Blake McCarty, choreographer Micah Parra and music director Lyndon Pugeda. (Joe Kao)<\/p>\nThe songs may be someone else\u2019s but the stories they tell, at least for a few minutes, belong to the karaoke singers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWatching people sing a song they love, it\u2019s clear that it means something to them,\u201d said Blake McCarty, executive artistic director of San Diego\u2019s Blindspot Collective and creator\/director of the new world-premiere musical \u201cKaraoke Dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n
For this show, which has been in development for almost a year, The Loft at UCSD\u2019s Price Center is being transformed into a karaoke bar where a cast of 14 will re-create the vibe of a communal space where, McCarty said, \u201ceveryone feels like it\u2019s where they\u2019re exactly supposed to be.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cKaraoke Dreams\u201d is a product of UCSD\u2019s Depot Residency Program, a goal of which is to ultimately provide a performance space for artists and nonprofit art organizations in the onetime baggage building of the Santa Fe Train Depot downtown that is currently undergoing structural upgrades. Eight-year-old Blindspot Collective and the dance programming organization Disco Riot, founded in 2018 by Zaquia Mahler Salinas, are the first arts organizations using the depot space for rehearsals and development.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a test case,\u201d said McCarty, \u201cfor that vision that the university has: to be able to extend new partnerships into the region with an eye toward new-work development and really supporting and sustaining not only local artists but local organizations as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
The creative team for Blindspot Collective\u2019s world premiere musical \u201cKaraoke Dreams,\u201d from left, director Blake McCarty, choreographer Micah Parra and music director Lyndon Pugeda. (Joe Kao)<\/p>\n
The \u201cKaraoke Dreams\u201d production stems from a partnership between Blindspot Collective, ArtPower at UC San Diego and the university\u2019s Campus Performances and Events Office led by Colleen Kollar Smith. All of these organizations, said McCarty, are \u201cworking to imagine the future of the depot downtown.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 120-seat Loft on the UCSD campus is getting some subtle transformative touches for \u201cKaraoke Dreams\u201d from a team that includes New York-based lighting designer Sierra Shreves and sound designer Cole Atencio. McCarty and Blindspot Collective colleague Shellina Hefner, who is also this show\u2019s associate producer, are handling the video design.<\/p>\n
Lyndon Pugeda is music director for \u201cKaraoke Dreams\u201d and Micah Parra is the show\u2019s choreographer.<\/p>\n
For \u201cKaraoke Dreams\u201d The Loft\u2019s Zanzibar Caf\u00e9 will be in operation, serving beer and wine.<\/p>\n
As for the music, \u201cThe scale is gargantuan,\u201d said McCarty.<\/p>\n
\u201cStructurally the show features moments from 65 songs, There are sections where for 10 minutes or so there\u2019s actually no dialogue. All of the storytelling is told through music and through original arrangements of existing songs, custom tracks created for the show.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose stretches of music provide insight into individual characters. You get to understand them and know about their back stories.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though not a karaoke regular himself, McCarty said he was inspired by the \u201cspontaneous community\u201d that exists in such venues.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what we want to capture,\u201d he said. \u201cThis cross-section of humanity that is in a shared space and has this shared experience that for us speaks to the power of theater as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though audience members won\u2019t be getting up there and \u201ckaraoke-ing\u201d themselves, they\u2019ll hear stories in song and in words that they can relate to, McCarty said. \u201cThough the characters are all fictional, we can see ourselves and our friends, our family members, reflected in those characters.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Karaoke Dreams\u2019<\/p>\n