Perfecting Performance: The need for rehearsal and direction

No one is born a lector; those who are selected to be lectors ought to be trained. If the lector is perform ministry to the glory of God, one will practice and seek out constructive criticism: “Was I loud enough; could you understand the text; was I reading in a tone that is good for my voice; did I read too quickly; what did I look like when I walked up …”

Voice Matters: Breath, Posture, Articulation, and other Physical Aspects of Reading

The English speaker normally uses three pitch levels, and a fourth for special emphasis:

1. The first level is the one which signals the statement has come to an end. If there is no difference between this ending level and the pitch level at which the speaker began the statement, it would be monotonous.

2. The second level is the normal level at which a speaker begins a statement. This is higher than the ending pitch.

3. For emphasis, a speaker, at a certain point in speaking, pitches the voice higher than the rest of the statement.

4. A fourth level of pitch will signal extra emphasis.

Starting to speak, one pitches the voice comfortably and goes on to complete the statement.

· MONOTONE:

Starting to speak, one pitches the voice comfortably and goes on to complete the statement.

· NORMAL w/emphasis:

Starting to ^speak, one ^pitch-es the voice ^comfortably and goes ^on to complete the state-_ment.

· NORMAL w/ extra emphasis:

Starting to ^speak, one ^pitch-es the voice ^comfortably and goes ^on to com-^plete the state-_ment.

Two other things to consider in terms of pitch:

inflection (which describes a pitch or glide within a particular sound)

and intonation (which refers to the pitch pattern of a sentence or longer unit of utterance).

Consider how the use of pauses, or phrasing, sets off units of discourse. The pause

· gives one a chance to breathe;

· gives the speaker time to consider the next phrase or sentence;

· gives the listener a brief moment to absorb what has been said;

· provides a clue to meaning.

It is best to speak conversationally when reading. This advice

· emphasizes the idea carriers rather than unimportant words;

· emphasizes the new idea or the contrast rather than the old idea;

· emphasizes causal or conditional relationships;

· emphasizes the main thought rather than parenthetical phrases.

Any word that can be omitted without significantly changing the meaning should not be stressed.

Consider articulation – moving the tongue, lips and teeth to precisely form sounds.

Try the saying the following phrase, increasing the speed each time while continuing to speak precisely as possible:

“The tip of the tongue, the lips, and the teeth.”

Projection is a function of both loudness (breath control using the diaphragm) and articulation.

· Breathe more from the diaphragm to force air through the vocal tract; pause often enough to breathe.

· Measure speech to avoid running sounds together.

· Concentrate on reaching listeners at the farthest reaches of the space.

Be alive to others when speaking! Look at those who are listening, letting eye contact cooperate in communication.

Identify with the characters being quoted and visualize what is taking place, projecting the experience to the listener.

Fully utilize all vocal and physical resources to bring to life that about which one is speaking.

Gordon C. Bennett’s Readers Theatre Comes to Church: A New Form of Christian Communication for Worship, Teaching & Evangelism

Giving Attention to Reading: The Lector as Minister

The lector is one who ministers to the congregation through the reading of Scripture. At one point in church history, the lector, or reader, was considered one of the minor orders in which persons were formally acknowledged for the exercise of gifts, or charismata, they possessed. Although reading is nowhere explicitly cited as one of the charismata, its exercise is as significant as preaching and teaching; we read in 1 Timothy 4:13: “Give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhorting, to teaching.”

Reading the Word of God aloud can bring blessing to the one who reads and to those who hear. How is such blessing brought about? It is first of all a gift of grace. Reading is a charismatic act when done in the context of true worship – that is, when words are read aloud in spirit and truth. A worshipful act of reading is no mere playback of recorded inspiration; prophetic reading breathes again the truth present in the text being read. This representation is a poetic act of mimesis which resounds with the breath of life. The Bible does not speak for itself; God has chosen to speak through the reading of His Word. God became incarnate in Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh; so does the Church continue by the Spirit of Christ to be the Body of Christ to the world as each Christian in his or own person presents the Word of God uniquely, whether individually or with other Christians.

The reader becomes the letter of Christ written with the Spirit of the Living God when words of prophetic proclamation are processed through the whole person. The Great Commandment, to love the Lord God with all one’s heart, soul, and mind, and to love others as oneself, is to be applied to reading as much as to all things in life. Anything less than reading with one’s whole person, in loving submission to God and others, strangles the Spirit’s flow.

Competent charismatic reading prophesies life to those ready to hear the Word of the Lord. The Christian reader is a minister of the new covenant, not of letter but of spirit. The Spirit gives life – this then is the criterion by which prophetic reading is judged. Lifeless reading is a mocking impersonation of presenting the Gospel – still born words sound monotonously ineffective and reflect gloomingly off veiled and captive minds of hardened hearers. However, reading full of the Spirit is transformative – the image of God, figured in reading the Word of God, is set in one’s imagination as an example to be followed with others as faithful disciples of Christ.

Faith come from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. Blessed is the one who reads aloud words of prophecy and blessed are those who hear.

TRUE TELLING, GOOD ACTING

Life lets one live mimetically and diegetically by way of one's imagination - at the moment one acts, one's conscience is at once considering one's action while ready to judge what was done and what is to be done next. This conscientious judgment may be considered the running narrative that accompanies contemporaneous conduct.

Mimesis is no mere copy of an idealized past but an effort to create an ideal present-to-come. Diegesis sets the conceptual framework within which mimesis acts, describing what is to be done.

Mimesis	Diegesis
(Greek `imitation' or `to copy')	(Greek `to narrate')
shows rather than tells, by means of action that is enacted.	the telling of the story by a narrator.
represents	reports
embodies	narrates
transforms	indicates
knows only a continuous present	looks back on a past

Doing is always present tense. Once something takes place, mimesis is necessarily replaced by diegesis. This is the dynamic of rehearsal – one considers what is to be done, one does it, then one discusses what was done so that it can be done again, whether the same way or better or perhaps just differently.

Discuss, do, discuss.

Perhaps this nexus of diegesis and mimesis is an aspect of love that lets two individuals act as one – the two hold in common an imaginative narrative that constrains each one's actions to follow a similar direction; one is constantly considering the other, doing what the other wills as well as one can. We learn to work with others in such a way that, given the intimacy of our relationship, we become aware of one another's non-verbal narrative that may not necessarily be explicitly expressed. We know one another well enough to have a good idea of what one another may very well be thinking.

Actors do this more easily when they have a script to follow and much rehearsal prior to performance. People do this when they have been working together over time – it defines a dynamic essential to teamwork.

Living the truth in love, as Scripture commands (Ephesians 4:15), demands that diegesis and mimesis be congruent; otherwise, one is in danger of hypocrisy – one does what is not consistent with what one thinks. We are called to be imitators of God (the Greek word behind imitators, mimetai, gives us our English word "mimic" or "actor"). However, we are admonished severely not to be hypocrites (the Greek word hypocrites also meaning actor).

Counter to how our current culture prizes effective presentation without regard to truth, Christians are called to do what is true - it is simple as that.