Babies shake, rattle and roll at play developed with Birkbeck’s Babylab
Scientists from Babylab have teamed up with theatre directors to create a show guaranteed to have babies bouncing, waving and giggling
Scientists from Birkbeck’s Babylab have teamed up with theatre directors to create a show guaranteed to have babies bouncing, waving and giggling. Shake, Rattle and Roll launches tonight at the Polka Theatre in Wimbledon, and is part of the Brain Waves theatre festival, which includes a number of neuroscience-inspired works.
Sinead Rocha, a PhD student whose research looks at how babies learn to dance; Rosy Edey, a PhD student looking at biological motion perception and social difficulties in people with autism; and Dr Caspar Addyman, who developed the Baby Laughter project while working at the Babylab, worked with theatre director Sarah Argent to create the show. Sarah visited the Babylab to gain a deeper understanding of their research and how experiments are conducted at the lab to inform her creative team as they initiated the show design. Throughout the development stage, Birkbeck’s scientists were invited to observe babies and their parents watching rehearsals to help the creative team interpret their reactions to different elements and enable them to refine the design for the final show.
Explaining how helpful the process was, Sarah Argent said: “The music that Sinead uses in the BabyLab as part of her exploration of rhythm was not music that either myself or our composer would have instinctively been drawn to in creating a theatre piece for babies but, in line with the brief of responding to the work of the scientists, we have dutifully explored this – and it has led us to realise that babies respond to much more upbeat and rhythmic music than we had previously imagined.”
Sinead Rocha said: “This is the first time that I have been involved in the creation of a theatre show from its very outset. It was really enjoyable to work with the creative team and be able to help them develop something that appeals to their audience, and for them to understand the science of why that is the case.”
The show launches tonight (22 September) and runs until 16 October at the Polka Theatre in Wimbledon.
Further information
- Read a blog post by theatre director Sarah Argent about her experience of working with the Babylab team
- Babylab
- Sinead Rocha
- Rosy Edey
- Book tickets for Shake, Rattle and Roll