Photos by Ralph Freso / Slideshow
Half of Lip Sync is anticipation – days of social media teasers and camping out for the biggest Grand Canyon University student event of the fall semester. So by the time the Global Credit Union Arena crowd of more than 5,500 got to its raucous countdown for the competition Tuesday night, anything would have worked.
But the Canyon Activities Board organizers decided to really ignite it with a new twist to start the show. Host Matthew Stout, returning as master of ceremonies for his second time, glistened in the spotlight with his red coat with tails and top hat, facing away from the audience, leaning on his cane with head cocked, a regular P.T. Barnum for the theme of “The Greatest Show.”
He turned, ran down the center aisle into the frenzied crowd, music blasting, as each of the five teams danced down arena aisles, and the place went crazy.
By mid-show, the team of Don’t Blink brought on another standing ovation, winning the crowd-voted competition as its 25 young men leaped as if on pogo sticks.
Few were shocked.
The team is made up of many of the members of last year’s winner, Syndicate, in a competition that is one part karaoke lip sync but is mostly well-practiced dance choreography, acrobatics, storytelling and audio and visual editing.
Isabelle Aff won her fifth-straight competition as a coach/choreographer, while another of its coaches, Christian Juhl, was part of his fourth Lip Sync win.
Don’t Blink dreamed up a visual feast, neatly attired in black shirts and red bowties, opening the magic show-themed set with a pair of disappearing acts – the trusted man-in-a-tall-box-spin-and-he’s-gone trick.
But what brought the crowd to its feet was a series of high-energy dances, stunts of flying men and a seamless flow between song shifts.
“We really wanted to build a story. It’s not all about cool dancing,” said team co-captain and senior Nate St. John. “We wanted the people in the audience to feel like they were a part of it.
“Honestly, the reason I do it is I wanted to get the younger guys involved – and it’s an excuse to hang out with your friends every night during practice. We don’t have football, but we like the comradery of the guys.”
They had practiced 92 hours over weeks under the watchful eye of Aff, an alumna who was persuaded back to campus again to do her own magic.
“This year I told them, ‘No I work a full-time job (as a behavior therapist for autistic toddlers). Then I heard the theme was magic and I got excited again,” she said.
The key to Lip Sync success? “People don’t want to see a dance recital or a cheer team. They come to be part of something. So when you come on stage you want to bring them into the story and emotionally affect them.”
Few of the young men admit to doing more than shuffling on the dance floor prior to their Lip Sync training.
“That’s what it comes down to, a bunch of guys who can’t dance learn to dance,” said co-captain Porter Sonntag, clearly exuberant after streamers rained down on stage and the team passed around the trophy as the football theme emerged again. “It’s what happens when a D1 school doesn’t have football. Ten thousand people come watch a bunch of guys dance.”
They also watched four other teams put on a show. One of the three finalists, One-Eighty, opened the show with perhaps the most concerted effort at storytelling.
“Our story is about trying to seek worldly possessions. We realize they aren’t going to fulfill us,” said performer Julia Gutierrez of the set to the “Dune” movies, complete with tattered brown scarves and a video clip of a glistening pile of gold.
Finding faith is what is going to reward them, and their dance becomes lighter, more joyful, symbolized by a circle of joy.
“I love to dance. Being on the stage, I just want to run the show over again,” said Elizabeth Volenec.
The team of X-Force followed up with another movie theme, “Deadpool & Wolverine” with red battle costumes from Spirit Halloween.
“It’s high energy,” said Lukas Gauharou backstage before the show, “but you will be laughing.”
Indeed, the team provided comic moments, boy fanny wiggles as if they were a chorus line followed directly by aggressive mock Wolverine fighting. “Always out there, fighting in the void,” a team member told Stout in the short interviews that followed each performance.
The Heist team used its Hip Hop Club expertise to put on a show that was less acrobatic but more tight precision to songs such as Michael Jackson’s “Cool Criminals,” wearing fedoras and vests and telling the story in video of the heist of a new recipe for Stampede, the popular campus coffee shop drink.
The finale by Lope Island, another of the three finalists, was based off the popular reality TV show “Love Island.” It was a playful romp with team members in bright-colored beach attire doing both gymnastics and exaggerated gyrations to play the crowd.
Thunder made an intermission appearance with a lip sync (antelopes don’t sing, or talk) of “Never Enough,” from the movie “The Greatest Showman.” The crowd, which CAB managers estimated to be the largest in recent years, sang along with feeling.
“We turned it up to 11,” said Stout, resting afterward on the stage’s edge. “This Lip Sync was the best we’ve ever seen.”
Members of the winning team Don’t Blink:
Nate St. John, Porter Sonntag, Tyson Grimes, Gavin Towner, Jordan Rogers, Brennan Hayes, Luke Sauder, Evan McKee, Johnny Schuller, Braedon Nuttall, Jonathan Boyer, Jacob McCreery, Garrett Borgman, Noah Juhl, Aidan Juhl, Dylan Veigel, Ibinnabo Kelly-Briggs, Riley Kollbaum, Levi Guerengomba, Everet Ross, Sam Reagan, Quin Hutchins, Micah Thornton, Noah Reagan, Joseph McCreery.
Grand Canyon University senior writer Mike Kilen can be reached at [email protected]
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GCU News: Lip Sync electrifies crowd with mind-blowing performances
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