Tap into your inner Gleek

Calgary2012 wants you to get in touch with your inner Gleek.

That’s because Saturday the group is marking Calgary’s designation as a cultural capital by assembling a massive lip dub in Olympic Plaza, to lip sync and line dance (of a sort) to the Stampeders’ Sweet City Woman.

“It’s a cross between a flash mob and a music video,” says Calgary2012 marketing and communications manager Alyssa Berry.

Beginning at 10 a.m., an expected crowd of two to three thousand Calgarians of varying degrees of artistic talent — ranging from the high end (Alberta Ballet dancers) to the completely hopeless (civic aldermen and Calgary MLAs), with any number of grannies, toddlers, moms and dads in between — will be out busting a few moves.

It turns out that in a survey the group took about what sort of cultural events Calgarians wanted during its year as a cultural capital, one thing that topped the survey was the opportunity to participate in the actual creation of cultural events. Hence, the Lip Dub. “You don’t have to have any experience,” Berry says. “You don’t have to have any (performing arts) background, (either).”

The whole deal is being videotaped by Joe Media, to be fashioned into a video that is expected to go viral.

Interested participants are asked to arrive between 10 a.m. and noon, to check in at City Hall and sign a waiver allowing them- selves to be videotaped. They’ll be assigned to one of nine independent sections, where they’ll be taught a few dance steps, Berry says. (Latecomers can also participate in a closing routine choreographed by members of Trickster. The actual video shoot starts around 1:30).

It’s not only a nod toward our year as a cultural capital, but also a fun way to mark national Arts and Culture Days this weekend.

There will also be food trucks on hand, Epcor Centre will be open, and the Glenbow is opening its new show, Fairy Tails, Monsters and The Genetic Imagination.