Lip Syncing & Its Importance

What is it?

Lip syncing is moving the lips in synchronisation with a recorded speech or song to give the illusion of a live performance. It is usually put in in the post production phase of a music video by combining the recorded piece of footage with the pre-recorded track. It is done by playing the song on set and have the artist or appropriate band member mime along to the section of words.

What is its importance?

Lip syncing is important in Music Videos as it is the main link between the video and the song, it very unusual that a video doesn't have any lip syncing in it as it is seen to be the main convention of a music video. Lip Syncing helps the audience understand what band member plays what role in the song and who the lead sing or singers are, it also makes the audience feel more included as they are essentially being sung at by the artist in the video. Also another main convention of music videos is performance, which usually can't be achieved without the use of lip syncing.

 The video above accompanies Lily Allen's song called 'Air Balloon', the video featured a great deal of lip syncing. It is obvious that she isn't singing live as she is in the middle of a field and isn't singing into a microphone, however on the set of the video the song would be playing out loud and she would be moving her lips along to the song to give the illusion that she is singing live.