Medford Community Chorale and Youth Chorus UPDATE

I spoke with Betsy Pesce, director of the Medford Community Chorale and Youth Chorus (MCC), about the future of the MCC and how the chorale community in general are dealing with the Covid-19 challenge.

Q: Will there be a Medford Community Chorale and Youth Chorus concert sometime in the future?

Yes, Julie, I absolutely believe there will be a “live” Medford Community Chorale and Youth Chorus concert in the future. Unfortunately, right now, we don’t know just when that will be.

This insidious coronavirus has dealt all of us in the field of performance – singers, instrumentalists, dancers, actors, etc. - a crushing blow.

Last Tuesday night, the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) and the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), among others, along with medical experts, presented an almost 2 1/2 hour webinar entitled “What Science and Data Say about the Near-term Future of Singing”, and the news was sobering. The experts say that groups will not be able to safely begin singing together physically again until there is an effective treatment and a vaccine for covid-19.

Q: What will it look like? Is there the possibility that it will be some kind of online event?

Ultimately, Julie, I hope that future concerts will look similar to our previous ones, but in the interim, yes, If we are going to continue to present concerts, I anticipate that they will have to be online/virtual events. Unfortunately, trying to maintain social distancing on stage would be next to impossible. You may have seen some of the amazing “virtual choir” performances that have been posted on social media In the last couple of months!

Q: How are others in the choral music community dealing with the Covid-19 challenge?

I’m sure that most others, like myself, are still reeling from this news and are trying to figure out how we can adapt during this time, and how we can use technology to assist us in keeping the music going. As you know, Julie, I had already recorded all of the voice parts for our concert pieces and sent the links to those to all of the chorale members to assist them in practicing on their own, and you posted them on our webpage for members’ easy access to them.

It is my understanding that some school and college choruses have been conducting “virtual“ rehearsals, and I plan to reach out to some of those folks and find out how something like this works.

Also, the ACDA and NATS will be hosting another webinar in three weeks to provide any updated or additional information and to focus on what we CAN do now, going forward, and I plan to watch that. This is “uncharted territory“ for all of us, and it can feel overwhelming.

Q: Are there special considerations for choral groups?

Yes, there are, Julie. When we sing, we push air from our lungs through the vocal tract out into the space and experts say the aerosol droplets produced can travel as far as 16 feet, so even trying to space singers 6 feet apart isn’t sufficient. Wearing a mask (and only the N95 mask is truly effective) while singing simply isn’t feasible… It’s difficult to breathe, and as you continue rebreathing, you end up decreasing oxygen levels, and increasing carbon dioxide, and can develop a terrible headache!

Q: How will we keep the Chorale connected through whatever lies ahead?

As you know, Julie, the chorale was just formed in November - the adult chorale gave a beautiful first performance at Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn’s inaugural celebration in January. And as I said in my message to everyone over the weekend, in the less than four months that we were together, we were becoming a real community, a family, and I so hope we can stay connected during this time. Since our last rehearsal on March 11, I have continued doing weekly check-ins/updates with the groups, And I have just invited any members of the adult or youth choruses who would like to do so to please share an audio or video or email message with the groups and send it to you to post on our Facebook page, and a number of them have done this already.

As I mentioned previously, I will also be actively looking into the possibility of how we might be able to have rehearsals - and ultimately maybe even performances - online.

And I won’t give up hope that an effective treatment and vaccine will be found and that we will once again be able to gather together to make music together again.

Thanks, Betsy, for that update!