Choral Music and the Pandemic-Some thoughts from a teacher

We are all processing.

The finish to this school year is not what any of us expected or wanted our choral music experiences to be when we started teaching our students back in the fall of 2019.

Everyone needs and deserves rope right now.  Everyone is emotional and stressed.

People are saying a lot of things about the future of choral music.

What we cannot and must not do, is say that choral music is over.

Because it isn't.

So, we have to stop saying it.

Everyone needs to stop saying that.

If we don't, we are going to make it a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Group singing has been around for thousands of years.  We've been around for 10, 20, 30, 40...at the most 60 years leading group singing?

For the safety of everyone involved in choral music singing, it may look different for a period of time, but this too, shall pass.

At this juncture, on May 9, 2020, we are still learning about how Covid 19 works.  The entire world is learning new stuff at the same moment in time.  Webinars are popping up and people are saying things that they think they know when in fact, the thing they thought they knew changes the very next week as scientists learn more.

The guidelines have been changing almost daily.  Treatments that we didn't know would work are currently lowering the amount of time the sickest are in the hospital and those treatments are saving lives.   Eventually, we will get a vaccine.

Yes.  We have a long way to go.

Yes.  It is possible that our classrooms will look different in the fall.

We will be smart.  We will be rational.  We will make the decisions that are professional and safe for the health of everyone in our classrooms and everyone in our school buildings and communities.

And it will be temporary.

We will adjust.  We will lead for the good of humanity.

When this virus came about, the universe decided we needed to take a breath.

So, let's take one.

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I am a gay man who was 18 years old when the HIV pandemic began in 1982.  I watched my young friends die around me.  It was frightening like nothing I had experienced before.  We all realize that Covid 19 is a completely different beast, but the fear that overtook the world was the same.

Fear is always the same.

This clip from a show called Designing Women captured that fear and the divisions that fear is always able to create.


Let's not allow fear to win.

Let's watch for a while longer.  Let's listen.  Let's do the temporary re-imagining of our work that we may have to do.

But let's stop saying "choral music is over" when the information about the disease is still evolving.

Words have power.

When we say things like that right now, we are being overly emotional, irrational, irresponsible, and we are hurting our art form.

Out of adversity always comes the best art.

When we are able to make our choral music art form the way we did before this pandemic, we will treasure those experiences more deeply than we ever have.

I know that, right now...today...I treasure these two performances that happened two days before the lockdown more than I ever could have imagined I would.



Let's lead with love.

Let's be the light.





2 comments

  1. Thank you.
    Thank you for this.
    I just CANNOT with all the negative...
    I need to be positive and hope -
    not to be 'Pollyana' about it, but to hold out hope.
    For myself and my students. So thank you.

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  2. Thank you. I am a pretty positive person in general. I am always looking for the silver lining. I have to admit, this has me going down the rabbit if hole of what things MIGHT be like. Our school levy didn't pass last week. Music is always cut first. I've been there. I've had my program cut. See...here I go again. I am so very grateful for educators like you that will help us to come together to figure out answers and procedures before administrators do it for us. Again....thank you Dale

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