A Blog Space for Singers to Share Parts of Their Experience Singing in a Choir
As we enter into the month of February, I think quite a few people are starting to reflect back on what has been almost a year of Covid-19. Admittedly, a lot of that reflection realizes loss and acknowledges the will power it has taken to make it this far, but some of that reflection also considers the growth and our ability to persevere. Our choirs are currently preparing for what would previously have been Lenten Prayer concert during our Winter quarter. Last Winter, the Lenten Prayer Concert was the first thing within our community to be cancelled. I think a lot of my classmates and my directors would agree when I say that the transition away from choir and music making as we knew it was very difficult, but now, looking back over the year, I am beyond proud of the work that we have done as a community to grow and persevere together. Music making was one of the things that felt nearly impossible to replicate on a virtual platform, but over the past few months we have been able to come together (metaphorically of course ) and create three amazing pieces of music that have moved and touched so many. We have each taken time out of our days to dedicate to music and our community. We have been able to build each other up in so many ways despite our being apart, and we have been able to support each other despite the distance. When I tell people that I am in a virtual choir, I am often met with faces of confusion and conflict as the terms seem to contradict themselves entirely, but we, as a choir community, have accomplished so much over the past year. We of course are anticipating the arrival of the moment where we can sing together in the same space and bask in that communal resonance, but at this moment, we are so thankful for our directors and the ability to meet weekly and share the common virtual space. We hope that if you are reading this, you have been able to find your own light in this uncertain time, and we hope to see you at the end of this journey. In person. When we can be enveloped in music together.
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I think that a lot of us have been reflecting on the “New Normal” that is quarantine recently in the midst of this Pandemic. One thing that I really never considered to be able to be “normal” by any means in the middle of everything that has happened is choir and music making as a group. There was a lot of uncertainty about how choir would be leading into last quarter and at the start of this quarter, and in the end, it really is not normal. However, over the past few month in choir, I have been able to process music making in a completely different way. I have been able to consider what it means to be a singer that is a part of a whole in a time where we are so separated. It feels extremely weird, but I think that a lot of us would agree that there has been some growth that has happened in the process. I know that personally, I have come into touch within my own individual voice and the part that I play in the broader reflection of a choir. We are often told by our directors that it is important to support each other through supporting ourselves, and I don’t think I truly understood the depth of that sentiment until I was in a practice room by myself recording a part that would be joined with the rest of my choir later in the studio. There really is no place for silence in that moment as you know that everyone else is experiencing the same thing alongside with you. You have to be strong even in the moments where you feel extremely awkward. In the end, it was beautiful. The product was a choir, and the unified spirit was there even we weren’t. At least not physically. Once again, that is the undeniable power of a choir.
When thinking about choir and the collectiveness that comes from singing in a choir, I felt like I could not write on this topic alone. I asked my roommate who is a previous SU Choir member and a singer about experiences she had had in her previous choirs and SU choirs that would respond to the feeling I felt in the collectiveness of choir (I felt like I needed back up to prove my point!). She first referenced the sociologist Durkheim and mentioned that this feeling is strongly connected to the concept he refers to as “collective effervescence.” She told a story in response to this feeling about how when she was in high school, she was singing “Snow” by Eric Whitacre and her director mentioned in rehearsal that they were not connecting and that they sounded like individuals singing the same song. So, her director closed the door and turned off the light so that they were all in the dark and had them sing without a conductor and without seeing each other so they really had to rely on hearing. She mentioned that their voices didn’t sound like they were coming from their bodies but rather like they were floating above them and they were able to realize the important parts and give space for them. She said that for about four minutes after the song had ended, they sat in silence and in the dark completely moved by the music they made. I had felt this similar feeling with singing “Snow” in 2018 at SeattleU. Both of us were in choir at that time, and there was a very connection to the music and the presence of the whole choir in connection to an audience. This of course could be credited to the amazing composing done by Whitacre on this piece, however, both my roommate and I agree that there is a power in singing in a choir that singing solo or even speaking does not have. The meaning of a piece is driven so much deeper and is so much stronger when sung as a collective. There is a combined emotion that we know can be impactful for so many people and that truly is the power of choir.
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