Photo Courtesy of connartists.com.
We saw a big step towards normalcy this past Tuesday. “Our original plan (for auditions) is back on,” wrote Associated Director at the Office of Student Engagement Jeanette Williams in an email to members of A Capella leadership. This news comes after a long decision making process in which the Office of Student Engagement met with representatives from Hartford Healthcare and from the Connecticut College Music department multiple times.
Initially against in-person auditions, Professor Rachel Feldman, visiting director of choral ensembles at Connecticut College and visiting director of choral studies at Mount Holyoke College, cited the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University’s guidelines for in-person choral instruction and stated that “the logistics to safely do in-person auditions (is probably) outweighed by the ease and the convenience of doing auditions over Zoom, and that if auditions were to be happening in person, there would have to be enough time in between each audition for there to be the appropriate amount of air exchange, in order to make the space safe.” The guidelines recommend social distancing of 12 feet, limiting vocal activity to 30 minutes, and a 30 room vacancy between sessions to provide for adequate time for the air exchange.
The choral ensembles here at Connecticut College are going to be conducted largely in person, but Feldman expressed trepidation at the prospect of in-person A Capella rehearsals saying that “in order for me to support the idea of A Cappella groups rehearsing in-person, there would need to be some member of the faculty or staff present, in order to maintain all of the protocols going on.” She would later state that she would be fine with a student taking on that responsibility.
Midge Thomas, the Sylvia Marx Professor of Music and chair of the Connecticut College Music department, instead offered her sympathies and support, saying that “We all know how frustrating last semester was, whether it was in the music department or in the student clubs…the whole world is frustrated, everyone’s frustrated…and so I think Student Engagement is really committed to helping students find a safe way to make music.”
However, when faced with the fact that the Student Engagement Office wanted to allow in-person auditions, Thomas and Feldman raised concerns about how they could be conducted safely, before sharing the Peabody guidelines and leaving Student Engagement to make the decision. At first, that decision was to scrap the plan for in-person auditions.
With newfound confidence as a result of a shift to Alert Level Yellow, the Office of Student Engagement changed their minds and decided to give the A Cappella groups the go ahead to conduct auditions the way that they had initially planned.
Hannah Maki ‘21, Co-Pitch of the ConnArtists, says that the current plan is “to hold one day of in-person auditions with one to two members of each A Capella group present.” These auditions will be held in Evans Hall, and although there are a lot of specifics still to be worked out, she expressed that she’s very excited. “In-person auditions are critical to finding the people that are the right fit for the A Capella group, not just from a voice standpoint, but from a personality standpoint as well,” explains Maki. She’s no more apprehensive about in-person auditions than she would be with any other in-person activity, even if the current plan breaks slightly with the Peabody guidelines.
Maki expressed that she feels very hopeful embarking into this unknown and “very grateful to have the support of the Student Engagement Office, who are supporting our in-person endeavors as musicians.”
This is a big win for the arts community, and signifies the next step in the slow march back to normalcy here at Connecticut College.
Love it moylan