Congress 2021 blog edition
By Megan Perram (she/her), PhD Candidate in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultural Studies at the University of Alberta
We know that the arts sector has been hit particularly hard by the global COVID-19 pandemic, but as Laurier Fagnan, Professor at Campus Saint-Jean, explains, choral singing has been almost completely silenced. Near the onset of the pandemic in March of 2020, choirs were one of the many forms of gathering that became prohibited. In Fagnan’s talk “Choral Singing in a Confined Pandemic World” the Professor discusses the innovative forms of adaptability the choir community has undertaken over the past year.
Choirs that were once vibrant suddenly went silent. For Fagnan, the effects of shutting down the choir singing community ran deep. The professor explains that choir members began facing mental health decline when they no longer were able to connect with others face-to-face. At the end of the day, choirs are about gathering a community. Fagnan explains as a conductor: “I can wave my arms all I want but my instrument is the wonderful sound of the community of singers in front of me. So, without them, it is pretty tough to be who I am as a musician.”
Fagnan showed us that the choir community became empowered to adapt to our new socially distanced world in ways where they could continue to sing as a unit. For example, some composers worked to entirely change their compositional style to account for the latency of Zoom by writing pieces that did not require strict synchronicity. This innovative style was completely novel as regimented timing, up until this point, was the foundation of an effective choir. Fagnan took his audience through some examples of how video and audio editing was utilized further to create harmony.
Transitioning to virtual methods to facilitate his choir was perhaps the most difficult for Fagnan. He explains: “I had never wanted to do a virtual choir video. For me, it was not choral singing.” However, to keep the community alive, Fagnan embraced new technological approaches to editing a piece digitally. Fagnan explains to his audience the immense work that went into creating a socially-distanced choir video, including recording and isolating each singer individually and then matching various tracks together to create the illusion of harmony.
Fagnan’s closing words were perhaps his most poignant. The professor enthusiastically notes that “human beings need to sing. They need to be in community and they will find any way possible to do it. This is such a strong human need that they have to have that experience. Choral singing will continue...it is too important to who we are as human beings. And, just too much of a beautiful experience.”
Fagnan’s verdict is that singing will remain evergreen for our communities to come.