Thursday, June 17, 2021
Silver Linings—Virtual Choir
Jen McPherson
Nearly sixty-five Sundays ago, late March 2020, I was terrified. Social media was ringing with videos of various choirs’ virtual performances. Church organists and choir directors detailed how much their jobs had changed overnight. Instead of their days being spent in choir rehearsals and various practices, they were now spending hours recording and assembling practice tracks, experimenting with the best way to teach their choir members how to record their own parts and videos, and then actually editing all the audio and video and have it ready for their Sunday morning virtual services. A two-minute anthem took at least 20 hours of work to assemble – and this was after getting over the curve of learning new software. I was overwhelmed (that’s an understatement) and wanted nothing to do with any of it. I missed our Parish Choir so much but was determined to wait until we could all physically sing together again. It took a few weeks for me to realize we’d be waiting for a long time.
Fast forward 14 months, I’m so glad to have taken the leap into this new territory. More importantly, I’m beyond grateful for the crew of singers that made our virtual music ministry possible. Many of our Parish Choir members, along with the addition of a couple faithful 8 o’clockers, spent time each week preparing hymns, canticles, and the occasional virtual anthem. They went from singing together in our Thaxter Hall choir room to practicing and recording by themselves – an isolating and vulnerable experience. Yet, they did it joyfully.
One of the silver linings is that we now have a Music playlist on our YouTube channel! Have you checked it out yet? All of our hymns, musical meditations, virtual anthems, and special music offerings (126+ videos!) are in this playlist. You can access it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96h6JnBySA0&list=PLo7KT1p2NSCyB2YDOs5pJbAP6KwGqXsGP
I am eager to make music with our Parish Choir again – together, in person, not behind a screen! Thank you, dear virtual singers, for sharing your gifts with our church community.