FINDING CONNECTION AGAIN

Written by Nicola Bertoni Dedmon

I am sitting down to write this in early July, a time during which I would typically be finishing up my repertoire selections for the following year and planning for the year’s events. As one of the Repertoire and Resources Coordinators, you might expect to hear from me regarding practical issues related to programming or something similar; however, it would feel odd to write about such topics when many of us are struggling to see a clear and realistic picture of what this year will look like. We’ve endured more than a year of sleepless nights grappling with seemingly unsolvable dilemmas such as recruiting, keeping up with ever-changing health guidelines, debating internal choir policies like mask or vaccine mandates, etc. These very real and anxietyproducing issues affecting our daily operations can be very distracting; however, I would like to pose a broader question to perhaps recalibrate our mindset when considering this impending return to the choral rehearsal room: how can we feel connected—not just socially, but also physically—as a community again?

I don’t need to spend too much time listing all the different ways this pandemic has hurt the choral community—we are deeply and painfully aware. It has been a nightmare, filled with death, illness, isolation, deep economic hardships, psychological crises, and grief. Early on, due to several tragic super-spreading events, choral singing was identified as a dangerous activity that is very efficient in spreading an airborne virus. For a lot of us, this changed our calculus. Almost overnight, we were stripped of not only our careers as we knew them, but also of our passion. “Zoom Choir” was too often demoralizing. Masked and distanced outdoor rehearsals, however grateful we were for them, felt too sterile and devoid of the connection we once enjoyed.

Yet, for many of us, underneath our desire to return was also, paradoxically, a deep sense of fear and anxiety about physical connection with others. I can speak from personal experience: for much of 2020, I would feel physical sensations of a fight-or-flight stress response every time I came close to another person. The thought of returning to in-person rehearsals gave me acute cognitive dissonance because even though I yearned for it so deeply, I also feared what might happen if we tried it. When eventually my choirs did return to in-person rehearsals, there were so many safety protocols in place that this fear of human contact wasn’t exactly alleviated. For months on end, we had essentially conditioned ourselves to avoid human contact, which inevitably led us to the point where it was easy to view other people as vectors of disease, rather than fellow community members. The intent behind this conditioning was indeed an altruistic and necessary one at the time—to avoid spreading a dangerous novel pathogen!—yet I do believe that now, in a post-vaccine United States, we should acknowledge that we may need to un-learn some of these habits – which in the extreme can seem unhealthy and borderline survivalist –as we attempt to return to a place of connectedness and empathy within our choirs.

This past winter, we were given the greatest gift from our scientific community that we could possibly be given—the existence and availability of not just one, but three highly effective, very safe vaccines in the U.S. that protect us against serious consequences of COVID-19. We now live in a world where we have the power to prevent COVID deaths, and the risk of serious illness is remarkably lower than it was before vaccination.

"HOW CAN WE FEEL CONNECTED - NOT JUST SOCIALLY, BUT ALSO PHYSICALLY - AS A COMMUNITY AGAIN?"

Even considering the latest variant (Delta), these vaccines still provide excellent individual protection against serious outcomes of COVID-19 to those who take themi —far better than we could have imagined months ago. Many experts have maintained that those who are vaccinated are well-protected against severe outcomes, even in crowded public environments where you might not know the vaccine status of everyone around you.ii Of course, nothing in life protects you 100% of the time, and there will be many headlines that give disproportionate attention to very rare but indeed scary breakthrough scenarios; however, it is clear that these vaccines have reduced COVID-19 risk for those fully vaccinated to levels that we previously tolerated. I personally am more nervous about getting in a car to drive to rehearsal than I am about getting COVID-19 in that rehearsal. We were never guaranteed these incredible vaccines, and I know that most of us are profoundly grateful for their existence. When the news broke in early November about the success of the mRNA vaccine trials, many of us were elated. This would change everything. This would bring us back to choral music as we knew and loved it, and it would bring us back soon.

Ultimately, the scenarios have unfolded in a much more complex manner. Yes, we are making important strides towards returning to classrooms and rehearsal halls, yet there does exist a certain undercurrent of simmering conflict. Many choral institutions are embroiled in heated debates about whether or not to mandate vaccines for participants. There are also those who disagree passionately on rehearsal masking policies, which is an even more complex discussion to have within a community of singers. The nature of these debates can be highly contentious, emotional, and political. Some of these debates have grown incredibly toxic and dehumanizing. Nuance is very challenging in a world where the majority of our discussions occur

i MediLexicon International. (n.d.). COVID-19 and the delta variant: Which vaccines are effective? Medical News Today. https://www. medicalnewstoday.com/articles/covid-19-which-vaccines-are-effective-against-the-delta-variant. ii Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2021, May 28). Choosing Safer Activities. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/daily-lifecoping/participate-in-activities.html. in an online space. We have now spent over a year in a baseline state of prolonged trauma, which can trigger a kind of tribal defensiveness that makes it hard to view the other side of these debates as anything but an existential threat to either our safety or our freedom, depending on which side of the argument you fall. I will not attempt to offer the perfect answer to these overwhelming dilemmas, and I believe that each choir should be empowered to make decisions that are best for their own unique community. I will, however, say this: if we want our choirs to emerge from this pandemic with a sense of strength, connection, and mutual respect, we must actively work to change the nature of these discussions. We must begin conversations from a place of mutually acknowledged humanity. Trust is at the crux of choral singing and ensembleship. We trust each other when we sit next to one another and share in singing—a vulnerable and deeply personal human activity. We trust each other when we make mistakes in rehearsal and humbly learn from those mistakes, in front of others. We trust each other to show up to rehearsals and performances, because we cannot begin to accomplish these activities alone. We trust each other when we share personal stories that help heighten the artistic interpretation of a piece of music. We trust each other to sing out so that each individual voice is strengthened by the next. Choir cannot function without trust, and as wild as it may seem to say this on the tail of a global pandemic, guardedness is often antithetical to trust.

Today, I received an email from my school district stating that face coverings will no longer be required for those vaccinated, and though they are asking unvaccinated people to continue masking, they will work off of an honor system rather than requiring documentation of vaccination status. Vaccines, at least for now, will not be mandatory. These policy decisions will make many people in my choir very happy, and it will also make many people very anxious and uncomfortable. I intend to follow these policies, and I already anticipate conflict as students decide whether to return to choir, whether to mask, or even whether to get vaccinated. My goal is to create an environment where we can truly listen to each other, and avoid a scenario wherein students collect in camps or tribes according to their beliefs on these very controversial issues.

I believe it is my job to ensure that the culture of my choir is welcoming, inclusive, and fosters mutual respect, no matter what life throws at us. I hope that our group discussions—which are important to have—will entertain many different perspectives. For example, I deeply and desperately hope that all of my students will choose to be vaccinated, and I will continue to strongly encourage them to do this; however, I also acknowledge that there are many complex reasons that they may not have done so already. Believe it or not, there are many structural barriers that still exist with regard to vaccine access and equity, which is why low vaccine uptake is associated with high socio-economic vulnerability and minority status.i For this reason, I will try my best to approach the vaccine debate with my choir in a way that encourages thoughtful, empathetic engagement and avoids presumptions, such as falsely assigning virtue (or lack thereof) in an over-simplified manner. I do not want singers making moral judgments about a fellow choir member who may be facing a very personal and perhaps more complex decision than what is evident to those of us with more privilege. Of course, it is also completely acceptable and human to be fearful of virus spread and even fearful of someone who is unvaccinated, and there will be students that feel less comfortable participating in choir if they know that vaccines are not mandated. There are some practical ways to help mitigate these fears—rapid testing, proof of prior natural infection, symptom screening, attention to community prevalence, etc. There are also ways to assuage these fears with data, if that is something a particular person responds well to (though not everyone does). Also, sometimes it simply helps to explain to someone why you made the decision you made— perhaps understanding your thought process helps people feel more comfortable with your decision. I don’t know yet exactly how I would implement these tools, but I do know that I will maintain an open dialogue that begins from a place of compassion. I hope that I can instill a culture in my choir where our members assume the best intentions of one another, despite all of us having experienced a pandemic where we seem to have inadvertently taught ourselves to do the opposite. If we

i Brown, C. C., Young, S. G., & Pro, G. C. (2021). COVID-19 vaccination rates vary by community vulnerability: A county-level analysis. Vaccine. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2021.06.038 do not assign charitable intentions to our fellow choir members, I do not see how we can possibly achieve as high a level of artistry together as we did before.

Rarely will there be a policy choice that makes everyone satisfied. Conductors need to make decisions based on good faith risk analysis that considers vaccine protection, community disease prevalence, risk tolerance of that group, and also considers the profound benefit of singing together again, especially for those who have struggled deeply with the sometimes dangerous mental health struggles that come from prolonged isolation. These decisions can feel impossibly conflicting, and no matter what, some members of your choir will be unhappy. My best advice is to make these decisions thoughtfully and transparently, in a way that best balances the needs of the group and reflects the philosophy of your choir, and then move forward with confidence. When disagreements come up, begin an open dialogue with your singers that begins from a place of shared humanity. Avoid telling someone that their fears are irrational, or conversely, that their beliefs are unscientific—science is messier than most of us realized. If challenging conversations are held within this framework, I believe that they will be a bit easier and result in a choir that feels more trusting and connected. This will lead to those wonderful, synergistic rehearsals and performances we once enjoyed so deeply.

This journey will feel uncomfortable at times, yet I do believe that we will soon return to a world where we can enjoy live choral music as we did before, free from fear. When we get there, it will be nice to know that our choral communities brought out the best of our benevolence in the worst of times.

Stay safe, stay kind, and I look forward to gathering with everyone at our upcoming regional conference. Special thanks to Dr. Stefan Baral, MD, MPH, for his input and guidance in preparing this article.

Professor Nicola Bertoni Dedmon is currently on faculty at Fullerton College as a Choral/Vocal Professor, where she coordinates the Choral Area and conducts the Concert Choir and Chamber Singers. She currently serves on the board of ACDA Western Division as the repertoire specific R&R Coordinator. Professor Dedmon is a graduate of James Madison University (BM) and Westminster Choir College