If an uninitiated viewer stumbled upon singer Vera Bowser’s livestream Sunday evening, they would have been surprised by what they heard. Opera music, its glass-shattering sounds normally reserved for domed ceilings and concert halls, had shrunk to fit the confines of a living room and YouTube screen. The audience was invisible, tucked away in cyberspace. But the performance, which rotated singers, adapted in real time to feedback from commenters. The result was something between a live show, a streaming service and a choose-your-own-adventure game.
Bowser, along with Musical Chairs Studio instructor and singer Leah Rockweit, singer Eddie Brennan and musicians Josh Quinn, Chris Hinkley and Tony Bittner, engineered the concert in part to replace a canceled live show. But with the rapid spread of coronavirus, “quarantine concerts,” as Bowser named the YouTube stream, are becoming the new normal.
“Society as a whole always looks to the arts to soothe the pain of existence,” Bowser said. “All of this is going to be what we need to get each other through: seeing all the beautiful parts of life, even if it’s through a screen.”
Though the informal opera concert came together in the span of a single day, Chicagoland outfits have been working to generate similar experiences on a large scale: live shows in their ideal venues, minus the crowds and contamination. FitzGerald’s, currently closed through April 2, plans to host Shout Section Big Band in collaboration with local jazz radio station WDCB (90.5 FM) on Sunday night. Donations taken during the show will go directly to the artists, and audiences will be able to watch via Facebook livestream. It is, according to FitzGerald’s owner Will Duncan, a way of recreating the connection that lies at the heart of live music: a group of people, sweaty and packed into a too-small space, hearing the same sound.
“What do we need more at a time like this than any kind of feeling of togetherness?” Duncan said. “If we can preserve even a shred of that feeling, we’re continuing to fulfill our purpose as a live music venue.”
And togetherness is symbiotic, benefitting both performers and audiences. Ron Onesti, owner of the Arcada Theatre in St. Charles, became determined to provide live music after speaking to a patron who lost a loved one and was looking forward to attending an Arcada concert as a distraction. Though a physical concert was impossible, Onesti is currently hosting a free “#MusicStrong” series, streaming new shows nightly. On Sunday, almost five thousand people tuned in to see Chicago’s Own Piano Man Band fill the otherwise-deserted theater, sound hitting the rafters and bouncing back. For Onesti, the music helps keep artists in the public eye and, crucially, is a gift for an audience that demands diversion.
“There’s such a thing as a starving artist, and right now, there are starving music lovers,” Onesti said. “And that’s not been a thing until now.”
But in the digital age, entertainment is a click away, and it would undoubtedly be easier for a venue or individual to post a prerecorded performance: no haggling with technology, no need to pray away human error. Bowser believes, however, that togetherness and immediacy go hand-in-hand — the vulnerability of live music can’t be mimicked in hindsight.
“As a performer, the minute you start to record something you have this sense of, ‘I have to make this perfect if I have a chance to listen and re-record it,'” she said. “Doing it live allows us to have a much more honest and real exchange with anyone watching.” For Rockweit’s friend Stacia Yeapanis, who viewed the opera concert from home, immediacy — the knowledge that the show would only happen once — was one of the draws.
Of course, the exchange between performer and virtual audience can’t always feel natural. Rockweit initially found it discomfiting to sing directly into a camera, knowing an audience was watching. But the benefit outweighed the cost. Brennan, who also performed, noted that artists have “fingers on the pulse of society,” and that pulse doesn’t abate with social distancing. In fact, Rockweit said, it only grows more pressing.
“For a lot of musicians, myself included, if we don’t have music in our lives and ways to express that, it’s really rough,” Rockweit said. “It’s an internal need for us.” While Rockweit hopes the show introduced newcomers to opera, the group plans to host another concert next week as part of a “Live from Winona Street” concert series, this time focused on the Great American Songbook. The goal remains the same — to help people find calm in an uncertain time — and the project is ongoing. Even once the virus is contained, Onesti doesn’t foresee an immediate return to normalcy.
“It’s going to be tough when this thing blows over,” Onesti said. “It’s not like when the rain goes away and all the baseball players come out to play. It’s going to be people one at a time walking onto the field, trickling into venues.”
Near the end of the opera concert, Rockweit sang an aria from “La Boheme” in which Mim , one of the opera’s protagonists, is near death from tuberculosis. The subject was topical for a quarantine concert, but the result was something more than an on-the-nose reference. When Rockweit outstretched her arms, hitting a particularly high note, the sound felt too big for the small space. It had to leave the living room to find purchase, past the camera and YouTube screen before landing, however indirectly, next to us.
When: Live from Winona Street 6:30 p.m. Sunday / FitzGerald’s 6 p.m. Sunday / #MusicStrong 7:30 p.m. nightly
Where: YouTube (VeraDoes) + Facebook (LiveFromWinonaStreet) / Arcada Live / Facebook (ShoutSection)
Tickets: All free; donations welcome.
