Covid and Equity in Choral Music

A Look Back at the Big Topics of 2020

2020 is coming to a close and I wanted to thank the readers and listeners here on ChoralNet, the Podcast channels, YouTube, or wherever you engage with Choralosophy content! This year has been year of growth for the show, and it wouldn’t have been possible without all of you!

A huge portion of that growth in 2020 were centered around two themes that got a lot of attention on the show for obvious reasons. Covid, and Social Justice related issues.

When the May webinar came out, I jumped into the fray be creating the Covid Conversations Series in which I interviewed some of the top infectious disease experts in the world in order to cut through a bit of the hype around the topic and offer a different way of looking at the issue than many had been exposed to. This project drew a lot of both positive and negative attention to the show, but it definitely drew in listeners! Ultimately, that’s why I did it. Covid affected our professions this year in a rather unique way, so I felt that a full exploration of the topic beyond “how do aerosols behave when we sing?” was warranted. As 2020 rolled on, it turns out that assumption was correct as hundreds of choirs around the world have returned to singing with risk mitigation strategies in place.

Back in February, prior to the tragic killing of George Floyd, I had decided to do a mini-series on topics surrounding diversity, equity and inclusion called “Choral Music: A HUMAN Art Form.” The episodes did well in terms of audience response and downloads prior to the pandemic. But, when the summer hit thousands more came back to download many of the episodes housed there. This was an interesting development as the discourse on social media heated up, and often times turned contentious, the conversations on this series took a different approach. Real people, just talking. In a way a Facebook discussion group cannot offer.

With both of these topics, it is likely more episodes will be added in 2021. Though, wouldn’t it be great if the world healed in a way that I didn’t feel the NEED to do more? Oh well, I guess we can dream. In the mean time, keep tuning in, and keep being part of the conversation.