Let the Music Play
As the pandemic shut many things down, music at FPC thrived online.
LIKE THE NOTES IN A HARMONIC CHORD, the elements were all there: space, technology, instruments.
In the spring of 2020, when the classical music scene in Atlanta seemed to hit a full stop, First Presbyterian Church’s commodious sanctuary, with its recently rebuilt organ and brand-new grand piano, became a venue for music that wafted around the world via cyberspace. Dr. Jens Korndörfer’s parents listened from Germany; Julie Coucheron’s family tuned in from Norway.
In weekly church services and special events, the music played on at First Presbyterian when other halls went silent. Korndörfer, the church’s organist and director of worship and the arts, credits the church’s audiovisual team and the equipment they manage. “Modern technology is wonderful when it’s working,” he said. “If this had happened in the 1990s, there would have been no livestream.”
The idea for a chamber music festival grew out of piano virtuoso Coucheron’s lament to master organist Korndörfer that she had no place to perform. The two musicians were in the sanctuary of First Presbyterian, admiring the tones of a new Steinway grand piano they had auditioned in New York in the fall of 2019.
By the time the instrument arrived in Atlanta, so had the COVID-19 pandemic. Most venues in the city were closed indefinitely. Coucheron and her brother, Atlanta Symphony concertmaster David Coucheron, had even had to cancel a music festival they produce in their homeland of Norway.
As Coucheron and Korndörfer commiserated, plans came together for a festival.
“I know a lot of chamber musicians in Atlanta,” Coucheron said. “I asked them whether they could be part of a chamber music festival at First Presbyterian.”
Many of them quickly agreed, and some of Atlanta’s top musicians came to First Presbyterian to perform, carefully obeying all guidelines of the Centers for Disease Control to be safe from viral infection.
In pre-virus days, concerts in the sanctuary typically brought in an audience of a couple of hundred people, Korndörfer said. The virtual concerts brought in thousands, each more than the last.
“We had no idea it would be so popular,” Coucheron said. “We had people tuning in from all over the world.”
When Korndörfer and Coucheron conceived their series, he had already overseen other musical events during the pandemic shutdown. The Talent Development Program of the Atlanta Symphony held a concert of young performers at the church on March 8, 2020; in early May two symphony trumpeters performed with Korndörfer on the organ; and Challenge the Stats, an organization to empower artists of color, held a concert with the theme “Music for the Crisis,” responding to racial injustice, on June 27. Other events would follow, featuring the Atlanta Chamber Players and the Emory Chamber Music Society of Atlanta.
And, of course, there were regular Sunday morning worship services with various types of music livestreamed and recorded weekly.
For Dr. Daniel Bara, the church’s choir and orchestra director, the pandemic meant a major shift in approach. Choral music had been identified early as a major vehicle for viral transmission. A choir practice outside Seattle on March 10, two weeks before a Washington state stay-at-home order, resulted in fifty-two singers with COVID-19, two of whom died. One theory is that the act of singing projects a fine mist of particles that carry germs.
“We had no idea it would be so popular. We had people tuning in from all over the world.”
JULIE COUCHERON
The Washington incident “sent ripples through the choral world,” Bara said. “Choirs around the country immediately shut down.”
First Presbyterian held a regular choir practice on a Wednesday night in March, and by Sunday, the church was closed. At first Bara relied on staff singers doing solos, but the approach of Easter on April 12 presented a dilemma.
On Easter Sundays, the rafters of the historic old sanctuary would usually ring with the festive sounds of a full orchestra, choir, and standing room-only congregation rejoicing and giving thanks for Christ’s resurrection.
“What could we do with music?” Korndörfer said. “We couldn’t have the orchestra and choir and do the wonderful things we would usually do.”
The session—or governing body of the congregation—committed to paying the staff, including the professional singers, whether or not they were able to work while the church was under severely limited operations. But when staff singers were offered the choice of to sing or not to sing, most decided to sing. So even during a pandemic, there they were on Easter Sunday in their bright blue robes, a few mighty voices singing the “Hallelujah” chorus. In what seemed to be a miracle of multiplication, their sounds filled the sanctuary.
“For me that was a really memorable service,” said tenor Brendan Callahan-Fitzgerald. “I think we realized it was possible for us to do this.”
Flexibility and adaptation became the principles for functioning. Bara sometimes added his own voice to the mix, and his wife and co-director, soprano Dr. Deanna Joseph, stepped in to sing with son Benjamin, then four months old, in her arms and daughter Ellie, then three, nearby. As the pandemic wore on, Benjamin grew. “The older he got, the squirmier he got, the louder he got, and the heavier he got,” Bara laughed.
Bara experimented with different kinds of music, different accompaniment, and different locations within the sanctuary. With no midweek rehearsals, the singers had to work on their parts on their own, then come together, briefly, before service began.
Like Coucheron on the piano, alto Ana Baida was grateful for a place to use her talent. “Normally my life is very filled with gigs and singing opportunities,” she said. “When the pandemic hit, the opportunity to sing face-to-face essentially went away. The only group singing that continued for me was at First Pres—and what a profound gift it has been.”
Bara said he believes the staff singers actually got better as they worked under difficult circumstances.
“That’s probably true,” said Callahan-Fitzgerald. “It made us kind of go into turbo mode to make sure we’re doing our jobs in an exactly precise and perfect way. . . . A mistake would stick out like a sore thumb. There’s nowhere to hide.”
The singers brought their lunches on Sunday and had picnics in the parking lot. “It’s been a huge blessing for everyone to see each other,” he said.
In his weekday life, Bara holds a named chair in choral music at the University of Georgia, where he oversees seven choral ensembles. As the university resumed a modified schedule in the fall, the choruses weren’t allowed to sing together. “It’s been kind of like teaching a choir appreciation class,” Bara said.
Callahan-Fitzgerald, a piano and voice instructor in First Presbyterian’s School of Fine Arts, has been teaching online. “I feel like I’m running a television program on my computer,” he said.
Coucheron has also been teaching some piano online and some in person as well as performing and accompanying online. And Korndörfer continued to work with his organ students, keeping a safe distance.
But while the professionals continued to make music in whatever ways were available, volunteer choir members watched from home.
“I feel like some part of me was taken away because I didn’t have that time together with other choir members making music,” said tenor Eddy Romero. “At home I’d get out my hymnbook and do some harmonizing on my own, but it’s just not the same.”
Florrie Johnson, a second soprano in the choir and violist in the orchestra, also said she felt “a great sense of loss.”
“The staff singers, Jens and Dan, have done a beautiful job on Sundays, and I appreciate seeing and hearing them online, but I really miss participating in worship myself in person,” she said.
On October 18, the orchestra was back in the sanctuary for the first time, playing in masks with socially distanced music stands. A limited congregation was also present.
“It brought me to tears to see everyone singing and following the words on their phones or tablets,” Johnson said. No printed material or hymnals were used, for safety reasons.
Korndörfer said he thinks some innovations of COVID-19 will be permanently adopted by the church, such as livestreaming and recording concerts. “We’ve discovered the power of the internet and the number of people we can reach,” he said. And both he and Coucheron say that although First Pres won’t host as many events once other venues reopen, it will continue to be a favorite location for some groups.
“There are literally thousands of people who have discovered First Pres,” he said. “And I think through the music they will have discovered other ministries.”
