Page 27 - Fall 2020 Tags and Swipes

Tags and Swipes, Fall 2020

Valley Chords Chorus

The Valley Chords have maintained our commitment to barbershop and each other through weekly Zoom
meetings/rehearsals. We have worked to stay together socially and musically while being apart
physically. While we wish we had someone on our roster who was savvy enough with technology to help
us sing together in the virtual world, we’ve pulled out our good old Vermont grit and have used what’s
available to us so we can come out prepared to sing when we can again be together.

Our director, Carmen Wilmot has resigned, although we’re hoping she’ll rejoin us at some point. In the
meantime, Laura Fraser has been attending, coaching, doing PVIs online and generally providing an
enthusiastic voice. Our Lead and social media guru, Hannah Cerasoli, while moving us forward musically,
has kept our presence in the community known by inviting interested singers to come to virtual
rehearsals and posting chorus news. Our hard working President, Robyn Jacobs has helped immensely
with organizing us while managing her medical practice in the difficult times.

We’ve spent our Zoom time on both educational and social activities. Just catching up with each other has
been important, since we have two members who are away from the Upper Valley for the summer. One
of the bright sides of virtual rehearsals is that they have been able to attend while out of town! We try to
maintain a rehearsal schedule each week so everyone will know what to expect. A typical night starts with
singing along with a warm up video (each person muted but participating), or if we have a guest we’ll
watch a performance video especially if we have a guest who needs introduction to barbershop singing.

We’re trying to keep our repertoire in shape as well as working on a new song. Oh, how we miss the
process of learning new music together! Sometimes we sing muted while all listening to a learning track
of the song we are working on, or one brave soul will sing unmuted and others will sing against it.

In addition to keeping our voices in shape and our lives connected, we’ve begun exploring some other
possible activities, including meeting with other regional choruses to plan joint virtual events. We are
planning to host a virtual teaching session for our community with Donya Metzger in September just
before Fall regional. We’ll welcome any Sweet Adelines as well as community singers.

The best news is that we’ve all managed to
remain healthy thus far and we’re thankful for
the leadership from the region in helping us to
navigate these unprecedented challenges.

Valley Chords welcomed a new friend, Cheri, to
rehearsal this week. Boy, are we the lucky ones!
She wowed us all with her bravery of doing a
PVI at her first rehearsal with a Whitney
Houston song we are so very happy to have her
with us!

Laura Fraser joined us this week, which is
always a crowd pleaser! We taught Cher to say
“yes, Laura”, so we know she’ll fit right in.

Julia O’Hara
27

North Atlantic Region 1 Sweet Adelines