When houses of worship were allowed to resume in-person services May 18, Massachusetts issued a detailed set of guidelines designed to curb the spread of coronavirus: Attendance is limited. Worshipers and staff must wear masks. Cleaning is required after each service. Coffee hour is canceled.
But neither the state nor federal government has provided instructions on singing, a central part of worship across faiths since time immemorial. That leaves religious governing bodies and individual faith leaders to make their own decisions, just as experts are sounding alarms over the potential dangers.
A May 12 report from the Centers for Disease Control indicated that the “act of singing’’ probably helped spread coronavirus during a March 10 choir practice at a church in Washington State. Dozens fell ill after the rehearsal, and two people died. The CDC later recommended suspending or decreasing singing during religious ceremonies. “The act of singing may contribute to transmission of COVID-19, possibly through emission of aerosols,’’ read the agency’s guidelines, posted May 22 on the CDC website. However, the White House quickly scrubbed any language concerning choirs, according to the Washington Post.
In Massachusetts, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston has responded by disallowing both choral and congregational singing in “these early days,’’ permitting just one cantor and an instrumentalist per Mass. The two Episcopal dioceses of Massachusetts went a step further, delaying all in-person worship services until at least July 1 and prohibiting congregational singing beyond that.
“We believe that we best express our Christian values and our love of music by choosing not to sing until it’s safe,’’ said Rev. Morgan Allen of Trinity Church, the Copley Square Episcopal church with a longstanding reputation for choral excellence. “It’s more important to be good citizens of the city, the Commonwealth, the country right now than it is for us to worship in our most familiar format.’’
At First Lutheran Church in Back Bay, leadership has gone a different route. “Hymnody and congregational singing plays a major role in the Lutheran church, so we’ve opted to keep it but be very cautious,’’ explained Rev. James Hopkins, one of more than 260 Massachusetts pastors who signed a letter to Governor Charlie Baker earlier this month urging him to reopen houses of worship. Masked churchgoers are allowed to sing at First Lutheran. A few unmasked vocalists also sing parts of the liturgy from the back of the balcony, Hopkins added. “They’ve gotta be, like, 100 feet from anybody, and they sing for 30 seconds at a time.’’
But for many individual faith leaders, singing together is too risky right now — especially given the lack of official directives. There’s no chorus at Temple Beth Zion in Brookline, but singing is synonymous with community for Rabbi Claudia Kreiman. Before the pandemic, the monthly Shabbat Nariya service regularly drew a crowd of 300 for two hours of songs and potluck eating — all unthinkable at present. Because singing is so central to their worship practice, Kreiman said, official guidelines would “shift a lot of our decisions.’’ Absent those recommendations, Kreiman heeds advice from public health experts in the temple’s community and virtual trainings for houses of worship. So the building remains closed, but the temple is open, she stressed. “Right now the most important thing is to make sure we’re being safe and responsible.’’
At All Saints Church in Dorchester, another parish of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, liturgy is typically chanted, services include abundant hymns, and the church’s famed Choir of Men and Boys provides musical interludes. With none of these traditions advisable during the pandemic, organist and music director Andrew Sheranian has been playing instrumental music for livestream services and staying in touch with choristers online.
Because singing is so ingrained in the way the congregation worships, All Saints staff is considering delaying in-person services until experts deem congregational singing safe again. “What to say to the people? You can come to church but you can’t sing the Lord’s Prayer. You can’t sing ‘Amen’,’’ Sheranian said. It’s possible the church could do an all-spoken service, he added, but he wonders if it would feel stranger than worshiping from home.
Like many choral leaders, Sheranian tuned into a May 5 webinar cohosted by a slew of associations for singing teachers and choral directors, where Performing Arts Medical Association president Dr. Lucinda Halstead said she couldn’t imagine a safe way to sing together until there’s a vaccine and effective treatment for COVID-19. How long might that be? Eighteen months to 2 years into the future, by her estimate.
That webinar “shook the entire choral community,’’ said David Coleman, who directs a handful of choruses at schools and churches in Greater Boston. “This is unprecedented. Even in times of great strife and stress and oppression, people could gather together and sing. ... Now they’re telling us no, you don’t even want to do that ... because you might be infecting your loved ones or the people you’re singing with.’’
Coleman is director of worship and arts at Greater Framingham Community Church, an interdenominational predominantly Black church; at present, he’s part of a small team that live streams services from the building. The church isn’t making plans to open for in-person worship yet. Nor has there been discussion of how the congregation might sing together one day. “I’d love if there would be an official CDC or federal government stamp,’’ concerning the safety of singing, he said.
Sacred and secular choirs have been grappling with this issue for months, and Coleman has been active in online choral communities who are trying to forge ahead. For those working in education, one possibility is turning performance-based classes into academic classes; the Tufts gospel choir (which Coleman leads) may become a class on the history of gospel music. High school concert choirs could study music theory and sight singing or listen to music together, whether in person or online.
Virtual choir videos are another possibility — Coleman recently made one with his chamber choir at Wellesley’s Dana Hall School. At Trinity Church, weekly videos treat congregants to poignant performances by the church’s choir. But there’s no communal experience for the vocalists themselves, with each recording their individual part from home. What’s more, the videos “take forever’’ to record and edit, Coleman said. (They also require a deep well of technical skills.)
Joshua Jacobson, founder and director of the Newton-based Zamir Chorale, recently sent a letter to a handful of public officials requesting guidance for the area’s many choruses.“While social distancing is certainly helping to save lives, it is also resulting in the dissolution of crucial emotional and spiritual resources,’’ he wrote.
Reached via phone, Jacobson described his plans for the upcoming Zamir season, the 52nd for the Jewish music-focused chorus. Should singers not be able to gather, they’ll stick with rituals developed since concerts and rehearsals were canceled: They’ll keep recording virtual choir videos to connect with audiences. And they’ll keep meeting weekly on Zoom to socialize and sing as Jacobson plays recorded backing tracks — with their mics muted to avoid the application’s frustrating lag. Singing together on Zoom is “a total disaster,’’ as Zamir bass Michael Miller put it.
“I sometimes feel guilty worrying about what my choral group is going to be doing when you consider the big picture, and the suffering that people are undergoing,’’ added Miller, a primary care physician who recently joined the chorus’s safety committee as medical consultant. “Choral singing, for us, is like another family that we’re being kept away from, and we’re eager to try to get together.’’
That doesn’t mean they’re going to try now. While there’s no vaccine, treatment, or rapid testing available, Miller said, “the personal protective equipment and spacing that would be required to guarantee people’s safety is so anathema to what choral singing is all about, that they don’t seem to line up in any way.’’
And that doesn’t even account for concerts, he added. Who would feel safe sitting in a room full of potentially infectious singers right now?
In other words, so long as coronavirus is a threat, the outlook is dismal for those who treasure connecting and worshiping together in song. “What I pray for,’’ Coleman said, “is a vaccine to be discovered sooner than they predict.’’
Zoë Madonna can be reached at zoe.madonna@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @knitandlisten. Madonna’s work is supported by the Rubin Institute for Music Criticism, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation.