Weiser school's choir and band concerts can be viewed online

 The Weiser High School band and choir programs have faced the challenge  of social distancing while performing music and having concerts throughout the pandemic. As a solution, the band and choir Christmas concerts were recorded instead of performed live and are available for families and friends to watch online. 

 Band director Jake Fortin shared that concerts during a pandemic have been strange for everyone. For the most part the rehearsal process is the same with the students spread out more than they normally would. This has just required both directors to get a little creative with the use of space to maximize distancing. 

 In order to have concerts both directors have had to figure out the best possible way to record the performance. This required quite a bit of research on the best way to record and capture the sound of the music so it would be like seeing the concerts in person. Although, as choir director Mike Turner shared, duplicating the live concert effect is completely impossible.

 “Nothing equals a live concert experience,” Turner said. 

 Both directors have had to invest some of their budgeted money into camera/recording equipment in order to have a relatively future-proof end product.  

 “I don’t just want concerts to have that 1990s VHS tape look ten years in the future,” Fortin said. 

 The quality of sound has also been a concern for the directors and after the first round of concerts this fall they also invested in more microphones to pick up all the melodies and harmonies better on the stage.

 In order to record the concerts and preserve social distancing the middle school and high school groups have all recorded separately. The groups have not gotten to hear each other, which is usually really important to their education especially for the younger music students who learn more when they can hear what more experienced high school students can do. 

 The band had no audience and the choir only had a small audience of other choir groups from the same school. 

 “We really miss not having a live audience and the feedback that can provide,” Turner said. 

 On the positive side, Fortin shared that one nice thing about recording our concerts like this was that they had the opportunity to use more than one take on a tune if they knew they could play it better.  The band recorded two or three takes for each tune and used the best one for the concert. 

 For both the band and choir one advantage is that although no one was able to see the concerts live, hopefully more people will be able to view the concerts online. The concerts will be posted on YouTube and the links are on the school’s website. Everyone from parents to grandparents even if they live far away will be able to see the performances and they can view them more than once throughout the Christmas season.  

 For the band the music includes: Sixth grade band performing “Jingle Bells”, “Good King Wenceslas”, and “Dreydl Dreydl.” The seventh and eighth grade band performed “Carpe Diem” and “Trombones on the Housetop”, while the high school concert band performed  “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and the high school jazz band presented “Tastes Like Chicken” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” 

 For the choir, one fun change for the videos is that while they all are recorded separately Turner produced the concert as one concert. Viewers can see all the groups and the order of the songs is spread out so you hear one from the sixth grade and then maybe one from the treble choir and the chamber choir before the next sixth grade song. 

 The sixth grade performed, “First Flakes”, “When Christmas Comes to Town” and “Antiphonal Deck the Hall.” The seventh and eighth grade choir sang, “O Come O Come Emmanuel”, “30 Second Fa La La”, “Ding Dong Merrily On High.” The concert choir sang “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”, “Silver Bells” and “Frosty The Snowman.” 

 The treble choir sang “Carol Of The Bells” and “This Little Babe.” Chamber singers sang “It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year”, “Personent Hodie” and “Bidi Bom.”