Upper Canada Chorus: Canada’s preeminent choral experience for youth
An extraordinary ensemble for elite singers, CHOIR ONE is the destination for some of the finest young musicians in our city.
Upper Canada Chorus: 2020/21 Season
Formal rehearsals begin in a little over a month and we couldn’t be more excited! It’s been a long time since we’ve heard your voices in harmony together, and it will be amazing to resume, albeit in a modified capacity. As you no doubt know by now, Ontario will be resuming in-person learning this September. Our program was permitted to re-open in Stage 3, so we are looking good for September. Below you will find a description of our program, including Covid-19 modifications, for 2020/2021.
Monday Evening Rehearsals – Holy Trinity Anglican
We will operate only one campus for the 2020-21 season – our Thornhill Campus on Monday evenings. Our first priority is safety, and we believe for many reasons our best practice for 2020 is to limit our activity and collective exposure to one campus. We feel that Holy Trinity is the most central of our campuses, located in the heart of Thornhill at Yonge St. just south of Hwy 407. In addition to the central location, we have a large facility with multiple rooms and a great capacity to enact our program with correct group size and distancing measures.
We will be conducting rehearsals in 3 cohorts of 15 students, with start times as follows:
Grades 1-6: 5:45PM – 6:55PM
Grades 7-12 Group A: 6:15PM – 7:45PM
Grades 7-12 Group B: 7:00PM – 8:30PM
Each cohort will enter and exit at different times, and use a different room in the facility for rehearsal. Masks and visors will be mandatory for all ages.
Tuesday Evening Rehearsal Option – Virtual
Students may choose to attend either the Monday night live rehearsal, or our new Tuesday night virtual rehearsal. The Tuesday virtual rehearsal will duplicate content from Monday, and will consist of 2 parts: from 6:00PM-6:30PM live via Zoom, followed by an edited video recording of the Monday night rehearsal which may be completed upon your own schedule. If you have attended the Monday rehearsal, you are not expected to attend on Tuesdays, but may do so if you choose. Conversely, you may choose to attend only the Tuesday rehearsal from the comfort and safety of your home. Students may choose this option for any reason, including inclement weather, health considerations or even distance to rehearsal facility. Regardless of the current state of distancing and COVID-19 measures, the Tuesday rehearsal will always be available.
We ask all members to please respect each other by choosing the Tuesday/recorded option whenever you feel even moderate symptoms that may be associated with Covid-19.
Note that the live Zoom component of the Tuesday evening rehearsal will also be recorded, so students who are not able to attend either class may review the class according to their own schedule.
Wednesday Evening – Choir One Members
Following the pattern of our Choir One rehearsals last season, we will use Wednesday evenings strategically next season. Whenever possible according to provincial guidelines we will meet as a full group. But, in the absence of this capacity we will be conducting small group rehearsals by ‘sign-up’ in preparation for solo lines and current recording repertoire. These will occur live at The Heintzman House or by Zoom according to current Provincial guidelines. We will also be using Wednesdays to record Choir One students in small groups and individually as we seek to establish and expand our video audience. Choir One members should plan on having some choir activity on occasional Wednesday evenings between 6:00PM and 8:00PM. The schedule for Wednesdays, however, will be unique for each individual Choir One student.
COVID-19 Key Safety Modifications
Small Groups
In addition to trimming our overall numbers quite drastically, we will be rehearsing in smaller groups (cohorts) of 15 students. We have organized these groups along social and age categories, and you can certainly request to be with your friends!
Staggered Start Times
Each group will have a different start time as noted above. This may change throughout the course of the season, but at least until January 2021 we expect to be rehearsing in groups of 15 as per the schedule outlined above.
PPE & Distancing Standards
We will be issuing Choir One visors and/or masks for rehearsals. Choristers will bring their visors/masks each week at least until the province and particularly the public school board removes this guideline. Additionally, we will mark our rehearsal facility according to distancing standards. The facility will be thoroughly disinfected prior to rehearsal, and we will keep motion to a minimum.
Preparing for 2020: Back to Broadway
Brian, Mark and the band have been in studio over the past few weeks recording everything from technical warm-ups to rehearsal tracks and background tracks we will utilize this September. Have a look at the video below and discover some of the music we will be covering this fall.
Current Assignment: Children Will Listen
A reminder of your current assignment (Choir One only):
Film yourself singing to our band recording of Children Will Listen. It should look like you are sitting at your computer or on your phone, but please use the best video recording device you have (an iPhone, for example, creates significantly better video than the camera on a computer). Keep the camera or phone perfectly steady (by placing it on a stand), and search for your best lighting and background. You do not need to worry about the audio for now, so even lip syncing will be fine. We will be recording the audio in small groups early this fall. Try to wear solid clothes with some character. Remember, once we launch these videos, they will be available for all the world to see, for a very, very long time. Govern yourself accordingly!
Several of you have already contacted us to let us know your videos are complete and ready for upload. That is great! An upload link to Dropbox is included here:
DROPBOX LINK
We will be preparing you vocally for the audio recording portion by small group Zoom classes throughout the month of August. These are optional classes for Choir One members, and are scheduled as follows:
Wednesday August 12, 6:00PM-6:40PM: Zoom ID 898 636 3222
Wednesday August 19, 6:00PM-6:40PM: Zoom ID 898 636 3222
Wednesday August 26, 6:00PM-6:40PM: Zoom ID 898 636 3222