Mozart in Quarantine

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed life as we know it since it ravaged the world in March of 2020, and classical music has not gone unscathed. A genre of music spanning centuries on centuries, classical music rests on tradition and continuity. Now, in the face of the unprecedented, it must learn to adapt. 

Nearly a hundred years ago, when the Spanish Flu pandemic hit, countless composers and musical giants wrestled with the disease, determined to continue their music. Stravinsky released the famous septet L’histoire du soldat during this period, known in English as “The Soldier’s Tale.” Perhaps this piece was symbolic of the soldier’s struggle that many musicians felt during this difficult time. 

Prokofiev, then a young, bright-eyed composer, had reached the States just as influenza became widespread. He had begun to gain fame for his work, but the derailing of tours due to the danger of the disease led Prokofiev to proclaim: “To fly from the Bolsheviks to die from Spanish flu! What sarcasm!” Nevertheless, Prokofiev managed to compose the opera Love of Three Oranges, a piece full of humor, fun, and satire — a stark but courageous contrast to the sobering reality of those days. 

The great Polish composer Szymanowski is perhaps the most interesting example of music face-to-face with disease. He had contracted the Spanish flu and was often beset with fever dreams due to the illness. Contrary to being discouraged, it was these same fever dreams that Szymanowski credited as an inspiration for his opera King Roger. Even in suffering, music found a way to claim victory. 

The commonality is clear. There is a well-kept, well-guarded mystery in music that allows one to find rhythm and melody in every part of life, the good and the bad; to find a theme to develop; and to take the dissonance of suffering and convert it into a resolution. 

Classical music has always been convention, but it’s also been about using opportunities to pioneer. That’s how baroque became classical, which then became romantic, which then became modern. The history of classical music is about the balance of progression and conservation. It’s about the Haydns of the world who composed pristine and well-structured music, and the Beethovens of the world who mastered the rules and then broke them. Both types of thinkers are necessary; lose tradition and you enter chaos, but lose progress and you become stagnant. 

This balance has become increasingly important for musicians during this pandemic, who are now tasked with preserving what they’ve worked for, while using this period to find something new. The mystery of music must work for them as it worked for the musicians of old. William Jae, winner of the musical competition “From the Top” for his piece “Alabaster Wool” (I encourage you to check it out on YouTube), and a student at the Eastman School of Music, remarks that the time he had spent alone in quarantine pushed him to make more music and explore different ideas he had never considered pre-COVID. One of the pieces which he composed, titled “Bougainvillea” (a species of plant), was inspired by the “quarantine strolls” he took twice a day around the neighborhood. “I realized more about nature during the pandemic,” he says, which is what led to his attention being caught by the bougainvillea flower. 

A performance of Debussy’s Suite bergamasque by William Jae at the Colburn School.

Jae also spent his time during the summer experimenting with other genres. He observes that “During the pandemic, with more time, I became more bold and experimented with jazz and hip-hop” This led him to make an arrangement of Liszt’s Consolations: a classical jazz version. He also ended up using his exposure to Jazz to create “Constellations,” a piece which he describes as “dreamlike” and was an emotional expression of all the things he had felt in 2020.

Nanor Seraydarian, a student and violinist at Cornell University majoring in music and biology, also reflects on how being in quarantine changed the way she approached music. She recounts preparing Tchaikovsky’s violin concerto the March the lockdown began to spread across the nation: “When COVID hit I tried rushing the piece to perform it before quarantine. I spent the summer fine-tuning the piece and quarantine removed the pressure of performing so I took my time. This time helped my musical maturity and enhanced my passion. I take my time now and pay more attention to the details.” 

Seraydarian’s experience is something a lot of musicians have felt. While it is regrettable that they don’t have opportunities to perform, the extended time they have to themselves gives them an opportunity to hone in on the subtle details of their pieces and compositions. This is an important aspect of music, what separates professionals from amateurs. Contrary to what some non-musicians may think, it isn’t always about the notes and the rhythm. That is only the outer surface of music. It’s not even about the dynamics. What makes it complete is the attention given to how each note is played, the sensitivity given to longer musical themes within the piece, the emotion that is evoked as the piece is developed and interpreted. Being stuck in one place with no deadlines often forces the ear to start critiquing these subtle details. 

A performance of Beethoven's Romance in G major by Nanor Seraydarian at Cornell University

Moreover, quarantine has made musicians value the performance opportunities they had before, and consider alternate approaches to performance. Seraydarian remarks that,“pre-covid, I hated performing. I get super nervous. Now, there are less opportunities to perform because of Zoom. I just realized how important performing is and how much I missed it. You can’t just be a musician and learn for yourself; you have to share it with others. COVID has shown me the importance of performing for others.” The importance of performing for others doesn’t just mean performing for the audience, but performing for your fellow ensemble members. This is something that COVID has substantially changed. Even after quarantine, Seraydarian, who has been playing with her chamber ensemble at Cornell, remarks that, “breathing is important in the chamber, so because of masks we had to overexaggerate our movements and breathing. The over exaggeration affects music playing.”

Every ensemble has a musician that takes the lead. The lead is responsible for cuing, for signaling the beginning of a new musical line, and for making sure the other musicians stay together rhythmically and tonally. This is accomplished with breathing. Breathing alerts other performers to these signals, and performers can literally “sync up” their breathing to stay together. Put masks on, and that gets harder, especially if breathing hard leads to the mask getting sucked up. 

Things get even more complicated with wind instruments. As Jae explains, most conservatories and music performance centers have made policies that require wind players to bring two masks. The first mask for performing must have a hole drilled into it that they can put their mouthpiece into. The second mask (without a hole) is for when they stop playing. Furthermore, they have to put a cloth over the hole the sound comes out of their instrument. Forget the technical implications, even a non-musician could walk in and not only see, but feel how different performance has become in the era of COVID.

Music has always been an emotional activity, because it is a communal activity. That’s because it doesn’t come from the impersonal mind, but comes from the heart, from the center of personhood. This is the source of music’s mystery. It isn’t just a collection of noises assorted in a particular order. It has an almost supernatural effect, speaking to the inner part of a person, creating an empathy that is near impossible to form with words. That’s why many believe that music is the closest real-life thing to magic. And, some might respond by saying that music is more powerful than magic. 

That’s why musicians cannot wait until “the future” to embrace the performance experience. William Jae says that many of his fellow colleagues have begun to invest in audio and video equipment. Musicians have begun to do livestream concerts and start to use online platforms to post videos of their performances. Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, for instance, have created a project called SOUND/STAGE, an online concert film series for performances designed for live streaming. It was launched during the COVID-19 pandemic as a way for the LA Philharmonic to continue giving the gift of music to the community. Many projects like this have been launched across the world. Some musicians, such as the viral Italian opera singer Maurizio Marchini, have recorded videos of them performing music on their balconies for their fellow neighbors and passersby to hear. Music finds a way.

Beethoven, who heard that one of his close friends was grieving the loss of a loved one, went to his friend’s dwelling – having entered, he had no idea what to say to comfort his friend (he wasn’t the most socially flexible person). But he saw a piano in the room and without saying a word, he began to play his music. He played his heart for an hour, then left the room. The friend later described that as the most comforting thing that was given to him. 

That’s why even in the concentration camps, and even in the Communist-occupied regions of the Soviet Union, people have not given up on classical music, but rather used it as a source of unity and camaraderie. 

Performance is an integral component of the musician’s life: performance connects the player to the listener. It allows players to breathe their interpretations, their inner message into the outer world. Understanding the preciousness of this is key, because it makes performance experiences in the future more authentic. 

While musicians in quarantine are experimenting with the digital technicalities of audio and video, musicians performing in-person (with precautions) are experimenting with the physics behind sound. As you might think, musicians in ensemble settings perform socially-distanced,  six feet apart, with masks, but not without drawbacks. As Seraydarian explains, “the sound balance is off because we had to social distance while playing. Because of masks, I can’t see other people’s facial expressions which affects their emotional atmosphere.”

It may seem like a small deal to non-musicians, but the placing of different ensemble players can greatly affect the sound dynamic, especially in concert halls. Even before COVID, the placement of performers was a delicate matter, depending on the very hall they were playing in. How the sound waves bounced off, whether the walls absorbed the sound, how small or how big the hall was, how loud the low-toned instruments like cello or bass could play; these were all important factors. Now they become even more important.

Facial expressions and breathing are also incredibly important. If you thought the emotional connection the performer establishes with the listener was important, then you must understand the gravity of emotional communication between performers. It’s important for an ensemble to be on the same page about the musical, emotional, and spiritual development of a piece. It allows performers to feed off of each other’s energies; to stay together, and to be more passionate about the piece, which in turn creates authenticity. Masks certainly get in the middle of such an intimate, but important component of music-making.

Yet musicians will overcome these challenges, and the many more that await them, because music is truly, and without exaggeration, invincible. Henry David Thoreau once said, “when I hear music, I fear no danger. I am invulnerable. I see no foe. I am related to the earliest of times, and to the latest.” Music takes the pieces of immortality lost in the life of humanity, and preserves it, so that we can connect with anyone who ever dared to make music from the beginning of time to now. Music is a mighty force, which, as Plato said, “gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything.” It is in this magnificent and powerful force that musicians place their unending hope, regardless of the circumstances.