February 2021

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Dear Wellesley Symphony Orchestra family,

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Nearly a year after the pandemic began, many orchestras from around the world are still adapting to the circumstances of COVID-19. Many have begun offering streaming performances of their modified seasons. The goal of the WSO is to continue offering music for your enjoyment as much as we can, until we can reconvene at MassBay.

 

With that in mind, we turned to creating a short, virtual performance featuring the whole orchestra. The weekend of Valentine's Day, you’ll be able to watch the entire WSO perform Harry James’ version of the classic tune “You Made Me Love You”!

 

This past December, we released three videos of our brass and woodwinds playing short tunes (you can find them on our YouTube page!). With this new project, we are taking the next step by including the whole orchestra.

 

This new production style has evolved because at this time we cannot play music in the same space. Instead of gathering in a hall, rehearsing the music as one, and recording the music, each player records their part individually on their phone or computer and those parts are edited together to create the complete whole. This process opens the door for many new challenges (notably how do 50+ people play exactly together when they cannot hear each other!), but this is also a tremendous opportunity. Virtual performances can never replace what we do in the hall, but we hope that our musical community will be strengthened by playing for you again. We are eager for the time that we can get back to playing live music together, but until then, we are glad we have found a way to keep making music together!