Two years ago we were dealing with the "new normal" of being stuck in our homes and sheltering in a place due to the Covid-19 pandemic, adjusting our lives to being at home all day. Two years later we have the vaccines to allow us to go outside and get back to pre-Covid times, but with the caveat that Covid is now likely to be with humankind forever. That in itself takes some getting used to.
I'm writing this on the day I went to a concert featuring Anne-Sophie Mutter, a Grammy-winning violinist who was scheduled to perform, but had to cancel at the last second due to testing positive for Covid-19. Since she was the feature act for a half of the concert (the better half, the one people paid up to come see/ headliner) but had to pull out at the last second, so there just wasn't a second half of the concert. Really unfortunate, but also due to Covid-19 protocols unavoidable. It seems like a paradox in this weird post-vaccine world that people feel safe enough to meet in public and generally go back to normal life, and getting a positive Covid test isn't nearly as scary as it used to be, but then it can still have devastating consequences like a stage performer pulling out, or a U.S. traveler abroad who cannot come home due to testing positive before boarding the plane home (I know a Facebook friend who's currently stuck in that ordeal). The chances of getting it are much higher due to looser mask mandates, more relaxed attitudes, but it's still just that one positive test that can ruin one's plans. Luckily, when MJ and I went to Italy we both tested negative at a pharmacy the morning of our flight home (after a bit of a freakout by MJ the night before that we wouldn't be able to get tested in time), but I had to admit we easily could have tested positive, from so many different dining experiences in a crowded restaurant where we unmasked to eat food, to sitting in crowded train cars full of other passengers, to being shoulder to shoulder in attractions like the Colosseum....any one of those interactions could have given us Covid. PLUS, what's to say that we wouldn't have gotten Covid after we got a negative test? It's not like we suddenly have a shield of invincibility after that negative test, we still had to get to the airport, sit in the Skyteam lounge (thank you Delta Skymiles), and get on a full flight home.....doesn't that increase our risk of getting Covid and giving it to other people? Seems like a silly proposition to just rely on that one test.
My cynical side also thought, "What if this is Ms. Mutter's way of calling in sick/playing hooky?" Covid-19 is a legitimate reason not to show up, but I can imagine that some people have used it as an excuse not to go to work/social event/anything they didn't want to go to but had to make up an excuse for. Right now no one's going to question a Covid test....why not just use it like people used "my tummy hurts" (very convenient as you can't prove that it doesn't hurt) or "personal emergency came up." In the current world of various excuses to get out of things (MJ's hospital constantly has nurses calling out and missing their shifts), Covid-19 could become the new normal of excuses. (But I'm not accusing Ms. Mutter of doing so, nor do I know whether people have to show a positive Covid test to legitamize that excuse). I haven't thought of doing it, I promise! Also I haven't gotten Covid yet and don't want to get it!
I'm not sure what the "new normal" in music is (likely some sort of mix of pop, R&B, and original song-writing), but it's unfortunate that it won't be classical music anymore. At the concert I went to, I looked around the audience and found about 70% of it to be senior citizens. There were some families in attendance (forcing their young children to come with them), some my age, and some college student young adults, but by and large the majority was over 60. I've also seen how these elderly audience members arrive: they come in big buses to the concert hall, likely as a mass migration from the senior living center that they are from. It's a little sad, really, the reality that seniors don't have much to do but go to classical music, but also conversely that classical music concerts have to draw from seniors as their primary audience. It feels like a whole generation of people are on their way out, and along with it the last generation of people who went to classial music concerts en masse. I wonder what will happen in the next generation to classial music....or maybe they'll be some sort of reniassance? Whatever it is, it seems doubtful that it will be a large orchestra full of strings, some woodwinds, brass, and percussion.......just not that much need for human performers at this rate, which is sad for me as a former violinist and appreciative audience membe.
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