In frightening times, it makes a huge difference not to feel alone.

Creating art with others in community enhances agency and strengthens self.

Creativity requires an open heart; love enhances hope and diminishes fear.

Pulling my red jacket close against the chill of an early March day, I grabbed my music bag from the car and made my way across the street toward the Mount Holyoke College Abbey.

Once inside, I found myself looking for space among dozens of singers filling the Abbey’s interfaith sanctuary. Adults of all ages dressed in concert black—college students and professors, grandparents and great grandparents and all in-between— were spread across the packed room, taking up every chair, overflowing onto steps. Gathered in circles, many students sat on the floor, eyes on their cellphones.

This concert brought together three longstanding choruses in our valley. Together we would sing Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem after the intermission.

First notes of a violin sounded through the half-opened pink and blue stained-glass windows connecting the sanctuary and the Abbey Chapel/Concert Hall. The orchestra’s tuning had begun; the room fell silent.

The initial piece........

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