With the majority of Washington University’s in-person performances, concerts and exhibitions canceled since early last March, the Student Life arts and entertainment section, Cadenza, has had to reckon with a drastic shift in artistic production and consumption. Listen to Cadenza editors juniors Isabella Neubauer and Sabrina Spence discuss the current state of arts on campus. This episode was hosted by Staff Reporter freshman Olivia Poolos. Staff reporter freshman Kamala Madireddi edited the audio. Copy Chief junior JJ Coley wrote the theme music.

Christine Watridge

Editor’s Note Episode 14: “Arts make a comeback” can also be found on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Soundcloud.

The transcript of the episode can be found below. It has been lightly edited for clarity:

Transcript

OLIVIA POOLOS (0:08-1:18) It’s almost impossible to name a student organization on campus that COVID-19 hasn’t impacted—and the arts and entertainment sectors are no exception. With the majority of Washington University’s in-person performances, concerts and exhibitions canceled since early last March, the Student Life arts and entertainment section, Cadenza, has had to reckon with a drastic shift in artistic production and consumption.

I’m Olivia Poolos, and you’re listening to Editor’s Note, Student Life’s weekly podcast breaking down our biggest stories with the reporters and editors that covered them.

Juniors Sabrina Spence and Isabella Neubauer have seen a lot of campus shows since they became Cadenza editors back in April of 2019. I sat down with them to talk about the current state of the Wash. U. art scene and how their content has evolved over the last couple of semesters.

In a typical year, Neubauer’s role as a Cadenza editor involved attending multiple events per weekend.

ISABELLA NEUBAUER (1:19- 1:36)nI would go to an event on Friday night, an event on Saturday night, and I would write both of those events up for the Sunday paper. And obviously that’s not something that we’ve been able to do but before it was definitely like, go to an a cappella concert, go to a theater production and physically be there.

OP (1:37-1:50) Looking back to March and April of last year, most of the Cadenza headlines had the word “canceled” in them, as you described how COVID-19 wreaked havoc for arts clubs and organizations. What was it like covering those few months?

IN (1:51-2:27) It was hard to reach out to people and say, ‘Hey, I know this was something you were really excited about that you can’t do anymore. Will you talk to me about that?’…There was one piece I did on the All Student Theater production last year and it was a senior that had written the show and was going to see her show performed and all of a sudden that had been taken away because of COVID. And so, at least for me it was hard because I was a sophomore and so I wasn’t experiencing this kind of loss in the same way that a lot of the upperclassmen were.

OP (2:28-2:46) Spence is a member of a plethora of theater and art organizations that prevent her from covering a decent amount of performances due to conflict of interest. But that meant when productions were canceled in March and April, Spence had a first-hand account of just how devastating it was to the students involved.

SABRINA SPENCE (2:47-3:10) For me, having all of these events canceled was very personal, because they were events that I was very much excited to put on and produce and that I was actively working on. So for me, not only was it, ‘Wow, all of these things are canceled,’ it was more of a, ‘Wow, all of the things that I love are canceled.’

OP (3:11-3:23) As the new academic year came into view, Spence and Neubauer realized that operations on campus were not returning to normal anytime soon. Their Cadenza coverage would have to continue to be flexible and creative.

OP (3:24-3:37) Looking at some of your coverage, you definitely talk a lot about more Netflix shows, or music—was that a conscious decision that you made, or did it just sort of happen naturally as events were canceled?

SS (3:38-3:59) I think it kind of happened naturally, just because those are the mediums that people are really consuming right now…Talking more about Netflix shows and movies and music that’s being released is kind of our way of bringing our normal content to the people and the current circumstance.

OP (4:00-4:13) Spence and Neubauer had to make some tough decisions about whether to risk health to cover performances. In November, The Pageant, a live music venue on the Delmar Loop, scheduled a low-capacity concert.

IN (4:14-4:33) I was stuck in this position as an editor where I’m like, ‘That would be a really interesting thing to cover, the Pageant’s first concert during coronavirus,’ but knowing that I can’t send a writer to that. That it’s very irresponsible of me to ask someone to potentially expose themselves to the coronavirus in order to get a story.

OP (4:34-4:45) It seems like a tricky balance between trying to cover everything responsibly and trying to keep your reporters safe. Were there any clubs that had particularly innovative ways of getting around the COVID-19 risk?

IN (4:46-5:32) Yeah. So I think it was in April that Mosaic Whispers, which is one of Wash. U.’s a cappella groups, did a collaboration not only with the club but with all of its alumni where they made essentially an a cappella song that they recorded over Zoom. And it was their club’s song. I think about 80 people were able to participate and they melded it all together online with people sending in their own Zoom recordings of themselves singing. And they were able to put on kind of, not a virtual concert because it was a five-minute song, but they were able to still sing and to still share their work with people that way, which was really impressive.

OP (5:33-5:46) Spence also noted that student theatre groups like Thyrsus, which has dabbled in radio plays, and the University’s Performing Arts Department, have utilized recorded performances. Spence says it’s really changed how the actors prepare and perform.

SS (5:47-6:10) When you do a show live, you go through it, and you’re done. Whatever happened that night—that’s just what happened. But with recording you can do things over and over again until you get it ‘perfect.’ Which is interesting, because normally the perfection and the beauty is in the little mess-ups that happen live.

OP (6:11-6:25) So, you’re talking about both the negatives and the positives of putting on virtual performances. Do you think that the art scene will continue to utilize virtual performance? Or are people pretty eager to just go back to the old normal?

SS (6:26-6:50) I would say that virtual performance is going to be something that we see a lot more, just because it’s making performance more accessible. Because not everyone can go out and spend money on tickets to go see a show, or they just don’t have the time to do that. But with virtual performances, you upload it to wherever and you have these set streaming dates.

OP (6:51-7:03) Even though many music and performance clubs have returned this year, most are planning to stay virtual until further notice. Neubauer said she wasn’t optimistic about a mass return to in-person shows.

IN: (7:04-7:20) As the semester progresses we’re definitely going to see more coverage of events, especially that are localized to Wash. U.’s campus, than we saw last semester, but I don’t think it’s going to get anywhere to the point where we were before last March.

OP (7:21-7:31) Still, both Neubauer and Spence agreed that with one semester of online activity under their belts, the performing arts organizations will come back stronger this spring.

IN (7:32-7:50) People are really getting to the point where they’ve experienced Zoom and they’ve experienced doing arts and entertainment virtually enough that they’ve been able to figure out how they want to do that and how to still produce content, and I think that by the end of the semester we’ll be seeing a lot of that content released to us.

OP (7:51-7:57) Despite the lack of live performance, Spence and Neubauer are proud of what Cadenza has been able to safely cover.

OP (7:58-8:01) What were your favorite pieces of Cadenza this academic year?

SS (8:02-8:17) One of our writers, Grady Nance, has been brilliant with his movie reviews and film takes. I have loved reading them––everyone should read them; they’re fabulous––but those have been some of my favorite pieces.

OP (8:18-8:37) Neubauer was especially excited about Student Life’s take on Spotify Wrapped, where 15 staff writers analyzed their streamed music statistics from 2020. Neubauer said that even though the article was about art, it was also a personal reminder about how art can define a time period in our lives.

IN (8:38-8:51) It really got me thinking about not only the music that I listened to this year but… It’s a retrospective. And even though it’s about music, I feel like it’s a retrospective that reaches out to a lot more than that.

OP (8:53-9:00) Editor’s Note will be back next week to break down another developing story. For Student Life Media, I’m Olivia Poolos.