The art of masks

“I play oboe and it’s really easy to break your reeds and with this [mask], you have to put it through fabric and try not to break it. We also have masks for our instrument. We haven’t gotten those yet, but supposedly they just go over the bells of the instrument, which is just going to muffle our sound.”

“[The theater masks] were the most uncomfortable thing ever. They were clear, but they had foam adhesive on the nose and chin in order for it to rest easily. They would fog up so much and it caused our mouths to disappear even more.”

“[Singing with the masks] was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be. They stick out two inches away from your face. It makes it a lot easier to project your voice, but it’s still really difficult to open your mouth wide.”

"We have everybody in the Keating theater, all spread out. We’re working on solo and ensemble stuff right now and we’ll go out in little groups. We have little covers for our instruments and we have to have these weird masks on, with a slit in it to shove our mouthpiece through. It’s weird but it works. It’s still fun because we get to play, but it’s not the same."...

“Twenty-two people got accepted [to crew for The Birds], so not everyone was able to do it, sadly. They mostly picked sophomores, juniors and seniors, but there were two freshmen. Everybody had to wear masks. Nobody had them under their nose or anything. We tried to work with the shop doors open that lead to outside, so there would be air circulating, but we had to be inside because you can only...

"During choir class, we have our singer’s masks on, but because singers are known to be super spreaders of COVID, we have to take a break for five minutes so the air can be filtered through every thirty minutes. It’s weird having people on Zoom who you can’t hear at all because they have to be muted and having the other half in person. Because only a certain number of people are in person for eac...