In spring 2021, Merrimack voice students were led by Cristi Catt, a voice instructor at Merrimack who got extra creative during the pandemic. Catt facilitated collaboration with WMCK, Merrimack College’s radio station, to give students the opportunity to perform this past year.
“I wanted to keep students present in a time when traditional singing recitals and performances were a challenge,” Catt said.
Catt had the idea to record the students and play their performances over the college radio. The project not only gave students the opportunity to perform but also taught them real-life skills such as collaboration, communication and the process of creating and producing their own works. The songs were played on a Merrimack radio show hosted by Angela Walukevich.
Along with the radio performances, students organized virtual recitals that were filmed and uploaded online. The videos were filmed by student Emily Woods, ’23, and featured Merrimack seniors Derek Henry and Meghan Sweitzer.
Sweitzer’s performance of J’ai deux amours was backed by the Merrimack Jazz Combo with Andrew Leuci on guitar, Stephen Jovellas on bass and Gavin Burke on drums. Other voice student performances were by Riley MacDonald, Gabriela Scarpelli, Krista Brown, Brooke Kennedy, and Sarah Scougall. You can find all the student voice recitals on the VPA Youtube Playlist.
