To Jam or Not to Jam

My local group is trying in-person jamming. They had one session on the lawn of a church, but today they will be in the basement - about eight people wearing masks. I'm not comfortable with that.

Singing, even with a mask, is more likely to spread anything than not singing. I doubt that any of these people has Covid, but still...

I rarely go into a store, and I'm not there very long. Playing and singing for 90 minutes is beyond my comfort zone.

Masks will only help a bit in an inclosed space like that with an aerosolized virus. If you goal is to not get or spread covid, stay way from that basement and other non-heavily ventilated indoor spaces. If you DO go, mask for sure, and limit the amount of time you spend, but that is a super high risk situation. See this article in Nature (one of the best academic/translational journals in the world) https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02058-1

No, not a good idea.

I'm with you Jerry. I'm part of a group that has been meeting on Zoom and last week the organizer wanted to meet live outdoors at a park for those willing to come. I sent my regrets. It's still way too soon for something like that. The latest estimation I read on my state is that we won't even reach a peak in COVID cases until the end of October so we're still in the thick of this thing. I'm guessing that there probably weren't more than 5-6 people attending and since they were outdoors I'm guessing they didn't wear masks. I'm sure they were "socially distanced" but when you are singing you are respirating much more than talking and neither is safe right now. As much as I would like it to be safe to attend a live get together it just isn't worth the risk right now.

richntacoma said:

Masks will only help a bit in an inclosed space like that with an aerosolized virus. If you goal is to not get or spread covid, stay way from that basement and other non-heavily ventilated indoor spaces. If you DO go, mask for sure, and limit the amount of time you spend, but that is a super high risk situation. See this article in Nature (one of the best academic/translational journals in the world) https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02058-1

Click to expand...

Thanks for the link.

We've held two jams outdoors at the church that gives us indoor space. Everyone was spaced 6 ft or more apart (unless they were from the same households). Everyone wore masks. A lot of our group didn't attend because they weren't comfortable in those circumstances, and that's OK. We still do jams on Zoom a couple of times a month.

I prefer the outdoor ones. It's nice to see people on a screen but not as much fun hearing only yourself and the song leader play.

YMMV

We are still doing our weekly strum-a-longs on Zoom and I'm good with that right now. A splinter group is going out to a shelter at the lake and doing their thing. I've not attended any of those. Iowa is still a hot bed of corona virus, especially Story County, where I live. I think that some people around here have just gotten so used to the risk level that they have become less aware. But I'm laying low for now. Every spring here we have the downtown music walk. It is a big deal and it gives lots of musicians the opportunity to play. I was all set to do it this year. It would have been my fifth year and I'm kind of a veteran of the festival, so I was pretty excited about it. But it got cancelled. Just last week I got an email from the downtown business association that they are going to hold the music walk in conjunction with an art walk on October 16th and they are looking for musicians to perform in the various stores and on the street corners. On top of that there is a particular women's wear store that I have played in the past years and they contacted me to see if I was going to play there again. Nice to be wanted I guess. I love this festival and it is where I did one of my first public performances, but I'm passing on it this year. I just don't want to take the chance. I have a lot of people that I'm responsible for and I don't want to do anything irresponsible. But it is really tough to turn it down.

Singing is a high-risk activity for spreading the virus. As difficult as it is for many people to fully grasp, uke clubs are now weapons of mass destruction. I have to admit that I get a bit of a thrill looking at people and thinking I could kill you with "White Rabbit." It is, after all, a position of power that ukulele players are not accustomed to wielding.

Alas, power comes with responsibility. Despite the passing thrill of being a truly dangerous woman for the first time in my life, I do not really want to kill anybody. Not anyone at the jam, nor their families, nor people several degrees of separation down the line. I won't argue about probabilities; I do not accept any risk that me attending a jam could help to spread this virus. It doesn't need my help. If my parents could put their lives on hold for four years to fight WWII, I can spend a year playing uke on Zoom.

We must be patient and carry on for a while longer. If we use this time practicing uke and learning to sing better, our jams will sound much better next year.

I went to an outdoor group in Altamont, NY a few weeks back - I was comfortable, about 7=8 feet from the nearest person, and other than when I went across the lawn to show chord shapes to one member - from about 4 feet away - I didn't get near anyone.

One of the members wore a face shield, no mask, but I stayed about 10-15 feet from him.

Overall, I felt very comfortable, but it was outside, in a park.

I'm not ready to join a group inside yet - still don't feel comfortable sitting in a restaurant, so it is all take out.

-Kurt

It's not worth it. We're still on hold from playing in ALFs. There was a meeting today to determine if we're going back to work for one of our monthly clients, but I'm not hopeful. We are 15 to 20 feet from our audiences, but still....they do rapid test everyone who performs, is your group gonna do that?
And singing through a mask, have you tried it? It sucks! My students and I wear masks, but I don't have them singing yet, and probably won't until they can strum and fingerpick with efficiency.
I cancelled a school concert the other day....I for one, don't wanna be around kids right now.
But we sure have fun making YouTube videos.
I don't like Zoom, my groups don't use it, but TBUS does, and if it works for ya, keep doin' it.

Jerry, I'd pass on that. Even with masks, being in an enclosed space for a jam duration sounds risky. Especially with uke players, they're the worst! Seriously, I ain't letting my guard down yet. We've been very careful. Then, on Labor Day weekend, our son's friend came for the weekend at our vacation house. We know him well. He and his family had also been very careful since COVID inception. The next week, he went back to his job, and caught COVID. He's young & strong, will be fine. But scary, since if he'd gone back to work 1 week sooner, he could have been infectious to us when he visited. Food for thought.

My wife’s in a high-risk category so we’re avoiding just about everything until a vaccine comes out. I love the ukulele and ukulele players, but not as much as I love my best friend. ;-)

My local club has been holding outdoor jams, and I wouldn't be averse to joining one of those. But for me, summer is for riding my bikes (~ 6000 miles/year or so), not jamming. Now that the weather is cooling off we do have an indoor jam scheduled at a local shopping mall, but frankly I don't think it is worth the risk. Much like visiting bars and restaurants, it's something I can do without for now.

I also agree with you Jerry, a closed in place singing is not a good idea. I used to meet with an acoustic group on Sundays from 12 to 2 in a park, it stopped with covid, then about a month ago the organizer sent out an email asking we would like to give it a try, I decided to attend with the idea that we would be wearing masks and keep our distance. When I got there at 12, two others were there with masks, but the park had a good number of people that were not wearing masks, mostly 20 and 30 year olds, which made me uncomfortable enough, but when two more members of the group showed up without masks, I left.

My main group has Zoom sessions twice a week, and a couple of weeks ago the member who's backyard we used for our twice a year pot-luck parties sent an email to invite anyone who would like to play together, meet in her backyard, with the stipulation that they must wear a mask and keep distance, plus it would be limited to 8 people (we have over 50 in the group). I attended playing my bass uke, it worked out very well, she even had chairs spread out in specific places to keep distance. We're doing it again in a couple of weeks.

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This is Michael Kohan in Los Angeles, Beverly Grove near the Beverly Center
9 tenor cutaway ukes, 4 acoustic bass ukes, 12 solid body bass ukes, 14 mini electric bass guitars (Total: 39)

• Donate to The Ukulele Kids Club, they provide ukuleles to children in hospital music therapy programs. www.theukc.org
• Member The CC Strummers: www.youtube.com/user/CCStrummers/video, www.facebook.com/TheCCStrummers

Michael, I think that’s smart. Even in an outdoor setting with plenty of spacing, a mask should be essential if you’re singing.

I understand and appreciate anyone’s caution.

ksiegel said:

One of the members wore a face shield, no mask, but I stayed about 10-15 feet from him.

Click to expand...

Outdoors is better than indoors.

A face shield will only protect you from having droplets expelled from someone into your eyes. It does absolutely nothing to protect from aerosols from breathing, talking or singing.

It may protect others if it's long enough from the largest droplets from your sneeze or cough. But the fine mist aerosoled droplets from breathing, talking, shouting or singing will go around the shield and intot he air of the room. High speed thermal imaging has demonstrated this conclusively.

Masks protect others from your breathing, etc. very well. Some better than others. They help to protect you somewhat, but unless it's an N95 grade face mask that's properly fitted to the face, it will not protect you 100% from breathing in fine mist particles in the air. The longer you are in an enclosed space, especially if it doesn't have excellent ventilation, the more of the particles and droplets you will breathe in. Some epidemiologists have concluded there is a level of virus needed for infection. And that's reached in a very short time in a room with aerosols.

In the local VA, anyone who works on a ward with an infected patient MUST wear an N95 mask, gloves and eye protection. No exceptions. Everything is removed when they leave the ward and the use hand sanitizers or antimicrobial soap when they wash. It's all more strict if they are in the room with someone infected.

The insidious thing about the virus is that people can show zero symptoms of infection for days. Interacting with others because they don't know they are infected. Cases are climbing rapidly because sports are being played and several colleges have started up and some of the private schools. People under 20 now account for about 15 to 20% of the new cases here. Because they won't wear masks when they aren't at the school. Nor do they keep a social distance.