(From left) Marissa Resmini and Becca Longhenry of the Richmond Philharmonic Orchestra play at a COVID-19 vaccination site at the Richmond Raceway Complex. (Photo courtesy Richmond Philharmonic)
To many people, becoming eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine is like music to their ears. On some days, volunteers at the Richmond Raceway Complex vaccination site can provide a shot in the arm along with some actual live music.
Since late January, the Richmond Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) has been organizing performances for patients receiving COVID-19 vaccines at the Raceway Complex.
“People just recognize on some level that music can provide those therapeutic kind of attributes,” says Dave Davis, president of the Richmond Philharmonic's board.
While mask requirements nix performances featuring wind instruments, the RPO has organized performances of everything from string quartets to a keyboard-guitar duet.
“They've had folk music artists, they've had jazz, they've had some sort of almost country music,” according to Tony McDowell, Henrico County’s deputy manager for public safety. “It's been a variety. It's been really nice.”
The idea for musical accompaniment to the vaccination process came from a conversation between McDowell and a friend of his who plays for the RPO. Early on in the vaccine rollout, McDowell was thinking of ways to put elderly patients at ease after they had been afraid to leave their homes for almost a year.
“We started with people who are aged 75 and older, and this is a population that [has] had a lot of negative impacts from COVID,” McDowell says. “A lot of people in this group of seniors have been practically shut-ins for the past year because of COVID.”
According to McDowell, the RPO performances have helped bring a more “human” experience to the vaccination process.
“We could feel the anxiety coming from this group of our population,” McDowell says. “We wanted to make it as streamlined and efficient and nonintimidating a process as possible.”
Davis says that effect has been noticeable. What struck him particularly was something an elderly patient said after getting vaccinated.
“When she gets her shots, she gets up, and she kind of shuffles over to where we were set up,” Davis says. “And you could just see her smiling behind that mask [as] she said, ‘This was the first live music I've heard in a year.’ ”
The RPO is a volunteer-based orchestra, so most of the performers have taken time out of their busy schedules to play.
“Most of our folks have day jobs,” Davis says. “We've had some folks who have taken their lunch hour and gone over there and played during lunchtime.”
McDowell says having volunteers from the RPO play at the sites has made his job “more enjoyable,” and it’s one of many examples of how an emphasis on community during the pandemic can “restore your faith in humanity.”
“For many of them, this is a service to the community, even outside of COVID,” McDowell says. “You see people doing this voluntarily –– just seeing musicians and other volunteers giving up their Saturday afternoon or all day on Friday to come out and just make the experience just a little bit better for other people.”
