From the balcony of his Parisian apartment, Camilo Peralta, cellist at the Île-de-France National Orchestra, performs Bach's suites for his neighbors. A way for him to "create a bond" in this period of generalized confinement disorder due to the rapid spread of the coronavirus epidemic. "It's a special moment, it's a moment of sharing because I realized that the neighbors liked a lot, he says. They go out when I go out, they start to applaud me and at the end of each dance, they applaud. Me it makes me happy, it makes them happy so I continue, we see how important and necessary it is, the music. "

It is also from his balcony in Warsaw that the Polish tenor Michal Janicki, 29, organizes opera concerts for his neighbors where he performs, among others, Mozart, Donizetti and Bellini. "People's reaction exceeded all my expectations!, He confides. These concerts were intended for a very small audience, I was just expecting a few neighbors on their balconies or their windows. During the first concert, the March 19, there were a lot of people at the windows as well as a few dozen people at the foot of the building. "

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On the other side of the Atlantic, in Caracas, the young Venezuelan Zandu Montoya also pushes the song for the neighborhood. From his small terrace, he plays songs on guitar intended to "entertain people", but also "bring them a good message about what is happening now in the world". At first, however, his vocal impulses were not to everyone's taste. "The first time I tried to sing from the balcony, the neighbors reported me, he says. The police came, but luckily understood and let me continue, but I had to turn down the volume a bit. "

A symphony by e-mail

More ambitious, other musicians continue to play together despite the distance. While he was on a tour throughout Europe with the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra, the British composer and performer John Miles posted on Monday March 30 a video clip in which he and sixty instrumentalists play "Music", the flagship song of their show. "I recorded my part in last Sunday, he explains. The people in the orchestra - I don't know how many there were, maybe more than 70 people, plus a choir, the horn section - sent their game by email and everything was very well organized. "

For the musician, continuing to work is a way of breaking the silence caused by the fact that a large part of the planet has been shut up. "Due to the coronavirus crisis, the world of music is suspended and it will remain silent for a while, but the Antwerp orchestra continues to play from a distance," he said.

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Same process on the side of the National Orchestra of France (ONF). Monday, March 30, the institution also posted on the Internet a "confined interpretation" of "Bolero" by Maurice Ravel. About fifty instrumentalists, confined to their home, filmed their score before being "united" in a single video reproducing the famous song.

In the delicate period that we are going through, the musicians of the National Orchestra of France wanted, despite the distance, "to play together to offer and share with each one what they know how to do best: music, wrote the NFB. Hoping that these universal notes from Ravel will bring you some warmth and comfort. "

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