World-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma gave a surprise concert on Saturday at a vaccination site in Massachusetts.
Mr. Ma, 65, who lives part-time in Berkshires, was spending 15 minutes under observation after receiving his second dose of a Covid-19 vaccine at Berkshire Community College in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. He “wanted to give something back,” Richard Hall of Berkshire Covid-19 Vaccine Collaborative told The Berkshire Eagle.
Clips shared on Facebook by the community college show the masked musician sitting with his cello leaning against a wall, away from other people under observation after being vaccinated. The songs included “Ave Maria” and Bach’s Prelude in G major.
Its post-vaccination performance came a year after the first posted on Twitter about his #SongsOfComfort project, sharing a recording of himself playing Dvorak in an effort to reassure an anxious audience when the blockades started in the United States and elsewhere. Other musicians, professionals and amateurs, soon joined. In December, Ma and British pianist Kathryn Stott released “Songs of Comfort and Hope”, an album inspired by the project.
Last year, Ma also gave a series of pop-up performances with classical pianist Emanuel Ax to small groups of bus drivers, firefighters, healthcare providers and other essential workers in the Berkshires region.
“People need each other to get support beyond the basics of life,” Ma told The New York Times in November. “They need music.”