The second of two Awesome Ottawa awards for May goes to Carol Ann Northcott and the Ottawa Children’s Choir to support the production of a virtual end-of-year concert.

“With COVID-19,” explains Carol Ann, “the Ottawa Children’s Choir has moved all its rehearsals online. This is a stressful time for everyone, and music, singing, and togetherness is a huge help. Every spring we put on a concert to celebrate the hard work of the approximately 200 choristers aged 6-15 in our five choirs, so we didn’t want to end the year with only rehearsals – we wanted a goal and a vision to work towards, to help motivate and inspire everyone along the way. So we are developing a virtual concert!”

“Each chorister in each choir will record themselves singing alone at home,” Carol Ann continues, “and the individual recordings will be combined into 11 choral pieces. The concert will be free and promoted broadly. We hope it will provide a fun experience for our choir community, but also for our larger community in Ottawa. For example, we would normally have had choirs performing in senior homes and at charity events, neither of which is possible now. Nothing is more uplifting than hearing kids' voices raised in song!” The free concert will be broadcast online at ottawachildrenschoir.ca on Sunday, May 31, at 3 PM.

Carol Ann is the Chief Risk Officer at the Bank of Canada and the President of the Ottawa Children’s Choir.