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Ways To Remotely Support the Arts During the Coronavirus Outbreak

During these trying times dealing with the spread of COVID-19, you might need a little more than Netflix and Hulu to keep you entertained.
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Interior of The Guggenheim Museum | Shutterstock

During these trying times dealing with the spread of COVID-19, you might need a little more than Netflix and Hulu to keep you entertained. Here are some digital ways to keep yourself from going stir crazy, while also supporting the arts & culture industry when they need it the most. 

The Metropolitan Opera

The Metropolitan Opera closed its doors. But as the opera company does its part to prevent the spread of COVID-19, you can stream titles from its Live in HD series online. These originally live broadcasted performances begin at 7:30 p.m. on the Met’s homepage. People can stream the performances with the Met Opera on Demand service, but the nightly shows will be available for free for 20 hours after the initial stream. 

Virtual Museums

Even though you’re stuck at home, you can still virtually travel the world by taking digital museum tours. Five hundred museums and galleries teamed up with Google Arts & Culture to bring what they have to offer to you. The British Museum in London and the Guggenheim Museum in New York are just a couple of the sites that have been made available to view right from home. The Nasher Sculpture Center is offering the opportunity to learn more about sculptures in the current exhibition by Barry X Ball from Nasher team members. 

Perot Museum of Nature and Science

The Perot Museum of Nature and Science might be, more or less, empty at the moment, but the need and yearning for learning never stops. The museum recently launched a weekly program that brings knowledge to you called Amaze Your Brain at Home! The museum’s digital guests can learn about winters on Mars, how to concoct a non-Newtonian fluid, formulate their own slime and so much more. 

Dallas Contemporary

Staying home is not putting Dallas Contemporary on pause. The Dallas Contemporary team is making programming available for free online, including activities, lesson plans and more! Check out #DCfromhome on the website.

Frisco Arts

While Frisco Arts has canceled productions, its team wants to see the communities performing prowess. The organization is inviting its Frisco Arts Youth Ambassadors to share the community’s creativity. People can submit work by tagging @FAYTH_Ambassadors in their Instagram posts highlighting their music, dance, theatre, visual art and  culinary skills. 

Piano lessons

Until the end of this month, you can learn how to play the piano at home for free. Frisco Arts member and founder Kristin Yost of Centre for Musical Minds is making her $2,000 value, online instructional piano lessons free throughout the rest of March. 

Music Lessons 

If you’re looking to learn more than piano, Frisco Arts member and founder of 7 Notes – an Authorized Music School, Eileen Tan, has you covered. The school is offering virtual piano, violin, voice and guitar lessons to you with Zoom. With all this extra time on your hands, you might as well actually learn that solo you’ve been air-guitiaring all these years. 

Dance Lessons

The Dance Industry Performing Arts Center is going to keep on keeping on with virtual dance classes hosted by Zoom. The virtual classes began on March 23. If you were already signed up for lessons, the 20-year-old dance company assures you’ll have the same classes, on the same days, at the same times. If you’re not signed up with the Dance Industry, you can head to its website and get registered today. 

Avant Chamber Ballet is offering live private or group ballet and pilate classes via Zoom, Monday through Saturday. The suggested drop-in class donation is $10-20, and private lessons are $50/hour. Check out their schedule on Instagram!

Frisco Visual Arts 

There is no shortage of talented artists in Frisco. You can learn all about them on your home screen thanks to the Visual Arts Guild of Frisco. Each week, the guild will highlight artists like Didi Alkassih, a local painter and photographer. If you have not familiarized yourself with Frisco’s artists and arts scene, now is the time to do so. 

Lumedia Music Videos

If you’re getting tired of just listening to music, you might want to check out the videos that Lumedia Musicworks, a Frisco Arts grant recipient, is putting out. Lumedia brings together some of Texas’ best early music instrumentalists and vocalists to collaborate on different projects. Along with their live performances, Lumedia also helps these artists produce videos to be shown online or at select shows. Hop on over to Lumedia’s YouTube channel to see what these young musicians are cooking up. 

Classical performances 

Dallas Symphony Orchestra is streaming Fabio Luisi’s conducting of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony in his first concert with the DSO as Music Director Designate.

Plano Symphony Orchestra is offering Saturday Concert Broadcasts, starting Saturday, March 28 at 8pm. Tune in to watch video recordings of past concerts on the Plano Symphony’s website.

The Dallas Opera is offering Musical Theater Hits by Jocelyn Hansen, soprano, and Emily Baltzer on piano. Enjoy the recording of this livestream recital of hits from Broadway!

Local live-streamed concerts

One of the wonders of living in North Texas is the area’s vibrant music scene. But, with all the bars and restaurants closing, some of your favorite local acts don’t have anywhere to play. But that doesn’t mean you can see them perform live. Many musicians and taking advantage of Facebook’s livestream feature to keep fans entertained and make a little money on the side. You can check out your favorite local bands’ social media accounts to see when they’ll be jumping online. Keep an eye out for their Venmo, Paypal and CashApp usernames to make donations. 

The Sammons Center for the Arts presented “Jazz of the Cool” on Feb 5, 2020. Stream a recording of this sold-out concert for free on YouTube!

Texas Winds Musical Outreach group Sentimental Journey brings you music by video since they can’t visit in person.

ACT Theatre

Due to the lack of stimulating conversation and community that ACT & its members normally enjoy, the Art Centre Theatre is implementing their YouTube channel as a means to keep everyone together. They’re offering videos of many different areas in the Theatre community such as tech, performing, dance, etc. 

Dallas Theater Center 

Buy a ticket to stream DTC’s recorded performance of American Mariachi and set a price that works for you. Ticket buyers receive email with instructions to access the video within 24 hours of purchase and you’ll have two weeks to watch the show.