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The Southern AZ Virtual Choir Festival, under the direction of Girls Chorus Executive Director Marcela Molina, is accepting applications from boys and girls who attend schools in ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥, Sahuarita, Marana and Oro Valley to participate. Registration is open until April and virtual rehearsals will be ongoing through the spring, when the Girls Chorus will premiere a video of the festival choir singing a new choral work composed to for virtual choir.

The festival "is really a tool of connectivity and healing," Molina said. "It is for people to sing about hard things, how we can overcome challenges through music.�

Initially, the festival video was to premiere in late November, but after talking to choir teachers at area schools the chorus pushed the project back to the spring. The group will perform "Begin," a new work written for virtual choir.

Molina said the festival is open to boys and girls and there is no limit to the number of vocalists they will admit.

"The more the merrier," she said. “As many as want to sing. That’s the beauty of a virtual choir.�

The festival takes the place of the Girls Chorus's children's music festival held in the fall and its young women's festival that it normally holds in the spring. Both events are on hold in response to COVID-19, which has limited the girls chorus's in-person rehearsals.

Last spring, ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ Girls Chorus hosted its annual concert online, which Molina said was a bit of a primer for the bigger festival concert they will make next spring. That performance will come from dozens of videos submitted by festival choir members singing their parts. Girls Chorus officials will then edit those videos into a single performance, which will premiere in May.