After two and a half years of personal devotion to leading Taizé singing online, David Robinson has decided to step back a little from conducting a global choir 3 times a week, to continue hosting the Tuesday morning sessions. Now is a good time to recognize, remember and appreciate – despite the Covid lockdown restrictions – how David Robinson not only filled a longing and need to sing that is core to the identity of the Findhorn experience but co-created a unique way of deepening our noosphere (as Teilhard de Chardin described conscious interconnections) by creating global harmony. 

Before Covid many of us took global connections for granted. We met friends anywhere. We attended workshops. We sang in ensembles, choirs and church. We travelled to the other side of the world.

So, when the doors shut during lockdown it was hard to imagine how we could keep up our connections, let alone create joyful routines that enlivened the soul. But David Robinson had an imagination that embraced technical expertise, natural environments and a love of singing. Especially through singing the sacred songs of Taizé – a 30 year tradition at Findhorn Foundation, where David had become a Taizé leader at the Cluny, Forres location.

When Taizé regular Karin Werner suggested singing Taizé on Zoom, David began to experiment with Zoom Taizé that not only engaged singers at our usual Scottish locations but had the possibility of embracing singers globally. David converted our weekly in-person schedule to Zoom Taizé on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and on Sundays for a full hour. He made playlists sourced from original recordings from the Taizé community in France, individual performers and Findhorn-related musicians (particularly Barbara Swetina who brought Taizé singing to Findhorn in the late 1980’s and Kathy Kennedy in the Borders). David emailed the playlist music and words to a contact list (which has grown to 500), the day before each encounter.

Most readers will know that Zoom is a powerful and generally easy technology. However, Zoom (and the internet) has a latency period that varies depending on your computer and location, impacting people who sing as a choir or group – instead of harmony we hear cacophony. The paradoxical solution David offered was to put all singers on mute!! So, what we heard was the beautifully performed song track and our own voice. We could choose to sing any of the 4 voices – bass, tenor, alto, soprano – and we could see the entire gallery of global singers accompanying us.

Strange as this may sound, it created a wonderful community of Taizé devotees who expanded out from Forres/Findhorn across the UK into Europe, Africa, Middle East, India, North and South America, Australia and even Japan. Many people were regulars – especially the Japanese singers – whose local time was at the other end of the day to David’s Scottish morning start. 

Over time, David’s playlists included personal recordings from regular attendees (and himself) – from Germany, Japan, England. David became an expert Zoom host, using his technical fearlessness to combine and recombine harmonies, spotlighting the special expressions of drummers, dancers (who usually spiralled into action on the last upbeat song) and even babies (born during this period). As an added feature, David offered informal Zoom Breakout rooms of 3 or 4 singers after every Taizé session. 

He also invited different readers for Eileen’s Guidance and on Sundays often we were led by one of 13 guest hosts who selected a unique playlist, shared poetry and even solo instrumental performances.

After two and a half years, David’s Zoom Taizé has created a transnational community that has spawned both new “face-to-face friendships and a lively WhatsApp group of 50. It has also donated nearly £16,000 which David has generously given to FF, CCC, NFA and others.

David became fascinated by the globality of the Zoom Taizé experience – encouraging interconnections, drawing out passions, performances and participation. David’s initiatives co-created and integrated new life conditions – not just for the 4 voices of harmony, but with human habitats around the world. This unexpected consequence of a musical nature has become a thriving expression of the noosphere that connects us all.

Marilyn Hamilton, Integral City Meshworks

 

Other Resources:

Read Integral City Blog (as source article) here: https://integralcity.com/2022/08/29/harmonizing-the-noosphere-david-robinson-zooms-outward/

Listen to full Interview with David Robinson here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJha1ThcpwM&list=PL4e6YqnCRQfBRYntdSKr85ntW6sXdq9lC&index=2

Send David a request to be included in the Taizé Zoom communications here.