Opera Singers Help Covid-19 Patients Learn to Breathe Again

Called E.N.O. Breathe and developed by the English National Opera in collaboration with a London hospital, the six-week program offers patients customized vocal lessons: clinically proven recovery exercises, but reworked by professional singing tutors and delivered online.

The program is being expanded to post-Covid clinics elsewhere in England, supported by charitable donations and free to anyone referred by a doctor. The aim is to take in up to 1,000 people in the next phase, the opera company said in a statement.

It wasn’t just patients and clinicians that had benefited, Mollica said: E.N.O. Breathe had also given musicians and producers at the company something to focus on during a bleak time. “Everyone’s found it really motivating,” she said. “It’s fantastic to realize that this skill set we have is useful.”

Read the article at the NY Times – https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/16/arts/music/opera-singers-covid-19-treatment-eno-breathe.html