How a Virtual Dragon Age Choir is Helping Fans Get Through the Pandemic
For me, Project Rising Sun started with a tweet. I saw it on Twitter, and immediately asked if I could join. The idea behind it was for everyone involved to record themselves singing ‘The Dawn Will Come’, from Dragon Age Inquisition, and send it to the organizers. They would put it all together, working out aligning the multiple languages, as well as any videos contributors provided. The hope was to give everyone a creative outlet, and show Dragon Age fans that there’s light at the end of the quarantine tunnel.
I’ve played countless hours of each Dragon Age game, and had nothing better to do than learn to sing one of the most powerful songs from Inquisition, so I was all in. About 100 other people all had the same idea, and that’s how this project began.
The original plan was for this final video to be released around May, but due to delays on the organizer’s end (on top of so many delays in the industry), the video still isn’t finalized. However, no one involved is bothered, because this project gave us all so much more than a creative outlet. It gave us a way to keep ourselves sane whilst stuck at home, worried about our loved ones, and fearing for our future. Most important, it helped us address our mental health.
One participant came to the project having injured herself two years ago. Since then she’s been unable to play the harp, but wanted to play her instrument for Project Rising Sun. On top of rebuilding her hand strength, she was having to relearn the techniques that used to be second nature to her.
Unfortunately, just as submissions were coming to a close, she revealed that she’d only been able to practice for 20 minutes a day, with any more causing her too much pain. Even half of most practice were spent warming up or on strength exercises.
While this was a tremendous blow to the harp player, the reaction from the rest of the group was unanimous. Everyone told them not to worry, even though they felt as though they’d let everyone down. The fact was that we all joined Project Rising Sun to have fun, and the only expectation was that we encouraged each other to produce something that encourages others. The simple fact that they’d been able to play the harp again was more than enough.
Someone else was incredibly eager to sing, but they had crippling performance anxiety. The only person who would see them sing was their boyfriend, but even that was too much when it came down to it.
With some encouragement from the group, and a hand to hold from their boyfriend, they managed to get through the song, crying towards the end. Everyone rejoiced at hearing this, because we all felt that same anxiety, probably to a much smaller degree, when recording our own voices.
Reading this actually spurred me on to record my singing, which I wasn’t sure I wanted to do until the last moment.
A contributor by the name of Quinne told me that they really enjoyed seeing the lyrics and sheet music for The Dawn Will Come. What they loved most was seeing it in so many different languages. They’d never seen so many different cultures come together to work on one project before, at least not one that they’d been involved with too.
On a more personal level, the project helped them during this pandemic by getting them back to learning to read music. This is something that they hadn’t done for years before the project came along. As a completely mental side-effect, this project, and learning to read music all over again, helped them realize what they were most passionate about. As a result of that self-reflection that they were able to do, they’ve started working towards a career in civil law.
Con, another Dragon Age fan who took part, also loved that so many cultures and languages were involved in the project. It brings a completely different sound and feel to the music that you just don’t get with a single language.
In particular they enjoyed surfing the ‘Classe and Country’ Discord channel for the project. Here we all posted our locations and languages from around the world.
Scanning through the channel now I can see so many different countries being represented. Obviously there are a lot of people from the UK and US, but they’re interwoven with those from France, Spain, someone from New Zealand who can also speak German, Canada, Italy, Poland, Indonesia, Israel, Australia, Argentina, and one person from South Africa who was in South Korea at the time.
Con described how nice everyone in the project was to me, and that’s why they enjoyed it so much. I can’t deny that everyone involved is exceedingly nice, even now, with no trace of drama in any of the Discord channels.
For Con, Project Rising Sun came at a time in their life when they were extremely stressed. Practicing for their recording gave them something to do, something to focus on, and above all else, a creative outlet. This helped them relax, forget the stresses they were under, pandemic-related or not, and improved their mental health immensely.
For some this project meant more than just a video or a song, it was a place to hang out and chat with like-minded Dragon Age fans. A contributor called Grey Lethallin shared a couple of pins one day, one of which, Fenris, caught my eye. It turned out that these are actually pins anyone can buy from Grey Lethallin’s Etsy store. We all got so invested that they now run their designs past us in the Discord group before they order the stock to sell.
I don’t know if they benefited mentally from the project, but I think everyone who now owns one of those pins is glad that they got to be a part of it for that reason alone.
One of the admins of the project, HikkoMuri, got in touch with me to share her experience and drive behind the collaborative effort.
When the pandemic hit, she’d just moved across the US to Utah. She had nothing to do, no work, no friends, just anxiety. To top things off, she was also at the end of a recovery period for some soft tissue damage in her arms and shoulders. As a result of that damage, she’d not actually played music for more than a year.
This lack of practice, combined with the injuries, made her relationship with music something that it should never be, complicated. She found it hard to focus on any non-instrumental music projects. But when she saw the chance to join a Dragon Age choir virtually, she jumped on the opportunity.
She was so excited about focusing on anything other than the pandemic that she transcribed ‘The Dawn Will Come’ herself in a day. The opportunity to create new resources for the project was getting her through the day, keeping her anxiety at bay.
Project Rising Sun moved her focus away from the panic that came with the pandemic, and onto a friendly community that seemed impossible given the state of the world, yet there it was. It also helped her remember why she loves music so much.
She explained that the project has evolved since it started, which is why we don’t have a finalized version of ‘The Dawn Will Come’ sung by a group from around the world just yet. But everyone involved is excited to work on it, and eventually share it with Dragon Age fans around the globe.
Of course, it wasn’t all people overcoming mental health struggles. Some of us took part in a game of Dragon Age Cards Against Humanity, and I believe a podcast was even started among some of the contributors.
The most surprising thing that I saw as part of this project was the reaction that everyone had to the organisers delaying the final video release. We all accepted it, and no one kicked up a fuss.
Particularly over the last month or so, it has never been more apparent to me how entitled some people are when they put in even the smallest amount of effort. I think that the pandemic has exacerbated this somewhat, because we don’t see enough of other people to register that they have thoughts and feelings too, we’re all just concerned with our output and being recognised.
Not only was everyone absolutely fine with the delay, and we all still are, some contributors reached out to tell the organisers to take their time. As the pandemic has gone on, people have lost jobs, or have had to adapt to work from home. This put a new level of stress on everyone, and while the organisers didn’t say as much, we could all see that they needed to put their personal lives first for a while.
This reaction is a microcosm of just how wholesome this entire project has been. Even though a final product started as the main goal, this Discord server was a place for us all to come together and help each other with our mental health, despite the fact that we didn’t set out to do that.
Whether it was though anonymously bearing our souls to strangers in the hope of some advice, or a kindred spirit to share our concerns with, or just throwing out cat picture after cat picture, everyone did their part to make everyone else feel special and welcomed.
The coronavirus has taken a lot from everybody this year. Some more than others. What this project showed me, and everyone involved, was that it didn’t take common human decency, and the ability to be kind to others.
As I’ve been putting this article together I’ve had a Robin Williams quote going around in my head. I think that it sums up exactly how the community of Project Rising Sun has acted during this pandemic, and something we should all bear in mind right now.
“Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. always.”
