“Freaky Friday” the musical was scheduled to hit the stage at West Central Valley High School this weekend, but instead it got the biggest switch-up of all.

Schools across the state are closed until April 13th as per the major disaster declaration for COVID-19, and with that comes the postponement or cancellation of sports and activities for schools, like West Central Valley’s spring musical. Choral and Musical Director Michael Gookin shares his remorse for all high school theatre directors faced with this situation, “It’s really saddening that all of these students put so much work and all of the staff puts in so much work for this production. And I’m just mostly sad that we’re not able to do it at this point. And hopefully we can push it back this semester, hopefully we can find a time.”

For an experiential subject like vocal music, Gookin says he finds it difficult to try to instruct students through video conferencing like other school teachers have tried during the school closure, but he feels lucky to have a great network of choir directors in Iowa he frequently talks with, “Not only do I get to hear different opinions but we just get to talk about how we’re feeling, and what this means for us so I’m really lucky and I’m also going on a call with some of my really good music education friends when I went to college at University of Northern Iowa. I just feel like I need to talk and discuss with people you know, ‘What can we do? What should we do? And how do we get through this together?’ It’s a very odd time.”

The Iowa High School Music Association also cancelled its solo/small ensemble and large group contests this April, and while West Central Valley fine arts events scheduled after April 13th like the “Evening of Elegance” are technically not cancelled, Gookin says everything is on hold until school is back in session.