The fateful March of 2020 brought the curtain down on in-person performances and rehearsals for the children and youth voices animating the Ottawa Catholic School Board (OCSB) choirs.

There are no ugly angels. In the entire 10,000-year history of art, from the caves of Lescaux through the Mystical Nativity of Sandro Botticelli to Ms. Fleming’s Grade 3 art class, every single depiction of angels is a depiction of beauty. Opera Atelier co-artistic director Marshall Pynkoski knows why.

It has been nearly five years since Come From Away debuted and enraptured big-city theatre audiences with its musical depiction of how the people of Gander created a ray of light within the darkness of 9/11 for nearly 7,000 Americans forced to make an emergency landing in the remote Newfoundland town.

Resurrecting The Resurrection has not been easy. Over 80 singers, dancers, musicians, set designers and more have been through quarantine, donned masks, practised at a distance to remount an Opera Atelier production that was stopped dead in its tracks just before Easter 2020.