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On Wednesday at noon, Lisa Bullwinkel stepped outside her home on Fulton Street in Berkeley and led seven of her socially distanced neighbors in a stirring rendition of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” Sage Spatz, from up the road, brought along a tambourine. Twelve-year-old Lucca Levitch waved an Oakland A’s pennant from his porch.
The scene didn’t quite look or sound like those heartwarming YouTube videos in which Italians passionately sing and play music from their balconies during the coronavirus lockdown. But the spirit behind it was just the same.
It was a reminder of what many of us are missing in our lives these days — the baseball season was supposed to start this week. It also was yet another encouraging sign that community solidarity can go on, even during a pandemic.
“I’m just doing what I can do as a citizen during a very crappy time,” said Bullwinkel, who plans to hold singalongs on a weekly basis. “It’s a way to lift our spirits up for a few minutes. You can still love your neighbor — from a distance — and have a good time.”
She’s not the only one who has the music in her. Similar get-togethers — call them porch parties — have been breaking out all across the Bay Area as residents attempt to sing and dance their blues away.
For example, on North 16th Street in San Jose, Shelly Glennon invited her neighbors to bust a few moves on their porches or driveways at 3:30 each afternoon. Mark Phillips, a neighbor who works in the theater world, brought out his sound system one day and the party was on.
“It’s completely transformed my state of mind,” Glennon said. “They’re singing from the windows and balconies in Italy. I can’t sing, but I can do this.”
And Glennon hopes the dance-dance revolution goes wide.
“My hope is by the end of this, all of downtown is opening their doors at 3:30 and dancing their hearts out,” she said.
And then there are the folks living in the Phoenix Arms co-housing unit on 29th Avenue in Oakland. Many of the residents there are senior citizens in “the higher-risk demographic,” according to Angela Hunkler, 75, and “are terrified” of COVID-19.
But that hasn’t stopped them from taking to their balconies at 6:30 each evening and getting their groove on to songs like Neil Diamond’s coronavirus-inspired update of “Sweet Caroline,” featuring lyrics like “Hands . . . washing hands . . . Reaching out . . . don’t touch me, I won’t touch you.”
“It raises your endorphins. You feel good. You see people you haven’t seen all day,” Hunkler said. “And we all sing — even if we don’t know the words. There’s no need to be perfect.”
Hunkler and her friends take turns choosing which tunes to sing and dance to. Someone busted out a boombox and another resident else dragged his keyboard out onto the balcony.
“We all want to hug each other, but we can’t do that now,” she said. “But we can dance and sing. We’re making lemonade out of lemons … It’s a wonderfully unifying activity.”
Sonya Hunter and Erik Pearson, residents of Southwest Berkeley, had a similar objective when they began appearing on their porch at 6:30 on weeknights, armed with guitars. The idea? Have a little fun and belt out some songs that feel fitting for the social-distancing moment, like Richard Thompson’s “Keep Your Distance,” or “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” by the Police.
“This situation is so new to us and there are so many emotions that we’re cycling through right now,” Hunter said. “I love to feel like we’re providing a moment of reflection and a little entertainment at a stressful time.”
Pearson, a professional musician, agrees.
“It’s nice to see some passersby kind of stumble upon the scene and enjoy what they’re hearing,” he says. “We don’t want to encourage congregating, but everyone is good about finding their own spot. It’s nice to form that sense of connection, even for a few minutes.”
Tim Volz, one of the neighbors who joined Bullwinkel’s “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” singalong in Berkeley, believes such bonding activities are simply good for the psyche right now. He plans to be out there again next week.
“It’s important to take a few minutes to get out of the house,” he says, “and remember that we’re not prisoners.”
Staff writer Sal Pizarro contributed this story.
Contact Chuck Barney at cbarney@bayareanewsgroup.com. Follow him at Twitter.com/chuckbarney and Facebook.com/bayareanewsgroup.chuckbarney.