Greetings, friends of Portal Irish Music Week! It is with great sadness that we have come to the conclusion that we need to cancel PIMW for 2021.
While there were already some unique safety issues inherent in holding a camp in Portal, the aftermath of a global pandemic was not something we decided that we could handle this year. The overwhelming response from you, our students, pointed toward wanting to do the camp in person this year, but only if we could require vaccinations and ensure a safe environment.
However, rural Arizona is different both culturally and politically from many larger cities. (For instance, they are still attempting to pass a state-wide ban on allowing businesses to require proof of vaccination for their services…)
And with the potential of needing to still provide social distancing in a place that is already very limited in space, and trying to ensure that all students, camp staff, and lodge staff are vaccinated made this an insurmountable task.
Although we had a very successful virtual camp in 2020, we believe that the desire for another virtual camp, as our society is starting to open up again, would not be high enough for us to do it again successfully in 2021.
We are regrouping and working on plans for a camp in 2022, so don’t give up hope! In the meantime, many of our instructors offer online resources for learning, and we encourage you to continue to help support them and the music that we all love!
Sincerely, Susan, Pete, and the entire PIMW Staff.
We’ll see you in 2022!