For some people, simply being vaccinated against COVID-19 is enough of an incentive to get a COVID-19 vaccine, but for everyone who inexplicably needs a little nudge and doesn’t have some stupid concern about government microchips, here’s a tip: There’s a chance that a famous musician will also be getting a vaccine when you do, and they will treat you and everyone else to a surprise performance of some kind. That’s actually what happened at a vaccine distribution center in Massachusetts’ Berkshire Community College on Saturday where world-renowned cello player Yo-Yo Ma happened to be getting the second dose of his COVID vaccine, with him putting on a little concert for the workers and other people getting vaccinated while he waited.
This comes from Rolling Stone, which refers to this as an “impromptu” performance, but it’s not like he was there and just happened to see a cello. Granted, if anyone on the planet is just going to happen to see a cello and bust out some Schubert, it’s Yo-Yo Ma, but you don’t put on a cello concert without at least considering ahead of time that you might decide to start playing the cello later that day. Still, it seems very sweet of him and hopefully the people there appreciated how ridiculous this experience was.
Then again, Rolling Stone also notes that Yo-Yo Ma put together a series of “pop-up concerts” (which is a step between “impromptu” and “regular” on the “how planned was this concert?” scale) for essential workers in Massachusetts back in September, so maybe the people of Berkshire are used to seeing Yo-Yo Ma show up at places where he just happens to have stashed a cello by now. “Yes, thank you for inviting me to the grand opening of this grocery store, and… what’s this? A cello? I mean, I guess I could jam, if people want to hear that,” he’d say with a grin and a shrug.
So go and get a vaccine if you can. You never know if a famous person will be there to play some tunes/perform a monologue/pantomime throwing a touchdown pass or whatever.