Cello Professor Emily Taubl felt pained knowing the Covid-19 pandemic had squashed live performances, without a return to stage in sight.

So the cellist got together with violinist Letitia Quante and pianist Hiromi Fukuda to set an ambitious goal.

Taubl, Quante and Fukuda formed an ensemble called the Champlain Trio this January and began visiting venues throughout Vermont to film a six-part documentary series called "Empty Stages: Performances and Stories of Resilience."

The trio first came up with the idea after recording a series of concerts for the Wake Robin Retirement Community and remembering what it was like to play for a live audience.

“After we finished recording the series for Wake Robin, we kept coming back to this idea of missing the stages that we play on all the time in Vermont,” Taubl said. “We’re normally at the Flynn, and we’re all around the state, and the idea of visiting the stages and hearing the stories of the venues kind of struck a chord with us.”

Taubl realized soon that the project would be far different from a typical series of concerts. The musicians would meet a new challenge: learning how to play to an audience of only a camera crew.

“There’s such a difference between playing a live show and recording something, especially as classical musicians,” she said. “We’re obsessed with perfection — probably to a fault — and we can get really in the weeds with small details. So when we go into the recording studio to make professional recordings, it takes forever and we pick every little thing apart.”

The transition was time consuming and awkward, but Taubl said the biggest challenge during the filming process was having to perform in front of an empty audience and see the state of the venues they had missed for so long.

“Seeing the halls empty was painful and really sad to see,” she said. “It was like we had simply walked away. There were still items in the dressing room and lights on downstairs … To go back and see a timestamp from a year ago was really moving.”

The project was a success, though, and the film crew finished the series in April. It is now available on the Vermont PBS website and YouTube, where anyone can watch the performances and learn about different venues across the state.

Taubl called the experience rewarding, and even though she was sad to see empty venues, it was still exciting to return to the familiar feeling of concert halls.

“We felt really lucky to get to go into the venues,” the professor said. “To play the piano in the halls and to hear the acoustics again, it felt like going home.”

Venues are opening up again as vaccination efforts have spread across the country.

Taubl said the return to concerts has been swift, and a little overwhelming, but she hopes the classical music community will start to see some sense of normalcy.

“It was really fun and the perfect Covid project,” she said of the series, “because it was time consuming and it took a lot of creativity and innovative ideas on how to get around safely.”

The Champlain Trio will be returning to live performances this fall, with a concert at the UVM Recital Hall on Oct. 23 at 7:30 p.m. More details about the trio’s schedules can be found online.

Connor Adams is a English Major with a passion for storytelling.