Disney Magic
At Disneyworld in Orlando
We went to hear the Voices of Liberty at the American Adventure pavilion in the World Showcase. I love their harmonies, and they didn’t disappoint. For those of you who have never been, this is a group of ten a cappella singers who stand in the middle of a grand rotunda and perform several times each day. There are a few benches around the room, but most of the spectators sit on the floor in front of the singers.
On the day we were there, one of the members of the audience started to act strangely. A young man started waving his arms, moved close to the performers, and threw his phone across the floor in front of them. That drew my attention to him. He was wearing a cotton jersey, and his hair was disheveled. He moved in sudden bursts, not fluidly, as though he was thinking about his movements before they started. He paused as he looked at his phone on the floor, then he scrambled over to retrieve it. As I watched him, I could see a familiar look in his eyes. He was neurodivergent in some fashion, and his gaze fluctuated between being slightly dull and unfocused to intensely direct. His companion, or friend, or family member, tried to get him to come back to sit with the rest of the audience, but he was too engaged in what he was doing with the singers.
I was imagining all kinds of ways that things could get out of hand. He could interrupt the show, could physically assault the singers, could get loud and obnoxious. When his friend attempted to bring him back into the audience, he could have become combative. But none of those things happened. Instead, he stood up next to the group’s director and started to mimic her conducting movements. As she waved her hands in time, he waved his hands a little more erratically.
The director was kind and gentle. She acknowledged him as they conducted together, didn’t make any attempt to make him stop, and kept on with the program as though nothing was happening. The audience, meanwhile, was concerned. You could see it in their faces and in their tense postures.
The Voices of Liberty didn’t miss a beat. They sang beautifully.
After the performance, we were able to talk with the director for a few minutes. We complimented her on how she handled the situation, and she downplayed her part. She said that she wasn’t sure what to do, so she just rolled with the situation. Disney doesn’t release the names of the Voices of Liberty, but she deserves to be recognized. It felt like Disney magic to me.
