Inside an otherwise empty Trinity Lutheran Church in Worcester last Saturday afternoon, the plan called for just Mark Mummert at the church organ while a camera that he had set up would be perched and ready for action.

Four days earlier on March 18, Judith Kalaora was alone at her home wearing a historical costume and about to address her camera.

It was a first for both, but live streaming of performances in place of performing live in front of an audience is a way artists can still connect with people in the COVID-19 era as well as try to financially survive and/or support other artists.

Mummert, cantor of Trinity Lutheran Church, performed a 60-minute concert of organ music on the 335th birthday of composer J.S. Bach on March 21 that could be watched and heard through a free public Facebook Live feed.

Donations were being accepted during the performance (and you can still donate) to help pay performers who lost work and income due to the postponement of Music at Trinity's scheduled full-scale presentation of Bach's powerful oratorio St. Matthew Passion on Palm Sunday at the church April 5. The Bach St. Matthew Passion performance has been rescheduled to Easter 2021.

"I've never performed a concert doing a live stream without an audience present in a room," Mummert said in an interview before his solo organ recital.

"I feel we need to do something now in the arts community to keep people connected, and arts is such a part of our communal life."

Kalaora, founder of the Boston area-based History at Play, or HAP – which since 2010 has presented one-woman and acting ensemble presentations to provide educational entertainment, chronicling the lives of influential and often forgotten women – was getting ready for her first free "HAP ‘n CHAT" social on Facebook Live, to be held Wednesdays at 6:30 p.m. "It's just me," she said of the set-up.

Just as recently as March 7, History at Play put on its "How Long Must We Wait" performance about the struggle for women's suffrage before a sold-out audience at the Worcester Historical Museum, one of many programs it has presented in various locations in the Worcester County area.

Now the Worcester Historical Museum is closed, and Kalaora estimated that she suddenly lost $12,000 in bookings for what were upcoming live performances. So History at Play is "re-branding."

"Hap n' CHAT" will feature Kalaora portraying a different historical character each week. The first was Deborah Sampson, known as "America’s first female soldier," who disguised herself as a man in order to serve in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. Following a 15-minute performance, the character will take questions that people in the Facebook audience can type in.

"Facebook is for new viewers to become engaged and informed. Contributions are always accepted," Kalaora said. She will also discuss how History at Play is doing and its new model of presenting full specific live streamed performances from its repertoire via Zoom Communications that institutions, organizations or any presenter can book and pay for.

"I'm not quite sure what's going to happen," Kalaora said.

"This is literally unchartered territory right now. This is the scariest thing I've ever been through in my life. I'm literally coming up with stuff before I've come up with it."

The April 5 performance of St. Matthew Passion would have been a major event featuring three choirs, two orchestras and vocal soloists. In all, 80 performers, "probably about half of that we were paying," Mummert said.

"We're seeking to raise 50 percent of the wages that we promised. The (April 5) performance was going to be our revenue. We have resources but we don't have unlimited resources, and we really are sympathetic to the hosts of musicians that are losing revenue at this time."

The goal is $10,000, and besides the Facebook recital, another way that could be met would be if people who were planning to attend the St. Matthew Passion donated $25, which was the suggested amount people give on April 5. Anyone is still welcome to contact Mummert about making a donation to pay the musicians (mmummert@trinity.org).

One of the attractions of live streaming is that it "can can draw people from many countries who may want to watch. That's one of the things with social media," Mummert said. A friend of his sent a note to 400 of his friends worldwide about the live streamed recital. "If even a fraction of them watch and even a fraction of them donate, it would help us reach our goals," Mummert said. "My family lives in Pennsylvania and they don't have a chance to see me play. This is a great opportunity for my 93-year-old grandmother to tune in and see me play."

March 21 was also going to be the day of a 12-hour "Bach-A-Thon" put on by the Worcester Chapter of the American Guild of Organists at Trinity Lutheran Church to celebrate Bach's birthday with numerous performances. The event was canceled.

"I also couldn't let Bach's birthday go by," he said of the Facebook recital.

"If you think of ways to be creative you can find ways." One of them is "looking into ways the congregation at Trinity Lutheran can worship."

Public gatherings for Sunday worship at Trinity Lutheran have been suspended, including the participation of the choir, but Saturday mornings the church pastor, Rev. Nathan D. Pipho, and Mummert record a service that can be viewed online Sunday at vimeo.com/trinityworcester. PDF bulletins are emailed to the congregation and posted on the Trinity website so that people can follow and read the words of the sermon, scriptures and prayers, and in the case of the hymns, sing along to them as Mummert plays the organ. The service can also be viewed on several local cable channels during the week.

Saturday's streaming was a success. "It went very well," Mummert said Monday. He wasn't totally alone for the first part of the performance, as a photographer for the Telegram & Gazette/Worcester Magazine showed up to take pictures. Online, meanwhile, 3,700 people "at one point or another tuned into the live stream," he said. The donations were still being tallied, but "it was a very good result," Mummert said.

Mummert can envision participating in other live stream performances. "I'm accumulating skills to enable me to do this in the future. There's nothing like music live. I do want to use every avenue I can to keep music alive and keep musicians alive. I'm sorry to say that I think it's really bad (the coronavirus pandemic situation). We might be in this situation for a longer period than anyone can imagine. What's really sad to me is the Worcester music community has really been blossoming and growing."

It had become possible for musicians to to "survive on a gig workload, especially (if they were) teaching lessons," Mummert said. Besides the St. Matthew Passion, a number of professional classical musicians were going to perform in the Worcester Chorus performance of Brahms' German Requiem March 27 in Mechanics Hall presented by Music Worcester "and many other performances this spring that they were looking forward to," all of which were canceled. "I'm lucky that I'm a salaried musician at the church," Mummert said.

He's heard that efforts are underway to compensate musicians hit by the cancellation of a performance of St. Matthew Passion in Chicago and that at some regional opera companies' singers and orchestra members will get "a portion of their promised pay. But that's not everywhere and its getting harder."

Kalaora said that over 30 History at Play performances have been postponed or canceled.

As she readied to go on Facebook live and worked on the Zoom Communications plan, she said, "I'm excited, but I won't be able to survive if this doesn't work, so I'm really scared. I don't know how long this is going to go and I don't have savings to last for a couple of years. I'm a performer, I'm an artist, you know? I've hustled and now I don't know what's going to happen. I'm almost paralyzed with fear. I'm a survivor and I will continue to survive, but I need to know that people still want this. And if they want this, I'll find a way to get it to them. This is trial by fire right now."

Still, she recalled how she started History at Play after working in Boston as a historical interpreter and seeing that people wanted to know more about characters such as Deborah Sampson.

"I wrote synopses for shows I actually hadn't written yet," Kalaora said.

History at Play now has 12 women it features in its regular performances, including West Brookfield native abolitionist and suffragist Lucy Stone. For the Facebook "HAP 'n CHAT" people can vote each week across History at Play's forums for which character they want to see on a given Wednesday. The announcement will be made at the start of each session. "You never know who you are going to see." Kalaora will be in full costume.

For the paid bookings via Zoom Communications, "It's not me recording it and putting it on a shared site because that negates the need for History at Play to exist," Kalaora said. Each performance is intended to be a unique, immersive and connecting experience for those watching.

"We'll probably continue to offer it even after the mandated quarantine. I've got to offer what I've got to offer."

For more information about History at Play, visit www.judithkalaora.com