
Emily Featherston
Around 120 boys from three different choirs performed together in a collaborative concert.
Vestavia Hills United Methodist Church hosted a unique collaboration Friday as the Birmingham Boys Choir was joined by the Cincinnati Boychoir and the Chattanooga Boys Choir for a joint performance.
Birmingham director Ken Berg said the collaboration was the result of the two other choirs coincidentally traveling through the area at the same time on their summer tours. Having three boys choirs in one place, or even one city, is something Berg said is quite rare.
“We’ve never been able to collaborate with other boys choirs,” Berg said. “We’ve collaborated with dance troupes, with soloists, with other guest choirs, but this is the first time ever that we’ve had three boys choirs on one stage.”
The Cincinnati choir, under the direction of Christopher Eanes visited on the last day of its 11-day tour featuring songs from countries around the world.
“In Cincinnati specifically, we don’t have another boy choir within several hundred miles of us,” Eanes said. “For our boys to be able to get together with people who do a similar kind of thing, actually a very similar kind of thing, is hugely important because they will no longer feel like they do what they do in isolation.”
Chattanooga’s choir, under the direction of Vincent Oakes, made its stop in Birmingham in the middle of its tour highlighting the history of civil rights both in the U.S. and around the world.
“It’s a rare and wonderful occasion to have three accomplished groups like this together at the same time,” Oakes said. “We’ve always had a mutual admiration of each other’s work and it’s great to get that all together in a celebratory verses a competitive way.”
All three directors said it is important for the boys too see others their age doing the thing they love.
“They get to learn about technique and repertoire, just how to interact with each other, because they’re often the only model they get to see,” Oakes said. “It’s great to have 120 or so boys together for an event where the goal is to make each other better.”