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🙌🏼 We are completely overwhelmed by the warm welcome we received at Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church in Selma, Alabama. This building is a beacon for the Civil Rights Movement and today we gathered inside...

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On our way!

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Hurricane Nate....uh oh....praying our flights get through!

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Hurricane Nate....uh oh....praying our flights get through!

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Lavender Pen Tour | San Francisco Gay Men's Chrous (SFGMC)

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Book tickets or donate to our Lavender Pen Tour as SFGMC travels to 5 states in 7 days sharing our music.

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Here we are at Grace Cathedral for our sendoff show!

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Holy cow! Holly Near is joining us in Charlotte and Greenville!!!!!!

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Holy cow! Holly Near is joining us in Charlotte and Greenville!!!!!!

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Here's a solo I did...first the audition snippet then the real deal at the gala!

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Out on the town in Jackson, Mississippi being home of the blues and all.

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Out on the town in Jackson, Mississippi being home of the blues and all.

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Howlin' Wolf, BB King, Pinetop Perkins, Elvis and ....

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Howlin' Wolf, BB King, Pinetop Perkins, Elvis and ....

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This church has a bluegrass band! Warming up...

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The State Flag of Mississippi still has the confederate flag on it.

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The State Flag of Mississippi still has the confederate flag on it.

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Members of The San Francisco Gay Mens Chorus and the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir gather on the steps of the Mississippi State Capitol to sing. ( Photo: Chloe Veltman/KQED)

Around 200 members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus, together with some 50 singers from the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir, gathered on the steps of the State Capitol Building in Jackson, MS to sing a message of love and unity on Sunday.

The gesture kicked off a concert and outreach tour of five southern states - Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina and North Carolina - and was intended as a powerful message to state legislators just days before a controversial law, House Bill 1523, takes effect across the state.

Also known as "The Religious Liberty Accommodations Act," HB 1523 gives businesses the right to refuse service to LGBTQ people due to religious views or preferences.

"As of this week it will be legal for any business owner in Mississippi to tell your pastor he can't have lunch in their establishment, to tell me I can't sleep in their inn, to tell me I can't buy from their shelves," said Robert Lowry, pastor of Fondren Presbyterian Church in Jackson. Lowry spoke with passion about the bill during his Sunday morning sermon, at which select Gay Men's Chorus members sang. Lowry is gay.

Lowry said this week is a turning point for Mississippi because of the passing of the highly-contested bill, and that the Bay Area singers' visit sends a powerful message.

"The religious liberty law is really a law for discrimination," Lowry said in an interview before the service. "It's important the choir is visiting right now, coming and celebrating and sharing their gifts and bringing this message of wholeness and peace and community into our community."

Spreading a sense of hope and solidarity to some of the most vulnerable parts of the country's LGBTQ community is one of the main goals of the Gay Men's Chorus's "Lavender Pen" tour. The chorus canceled its 40th anniversary international tour plans a few days after last November's presidential elections in order to undertake what the organization felt was a more pressing outreach mission at home.

"We wanted to be more radically inclusive," said Gay Men's Chorus staffer and former singer with the group, Peter Zimmerman. (Zimmerman even dyed his hair lavender in honor of the tour's title.)

Zimmerman said his organization expects around 800 people to attend Sunday evening's concert at Jackson's Thalia Mara Hall. All proceeds from ticket sales will benefit non-profit, LGBTQ support organizations. These include Project One America, the transgender education and advocacy program of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the AIDS Services Coalition based in Hattiesburg.

The Gay Men's Chorus has also offered some partner organizations free tickets. These include My Brother's Keeper, which provides health services to minority and marginalized communities in the region, and is bringing around 150 of its patients to the concert.

"Many of the patients that we serve have never been to a concert or even set foot in Thalia Mara Hall," said Deja Abdul-Haqq, director of organizational development at My Brother's Keeper. "So it's a really exciting opportunity for us."

Bay Area Choruses Sing Out in Mississippi Against Anti-Gay Bill

Author

Chloe Veltman

Chloe Veltman is senior arts editor at KQED.

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Bay Area Choruses Sing Out in Mississippi Against Anti-Gay Bill

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Around 200 members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus, together with some 50 singers from the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir, gathered on the steps of the State Capitol Building in Jackson, MS to sing a message of love and unity on Sunday.

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And...I get to sing a solo at Thalia Mara. Squeee

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And...I get to sing a solo at Thalia Mara. Squeee

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The Blues usually deals with extremely adult themes. Undercurrents of sexual imagery are often close to the surface in Blues songs dealing with desire, love and loss in human relationships. Drugs, drinking, and violence are common themes too, and not suitable for young and tender ears.

However, that doesn't mean that even very young listeners can't enjoy some wonderful Blues artists.

We have selected a few albums that are addressed directly to our children, and a few more tracks to sample and download that perhaps might encourage a sing-along, in the hope of sparking an interest in this most expressive and inclusive musical form.

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The Blues usually deals with extremely adult themes. Undercurrents of sexual imagery are often close to the surface in Blues songs dealing with desire, love and loss in human relationships. Drugs, drinking, and violence are common themes too, and not suitable for young and tender ears.

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Putting together some resources for the kids on the history of musical traditions of the south...

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Putting together some resources for the kids on the history of musical traditions of the south...

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Best Bluegrass Clog Dancing Video Ever Made

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To get this film visit https://www.createspace.com/204609 . Also. To see how and why I made this, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VFIlLrNtKE . In this clip you will see one of the best old timey scenes ever filmed. It is part of my two hour program, Making Documentaries, which has been helpful to thousands of budding videographers, filmmakers, moviemakers, storytellers.

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Life on Tour Bus #6, "Southern Comfort," this is our convoy en route to Selma...

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The housing project that surrounds the Brown AME Baptist Church.

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The pastor was so welcoming--he even wore a lavender suit! & he dug the music :)

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It was emotional. We had several speeches from "foot soldiers" who organized the teachers march, the bridge, peaceful civil disobedience for the right to vote. Many of our gay brothers were overcome with the sense of intersectionality, welcome and inclusion in the struggle for justice for human rights. Afterward our singers wept. And then saaaaaaang

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Nonviolent protesters built  a movement here. 

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Nonviolent protesters built  a movement here. 

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A lot of time on the buses today...

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And then on to the Edmund G. Pettus Bridge, where MLK, John Lewis, and all of the foot soldiers marched, at great risk to their lives. One of the gentlemen at the church, an elderly PE teacher, told us his story of having Sheriff Jim Clark shove his baton in his stomach to push him back when teachers were demonstrating at the courthouse for the right to vote--he said " it bounced right back because I had a six-pack!" He was a legacy member of the church and still attends.

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We weren't supposed to do this...but we did anyway...

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The river is beautiful, the buildings boarded up.

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The pastor at the Baptist Church of the Covenant told us the story of back in the 1960s a black woman named Twyla and her family had been participating in the white Baptist church in Downtown Birmingham since childhood. Three times she was denied. A man stood up and said, "I only want to be part of a church that accepts everyone. Anyone who wants to talk about it follow me." 350 out of 400 members did just that and started their own church, where we sang tonight.

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The pastor at the Baptist Church of the Covenant told us the story of back in the 1960s a black woman named Twyla and her family had been participating in the white Baptist church in Downtown Birmingham since childhood. Three times she was denied. A man stood up and said, "I only want to be part of a church that accepts everyone. Anyone who wants to talk about it follow me." 350 out of 400 members did just that and started their own church, where we sang tonight.

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SWAG, the SFGMC Ensemble in rehearsal...

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Birmingham civil rights Institute

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One of the freedom Rider buses that took inter-racial groups from the north down to the south to help support the marchers and others who were working for racial justice and The right to vote. They were attacked by racist mobs supported by the police.

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I didn't know that Chinese protesters saying we shall overcome in Tiananmen Square.

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Zendesk and SF Gay Men's Chorus Walk the Selma Bridge

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As part of the Lavender Pen Tour the SF Gay Men's Chorus is on through 5 Southern states, we went to Selma, AL yesterday and marched across the historic Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, AL to add our voices to the continued fight for equal rights.

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The San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus and Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir received a police escort through the city of Selma, Alabama.

It was the second day of a week-long tour that took the singers through Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina and North Carolina. The six blue buses bearing some 250 singers and around 50 family members, organizers, reporters, a documentary team, and various other hangers on, swept importantly into the quiet town on an overcast Monday afternoon. Cops stopped cars at a few intersections. The locals didn't seem otherwise inconvenienced.

Except for two individuals.

I encountered R.J. and Ashley outside the Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church. The picturesque, brown-brick national landmark was the kick-off point for a series of civil rights marches from Selma to the state capital of Montgomery in 1965, which played a major role in bringing about the adoption of the the Voting Rights Act, a piece of federal legislation prohibiting racial discrimination in voting.

The choruses had just spent a euphoric hour singing energetic gospel, torch and protest songs in the famous church. Attendees also got to hear rousing speeches from civil rights, civic and religious leaders, including the soft-spoken and sparkly activist Lawrence F. Huggins, who had participated in the marches and taken a police baton to the gut for his pains. ("It bounced right off," he said to the delight of the assembly. "I had a six-pack back then.")

Many singers were in a state of high emotion as they exited the church. Some were crying. San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus artistic director Tim Seelig called the experience a "mountain top moment." As we hopped back onto the waiting buses, people paid little attention to the two African-American teens, standing under an umbrella in the rain.

They stood serenely, saying little, allowing the slogans on their billboards to do the talking: "The Bible clearly states that HOMOSEXUALITY IS A SIN." "Warning someone of eternal circumstances is not hate, it's LOVE." "If it weren't for heterosexuals you wouldn't be here." If it weren't for the unfashionable zeal of their message, the photogenic pair might have been picked up by a modeling scout for a spread in Vogue.

"We just heard what was going on here and decided to come down," said R.J., who lives in Montgomery. "We're not here to hate, but to love, and the greatest way to show that love is to correct somebody. You know. Dr. King said homosexuality is a problem. He was a Christian. We're here to tell people there's a way out. We're here to help."

But it was Ashley who shared the most revelatory information of the day. When I tilted my microphone towards the pretty, bespectacled young woman, she barreled headlong into a story about herself with the loquacity of someone who wants to share, but isn't often asked to. "I've gone through this before," she said, eagerly. "This was a struggle for me for years. I had felt that I was gay. I've felt how horrible and demeaning it can be when someone comes up to you, they don't even know you, and asks 'are you gay?'"

Ashley shook her head and continued. "I've never actually been with a girl. But I've had these feelings, like I belong with a girl. I didn't want to be that way because I know for a fact that it's wrong in the Bible. So I did my best to stray away from that lifestyle. My religion says that's wrong. So I wasn't going to go against my religion for that." Then Ashley turned to R.J. and put her hand gently on his shoulder. "Which is why I found the best person on Earth next to me!" She giggled. "It's a blessing."

I asked Ashley and R.J. which church they attended. R.J. said they didn't go to church. "We are independent." I asked them why they decided to go their own way. R.J said, "Most churches don't preach the Bible like it's supposed to be preached."

R.J. said he might start his own church someday. When, that evening, I looked more closely at the photograph I had hastily snapped of the couple with my smartphone, I noticed for the first time the unhappy look on Ashley's face. Perhaps she was showing her negative feelings towards gay people, journalists, or the muggy, wet weather. Or perhaps it was a look of resignation about a heterosexual future.

The San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus decided to undertake its " Lavender Pen Tour " to five southern states just days after last November's presidential elections. "We're doing this because we're aware the events of last Tuesday have left many in the LGBTQ community feeling either unsafe or wondering about what their future holds, and if their rights are at stake," Chris Verdugo, the chorus's executive director, said when the plan was announced. "We in San Francisco and other urban cities are fortunate to have the support of large LGBTQ organizations like GLAAD. These states in the South don't have that kind of support. So it was obvious that we needed to take to our own backyard and bring a message of hope, equality and perseverance to our brothers and sisters."

The Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir saw a match between the Gay Men's Chorus' mission and its own, and decided to join the 200 male singers with around 50 of its own vocalists, male and female, on the road.

The vocal ensembles did a lot of ground work ahead of the journey. They met with local LGBTQ, civil rights and religious organizations. They chose partners in the various cities they planned to visit that would receive the proceeds from the box office and donations after each concert. They offered abundant free tickets to organizations and individuals too, including a cab driver who gave me a ride between venues one morning. One Mississippi healthcare nonprofit I spoke with brought around 200 of its patients, many of which, I was told, had never been to a concert before, let alone set foot in Jackson's 2,000-plus-seat Thalia Mara hall.

So far, the Bay Area choruses have been greeted for their efforts with an outpouring of gratitude and love. The atmosphere at the packed concerts in Jackson and Birmingham I have witnessed so far has been an intoxicating mixture of religious revival rally and gay cabaret.

The singers are tight and talented. They know how to deliver the repertoire of gospel, showtunes, and unity-and-acceptance anthems with just the right balance of earnestness and humor. The diction, as highly-polished as a drag queen's manicure, helps. As does an audience hungry for what the choirs have to offer. The performers got a standing ovation before they'd even sung a note in Jackson. The crowd later begged for an encore, even after listening for two and a half hours.

Clearly the choirs are tapping into a yearning for greater inclusivity here in the South. At this time, religious organizations I spoke with, like one Knoxville, Tennessee-based Presbyterian Church, are deeply divided between "those that believe homosexuality is incompatible with the teachings of Christ," as one congregant told me, and those that want to be more inclusive. Several states, most prominently North Carolina, are grappling with stringent anti-transgender bathroom laws. And the LGBTQ community in Mississippi is bracing for controversial House Bill 1523 - the so-called "Religious Liberty Accommodations Act" - which permits business owners to discriminate against anyone they don't want to do business with due to "religious views or preferences." The legislation takes effect this week despite major opposition.

But nothing speaks of the current crisis of civil rights to me as much as the look on Ashley's face. I wish I could have spent more time with her, away from her forthright beau. I would love to learn more about her life, the turns its taken so far from thinking she might be attracted to women, to shaking off that feeling, to apparently taking refuge in a form of Christian fundamentalism. I wonder even more what path she will take from here.

Even though their presence in the South sends out a strong message about the ongoing struggle for both racial and sexual rights, the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus and Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir didn't seem to reach Ashley.

Changing hearts and minds is largely, and probably sensibly, beyond the scope of the "Lavender Pen Tour." The organizers know it takes a lot more than a symbolic, two-hour visit to a couple of civil rights landmarks to get Ashley and others like her to rethink their ideas. (Though one transgender singer told me he plans to wear a T-shirt with the slogan "You Can Pee Next to Me" in the men's restroom in North Carolina to try to spark conversations about bathroom laws.)

Then again, who knows what impression 300 people of all skin colors, religious beliefs and sexual orientations wearing matching, purple "Love Can Build A Bridge" T-shirts and striding purposefully out of one of the country's most iconic churches will ultimately leave on Ashley. After all, she's someone who is willing to acknowledge her questions and doubts.

Choir's Joyous Crowds Outnumber Anti-Gay Protesters in Alabama

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Choir's Joyous Crowds Outnumber Anti-Gay Protesters in Alabama

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The San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus and Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir received a police escort through the city of Selma, Alabama. It was the second day of a week-long tour that took the singers through Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina and North Carolina.

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Tech rehearsal at First Baptist--one of the only mainstream churches to welcome a gay choir and their allies, an act of great courage in the "Bible Belt."

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It's cooling down as we drive through mountains....

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We are the blue spot in the middle of a standing-room only house! A lot of money raised for local groups. Many, including the pastor, were moved to tears. Tim, the director of SFGMC, told the story of coming out as gay in his Baptist Church and being kicked out. He couldn't have dreamed that one day he would bring a chorus of out and proud gay men here to sing. Greenville was a "mountaintop" experience for many of our gay brothers. So proud to stand with you all!!!

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And we're off again! Thanks Aaron and Miss Daisy

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And we're off again! Thanks Aaron and Miss Daisy

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United Methodist Interfaith Service

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Last sound check with SFGMC!