Springfield Street Choir

11/05/2022

Unfortunately the live stream cut off before the encore song, luckily we got a separate video of it!

11/01/2022

Don’t miss our concert this Friday night!

Editor's note: The original version of this story misidentified which choir Kenny Kabak is affiliated with. He leads the Queen City Chorale. Joy Lacy

07/08/2022

UPDATE:
While we admit that we've been "off-the-social media-grid" for a while, we've still been actively meeting for weekly rehearsals and even had our first performance a few weeks ago!

Like so many of us, the pandemic challenged us to shift our priorities - it just simply wasn't safe to gather and sing, so we refocused our efforts on street outreach and keeping our singers safe. We were grateful to continue staying plugged in with many of our friends experiencing homelessness outside of a rehearsal.

But now - community singing is back, baby. And we're off and running. Here are some highlights from the past year:

1) Re-stacked our staff to include Ethan Stahl (accompanist-extraordinare) and Alandra Hutchens (intern/friend/alto-extraordinare).
2) Purchased new equipment including a monitor to amplify our keyboard, necessary cables, storage totes, black binders, and some percussion instruments.
3) Developed a beautiful relationship with The Venues at 425 Downtown.
4) Some of our singers have finally secured housing despite a high-barrier housing system within our city.
5) We've become established with the National Alliance for Music in Vulnerable Communities with our associate director, Kenny Kabak even serving on the board.
6) Gave our first performance in two years at National Avenue Christian Church where all attendees were given our lyric books and invited to sing along to some of our favorite Street Choir hits including "I Can See Clearly Now", "I'll Fly Away", "Lean On Me", "What a Wonderful World", "Feelin' Good", and more. It was a true display of community and healing for all who attended.

We're continuing to rebuild our ensemble and plan to have a performance lined up in the near future. Stay tuned for more details! Thank you for your unwavering support of the Springfield Street Choir. We look forward to sharing in the collective singing experience with you very soon!

Gratefully,

Katie, Kenny, Ethan, Alandra

The Connecting Grounds

01/01/2022

2021 has been another rough year, for everyone, but especially for the people living on the streets of Springfield. The Street Choir has had our up and downs with multiple interruptions as waves of Covid pass through our city. But, nonetheless, we persist.

And as we do every year, we want to leave you with the Street Choir singing Auld Lang Syne. We hope that you take every opportunity in 2022 to extend a cup of kindness to those around you, and especially the poor, homeless, and oppressed. Happy New Year, friends.

10/14/2021

We're so excited to announce that we are finally resuming rehearsals one week from today! We'll be back at 425 W Walnut (thanks to the hospitality of The Venues at 425!) from 4-5pm on Thursdays, hopefully for good this time. Whether you've never been to a rehearsal, or you're one of our regulars, if you're homeless in Springfield, we want to see you and sing with you! To help you get hyped up and ready, enjoy this video of the Choir rehearsing "Great Gettin' Up Morning!"

10/06/2021

We are so very honored to be selected by the Gannett A Community Thrives program to receive a grant to share the work of the Springfield Street Choir and Springfield Chamber Chorus within our community and beyond. Street Choir rehearsals will be resuming very soon, and we can't wait to start bringing song from the streets to every corner of the city.

This grant will help us create fresh, video content of the Street Choir, as well as produce the "A Springfield Christmas" choral holiday special featuring the Chamber Chorus, Street Choir, and a number of other local high school and collegiate choirs. We will also be able to film and release our "Forgotten Voices" song cycle, featuring the words of our Street Choir singers. We are deeply grateful for the Gannett Foundation's generosity and vision in providing these grants to our organization and community.

A Community Thrives, a grantmaking and crowdfunding initiative sponsored by the News-Leader's parent company, generated $2.3 million in 2021.

10/05/2021

Congrats to our director, Katie Kring, on her selection for the Dallas Street Choir’s composition contest: “Home Is…”

This is a great achievement and we are thankful for her talents and leadership!

CONGRATULATIONS WINNERS!!!
In an effort to further our mission to bring art to those affected by homelessness, the Dallas Street Choir established the “Home Is… Composition Contest for Emerging Composers."

In our first year, we had nearly 20 new compositions submitted and we are thrilled to announce this year's winners.

Winners:

"Home Is..."
Unison Song and Piano
Words and music by Aaron Fryklund

A native of Oklahoma, Aaron now teaches orchestr at Liberty Junior High School in Richardson, Texas and is choir director at Cornerstone United Methodist Church in Garland, TX.

"Some Place to Come To"
SATB div. unaccompanied
Music by Katie Kring
Words by unsheltered members of the Springfield Street Choir

Katie has degrees in the arts from both the University of Michigan and New York University. Today, she owns her own bakery and teaches music theory at Missouri State University. Katie is founding director of the Springfield Street Choir in Missouri.

"Don't Give Up"
Words and music by Johnnie Driggins

Johnnie is a current member of the The Norfolk Street Choir Project in Virginia. As a proud gay man who plays guitar left-handed, Johnnie has composed three binders full of songs. Having spent more than five years living on the streets, Johnnie is thrilled to now have housing. With this award, he plans to purchase a new guitar.

CONGRATULATIONS WINNERS!

Thanks to our adjudicators who reviewed nearly 20 submissions!

Andrea Clearfield, composer
Scott Foss, Senior Editor, Hal Leonard Corp.
Rosephanye Powell, composer
Debra Scott, member of the Dallas Street Choir
Joel Thompson, composer

07/20/2021

As we posted last week we are regrettably shut down (again) due to a terrifying outbreak of covid cases in the unsheltered community. We are desperate to return to singing as soon as possible, and the only way we can safely do this is to drastically increase the vaccination rate in the homeless population. To that end, we are using some of the money we would have put towards $2 singer incentives and partnering with The Connecting Grounds to provide gift cards as vaccination incentives to our unsheltered friends. It's our hope to see 50 new people from the street community take this step towards protecting themselves, their friends, and our city today, and we're proud to be able to help.

07/14/2021

We are very sad to have to announce today that we are once again suspending Street Choir rehearsals indefinitely due to the uncontrolled spread of COVID-19 in our community. While Springfield made an effort to protect our vulnerable homeless neighbors in the early part of the pandemic, the resources that existed last year -- like a theoretical quarantine shelter, or hotel rooms for medically vulnerable individuals -- no longer meaningfully exist, which has caused sick, covid+ people to seek shelter where they always do -- around other homeless people. Thus, we are fearful of a significant outbreak within the homeless population in the coming days, and will be doing everything we can to preserve the life and health of our beloved singers. Today, that means suspending rehearsals until Springfield’s case rate goes down, health care becomes accessible, and more people are vaccinated.

To that end: roughly 45-50% of Street Choir and the homeless population at large are vaccinated. We will be partnering with The Connecting Grounds to provide valuable gift cards as incentives to members of the street community who choose to be vaccinated. We are grateful for your financial support, and we think that using our funds to get people vaccinated is the best way to bring the choir back together soon.

We wish it wasn't this way -- our singers had been making such good progress, and we love being able to share time and space and music with them. But, our first imperative is keeping people alive, and that's what we're doing.