Denver Gay Men’s Chorus: Singing the Story of Stonewall

“When people are feeling fabulous, they don’t want to take any crap from anybody, particularly the cops.” On the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots, the Denver Gay Men’s Chorus and the Denver Women’s Chorus commemorated the momentous event with Quiet No More, a massive choral production.

The goal? Educate, enrage, inspire, celebrate. Unabashedly frank and to-the-point, this piece created space for the LGBTQ community’s voices to be heard. As Artistic and Managing Director James Knapp noted, “You can’t fight with people singing.”

Starting with a history of the events of Stonewall, a tipping point in the LGBTQ rights movement, the piece is a call to action, connecting Stonewall to the present and the future. The storyline begins with an introduction to the Stonewall Inn as a social gathering place for the LGBTQ community that routinely put up with police raids.

As the audience’s blood boils listening to the habitual degradation the community endured in raid after raid, we expect the instant catharsis of the riot we’ve heard so much about, but it doesn’t come yet. First, the audience stews in the discomfort and injustice.

It’s not until Part IV of the piece that we experience the riot, the moment when enough was enough and they fought back. The chorus sings refrains that they would not be moved, that they were not going anywhere. We hear cries over hurled bricks and descriptions of the protestors linking arms in a wall of defiance.

The tension of waiting and fuming culminates in a fury of sound and fervor that erupts into sudden silence, a chance to contemplate what was just experienced.

The message of the piece is clear and relatable: everyone can and should fight for their truth. The chorus goes on to describe successes and victories that have been building on each other over the years since the protest to create a staircase leading to where we are today.

But, it reminds us, we are far from finished. Find your Stonewall, it urges, pinpoint the injustice you face and fight back. It leaves us with the powerful reminder that our love for ourselves is the only thing that no one can take away. Hold onto it.

From its inception to its fruition, this piece exemplifies collaboration and community. It was commissioned by the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus and the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles, and choruses from all over the U.S. collaborated to put it together. The magnitude of this piece reflects the importance of the historic events of the Stonewall Inn in June 1969. The choral ensemble joined other GALA choruses to take the piece on a national tour, including performances on Christopher Street in Greenwich Village (home of the Stonewall Inn) and the prestigious Carnegie Hall.

The DGMC and DWC are not new to lending their talents to political expression. DGMC has sung for causes including immigrant rights, housing insecurity and homelessness, and the inauguration of Governor Jared Polis. Similarly, Representative Leslie Herod was the keynote speaker at the Denver Women’s Chorus Anniversary Banquet, and Representative Brianna Titone has been a guest speaker as well.

These choruses have stood up for themselves and other marginalized groups, and they use music to reach the hearts and minds of their communities, showing us all what it means to find our Stonewall.

Photos provided by Denver Gay Men’s Chorus