New Mexico Gay Men's Chorus Brings Harvey Milk Concert to Santa Fe and Albuquerque

The New Mexico Gay Men's Chorus (NMGMC) is set to present its spring concert, "The Unbreakable Harvey Milk," at The Lensic Performing Arts Center in Santa Fe on Saturday, March 29, and at the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque on Sunday, March 30.

The program features two pieces by Tony-nominated composer Andrew Lippa. "I Am Harvey Milk" follows the life of San Francisco's first openly gay politician from boyhood to his assassination. Its companion work, "Unbreakable," marks 12 decades of LGBTQ+ history. Multimedia projections and choreographed dancers will accompany the singers.

Artistic director Aaron Howe said the staging makes for a different experience from a standard choral performance. "It is more engaging visually and thematically than a traditional choral concert," he said. "Although I do think we sound quite beautiful, that's only one part of what we do."

Gay men's choruses have deep ties to the gay liberation movement of the 1970s and to Milk himself. The first such chorus was founded in San Francisco in 1978, the year Milk was assassinated, and it made its public debut at a vigil for him on the steps of City Hall. That appearance helped launch a nationwide gay choral movement. Howe said Milk's killing could have halted the movement but instead "galvanized people and made people want to fight back and be even more brave."

The New Mexico chorus, founded in 1981, is among the earliest and longest-running LGBTQ+ choruses in the country. It began with 16 members and now counts roughly 80 regular singers across several generations. Its ranks include people who are not gay men, among them several women, but the group keeps its name to honor its history.

Brian Lanter, the last founding member still singing with the group, described the chorus as supportive in the way a family is. He recalled members singing at his mother's memorial and performing at many vigils and memorials during the AIDS epidemic. He said he hopes younger people will learn from the history he lived through, and that the central message is that the community "persisted and kept going in the face of adversity."

After the Santa Fe and Albuquerque shows, the chorus will tour campuses during the first week of April: Western New Mexico University in Silver City, New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, Eastern New Mexico University in Portales and New Mexico Highlands University in Las Vegas, New Mexico.

Board chair and chorus member Jerry Matthews said the college stops are aimed at LGBT youth in rural areas. "We want to let them know they're not alone, and it's okay to be your authentic self," he said. The chorus is partnering with other organizations to staff resource tables, and Matthews cited a state study from a couple of years ago that found LGBTQ youth suffering from isolation, depression and substance abuse.

Matthews said he has seen a dramatic positive shift in public acceptance during his lifetime, even as recent trends worry him. After the Supreme Court affirmed same-sex marriage as a constitutional right in 2015, he said, "We felt like we could finally exhale and drop our guard a little bit. But now we've had to go back on guard."

Howe said teaching LGBTQ+ history matters more than ever amid current political efforts to erase it. Pointing to the re-election of President Donald Trump and the removal of references to "gay" or "transgender" from government documents, he said the community needs to be "bolder than ever" and to tell audiences, "You will not make us disappear."