Chicago Children's Choir

Chicago Children's Choir is a non-profit organization committed to inspiring and changing lives through music. Founded in 1956 at First Unitarian Church of Chicago during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the Chicago Children's Choir serves over 4,600 singers annually through its core values of education, expression, and excellence and is devoted to peacefully creating a better world.

Chicago Children's Choir is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that raises approximately $4 million each year in order to provide reduced tuition on a sliding scale according to family income. The choir serves in excess of 4,600 children annually through choirs in nearly 80 Chicago schools, after-school neighborhood choir programs in 10 Chicago neighborhoods (Albany Park, Austin, Beverly, Englewood, Garfield Park, Hyde Park, Humboldt Park, Lincoln Park/DePaul, Pilsen/Little Village and Rogers Park), DiMension (an ensemble for boys with changing voices), and the internationally-acclaimed Voice of Chicago, the top performing ensemble and highest aesthetic pinnacle of the Chicago Children's Choir. Of the children served, ages 8–18, the majority come from low-income homes and would otherwise have no other access to music education.

In 1956 during the Civil Rights Movement, the late Rev. Christopher Moore founded the multiracial, multicultural Chicago Children’s Choir at Hyde Park’s First Unitarian Church of Chicago. He believed that youth from diverse backgrounds could better understand each other - and themselves - by learning to make beautiful music together. Today, the choir is fully independent and serves all of Chicago from its home in the Chicago Cultural Center. Christopher Moore’s vision of a choir combining high artistic standards with a social purpose continues to define the choir’s mission.

Distinguished singers included David Edmonds, who performed with the choir from 1970 to 1977. He sang classical, folk and spiritual pieces as lead soloist in numerous concerts, both in Chicago and on national tours. He can be heard on the choir's 1972 album Chicago Children's Choir Sings at Orchestra Hall. Edmonds also performed with the Joffrey Ballet, the Rockefeller Chapel Orchestra and Chorus, and the Bretton Woods Boy Singers. He died from AIDS complications in 1990.

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