Battle of the Choirs Easter Festival takes Nairobi by storm

In the words of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, “music is the food of the soul”. So it was as this year’s Nairobi “Battle of the Choirs” went down at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre.

The Battle of the Choirs has proved not only to be a competition, but a platform for choirs to showcase their talent, professionalism and versatility, with this year’s event attracting a bigger crowd as city choirs sang their hearts out.

An initiative of the County Government of Nairobi and Governor Johnson Sakaja, the Easter music extravaganza offered opportunities to showcase the rich choral life and the diversity of choral music from the sub-county level.

While Kenya is known for hosting several cultural and music festivals, choral music festivals are not very common despite choral music having a large audience that cuts across generations and social backgrounds.

The Battle of the Choirs draws mostly from local churches of all denominations across 85 wards in Nairobi county—Baptist, Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Catholic, Anglican, Seventh-day Adventists, Salvation Army and Legio Maria.

They are also dynamic as they consist of youth choirs, street choirs, student choirs and mixed church choirs thus giving the festival a good representation of Nairobi’s choral diversity.

The festival is the brainchild of Governor Sakaja that aims at promoting local choral music and onboarding local vocal talent, culture, and religion.

“This falls under City Culture, Arts and Tourism sub-sector of the Inclusivity, Public Participation and Customer Service Sector of Nairobi County,” the county government noted.

The choice of choirs is to share the energy of the music that is found within the church with Nairobi residents during Easter.

It is also an avenue to showcase Nairobi as a cosmopolitan city and one that embraces people of all religions, races and tribes.

This year, the committee whittled down 92 entries to 61, with 52 church choirs and nine community choirs.

Finalists in the Church Choir category included PCEA Kahawa Farmers’ Choir led by Nickson Odanga and St Teresa’s Kariobangi Cathedral Choir led by Anthony Odongo.

Others include Kenyatta National Hospital SDA Choir led by Nancy Adoyo and Kenya Church of Christ Choir Shillo led by Julius Ngala.

From the Community Choirs category, qualifiers include The Wazalendo Group of Singers led by Chrispinus Okulo, Tamasha Afrika led by Simon Mashini and Pambo Africa Chorus led by Geoffrey Mogots.

PCEA Kahawa Farmers’ Choir put in an electric performance to emerge this year’s winner, taking home the  grand prize of Sh2 million.

St Peter’s Clavers Choir came in second, winning Sh1 million while Ngomongo Ministers emerged third, bagging a cash prize of Sh500,000.

The Famers’ choirs performance is an improvement from last year when they came second after the Cathedral Youth Choir with St Peter’s Clavers third during the first edition.

“We are here to support your ministry of spreading the Word through song. I am sure someone has been encouraged, healed and their spirit lifted,” Sakaja said while congratulating the winners and participants.

The governor said a mobile travelling recording studio will be unveiled in the county to allow choirs to access affordable recording services.

Each subcounty will also have its own recording studio.