Texas Girls' Choir
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The Texas Girls' Choir is a nonprofit organization based in North Texas. About 100 girls, between ages 8 and 12, perform in the choir.
About
The Texas Girls' Choir is made up of around 100 girls between the ages of 8 and 12 from the North Texas region.[1] Rehearsals are held twice a week and the choir performs choreographed works, foreign-language songs and other programs.[1][2]
The organization was founded in 1962 by Shirley Carter in Fort Worth, Texas.[3] There had been many boys' choirs in the region, but no girls' choirs during the 1960s.[4] The choir was fully integrated, during the time when segregation was legal, and included African-American girls from the beginning.[4] The choir was first called the City Girls' Choir, and was incorporated in 1965 as the Texas Girls' Choir.[3] It was the first girl's choir in the United States to be incorporated.[5] The choir first performed in the Fort Worth downtown YWCA and later at the First Baptist Church.[4] The group found a permanent home in 1973.[4]
The choir has performed in over 46 countries.[6] In 1970, the choir was invited to perform in Tel Aviv in the Tel Aviv Youth Center and also sang at the Mount of Beatitudes.[7]
After Carter died, one of the original members of the first choir group, Debi Weir, took over as executive director in 2002.[5] Weir had been working as the administrative assistant since 1980.[5] Weir died in 2015.[8]