Choral instructor Gary Keating keeps a rainbow with the words ''safe space'' on the front of his office door at Dr. Michael M. Krop High in Northeast Miami-Dade.

When Keating came out as a gay man in the early '80s, there were very few safe spaces. Then, one evening in 1986 when Keating was in Manhattan for business, he passed Carnegie Hall and bought a ticket.

''They had a big poster that the Gay Men's Chorus was performing. I didn't even know it existed,'' said Keating, 56, who at the time was associate managing director for Gusman Cultural Center in Miami. ``When I sat there in the balcony in Carnegie Hall, looking at 180 gay men singing together -- I still get moved. I still get choked up -- It was wonderful.''

For one week beginning today, 5,000 men and women from more than 130 gay choruses worldwide are in Miami to perform and celebrate the 25th anniversary of GALA Choruses, a group that began in 1982 in San Francisco.

From Miami-Dade and Broward counties alone, four gay choruses featuring hundreds of singers will perform at the GALA festival. All concerts are open to the public.

Each chorus will choose its own selections, said Robin Godfrey, GALA's general manager.

''They all program individually. All kinds of music,'' she said, including gospel, ''upbeat Broadway music'' and ``feminist music.''

''There are a number of newly commissioned works being performed,'' Godfrey said.

When gay choruses first sprang up, anyone could join, regardless of singing skill. Today, nearly all choruses require that prospective members audition to join, Keating said.

''They have to come with some musical skills. All of the choirs have a musical goal and a performance standard they agree upon in advance,'' he said.

Keating started the first gay chorus in South Florida after his trip to New York. He and partner Richard Schultz signed up 84 prospects one afternoon at War Memorial Auditorium in Fort Lauderdale. They got rehearsal space at Michael-Ann Russell Jewish Community Center in Northeast Dade and 56 singers showed up.

At a gay pride festival in June 1986, the newly formed Gay Men's Chorus of South Florida sang ''a really bad rendition of We Are the World,'' Keating said.

When the group performed its first full concert a few months later at Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale, the 1,200-seat house sold out. One hundred people stood in the back of the theater and 300 had to be turned away, Keating said.

Since then, there have been about 20 gay choruses in South Florida. Some have folded, others merged, and some have new names. Keating's original chorus is now known as the Fort Lauderdale Gay Men's Chorus. He now directs Fort Lauderdale's South Florida Lambda Chorale, which includes men and women.

GALA's earliest recognized gay chorus, the Anna Crusis Women's Choir in Philadelphia, began in 1975. Two years later, the Gotham Male Chorus started in New York. The San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus began in 1978. The next year, women joined the Gotham chorus and its name was changed to Stonewall Chorale, and it become the nation's first lesbian and gay chorus.

Today, 148 choruses belong to GALA, Godfrey said.

''The farthest choruses are Ireland and Germany. We have a couple of choruses from Canada. And 40 of the 50 states,'' Godfrey said.

Nearly all (99 percent) the singers are amateurs and 40 percent are women, she said.

GALA's mission statement: ``Supporting GLBT [gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender] choruses as we change our world through song.''

''It's an organization that I feel really strongly about: its mission, its ability to encourage tolerance through music,'' said Godfrey, 51, a Pittsburgh accountant who went to work for GALA about 18 months ago.

'If you look at the mission statements of 100 of our member choruses, you'd see over and over again, `artistic excellence and change through the power of music,' '' Godfrey said. ``They really are looking to be excellent choral groups. Across the board we all believe in the notion that long before somebody's intellect is ready to accept something, you can touch their heart with music.''

GALA choruses don't just sing to the choir.

''These groups work really hard to get out of concert halls where they are usually singing to people who believe in what we believe,'' Godfrey said. 'They get out to schools, they get out into the `red' states. They're seeking to shatter stereotypes.''

Anthony Cabrera, who teaches choral music at the Young Women's Preparatory Academy in downtown Miami, is artistic director of the Miami Gay Men's Chorus, which will be the first chorus to perform at this week's festival.

Cabrera, 33, was a child when GALA began. ''The motivating factor for people 25 years ago was that we needed to be part of this gay organization that would allow us to speak out,'' he said. Today, most members join ``simply for musical satisfaction.''

Not everyone. 'I have a couple of guys in the choir who, for all intents and purposes, a year ago were straight. They came to one of our concerts and came out. `I am what I am,' '' Cabrera said.

Patrick Cullen, 64, of South Miami is one of those men. He joined the chorus in 2006. ''My first concert with the Miami Gay Men's Chorus was my first time [out as a gay man] in public,'' said Cullen, a divorced Cornell University professor who retired three years ago and moved from upstate New York to South Florida.

Cullen last year worked up the courage to tell his 30-year-old daughter, a Los Angeles attorney, that her dad is gay.

''I wrote and rewrote the letter I sent her probably 300 times,'' he said. ``She was absolutely wonderful. She flew across the country to attend the concert last December and cheer me on. It was the most liberating thing I've ever done in my life. That's really what it's about.''

Cullen says that being in the chorus ''had everything to do with'' finding the strength to tell his daughter the truth. ''It gave me an identity for what it means to be a gay man,'' he said.

Join the discussion

Note: If this is your first time using our NEW commenting system, you will have to LOG OUT and then LOG BACK IN.

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

     Showing: Oldest first Newest first Most-recommended first Least-recommended first

@Nyx.AuthorDisplayName@ wrote on @Nyx.PostedAtTime@:

@Nyx.CommentBody@

@Nyx.Recommender@ @Nyx.AbuseReporter@