Heavy heart of Harlem

The hulking redbrick building -- a windowless fortress except for the bottom level, where dirty glass is hidden by metal grates -- sits surrounded by shuttered shops and drifting trash. Except for the sign identifying it as the Choir Academy of Harlem, no one would guess this is a school.

But not just any school. One hint that something is different is at the doorway. Monitors in maroon windbreakers greet children as they enter off 127th Street, urging them to hurry and discreetly checking to see that they adhere to the dress code, which includes wearing black leather shoes. Not white or gray, not canvas or plastic.

“Where are your shoes?” one monitor asks a young girl wearing white sneakers as she walks into school earlier this week.

“At home,” she answers meekly, inching closer toward the entrance.

“They are not supposed to be at home,” the monitor replies, in a tone suggesting this is not the first time he has heard this excuse. “They are supposed to be on ... your ... feet. Go report to the desk.”

Inside, boys with ties and trousers -- no jeans here -- and girls with maroon sweaters hurry to classes, with snatches of songs drifting down the hall. Inspirational slogans clutter the walls and bulletin boards (“Your ATTITUDE determines your altitude”), along with lists of seniors who have been accepted to colleges. In the lobby hangs a large gilt-framed portrait of a young Walter Turnbull, the choir’s founder and artistic director, in a tuxedo, a gift from the parents. Next to it are two china cabinets full of trophies, plaques and awards, with dozens more in vaults and other rooms.

This is the school for the famed Boys Choir of Harlem and Girls Choir of Harlem. Despite its forbidding exterior, it has, for more than three decades, been a beacon of light here. Over the last few weeks, though, the light has dimmed, as Turnbull and his brother, Horace, the choir’s executive vice president, have been accused of failing to report repeated sexual abuse by the choir’s former director of counseling.

After much negotiating between the state education department and the choir board, Walter Turnbull has been allowed to remain artistic director of the choir, but he must resign his position as chief executive. Horace Turnbull has been forced out. What the changes will mean, no one yet knows. But even as rumors and accusations and anger swirl around, one thing is clear in this mostly African American neighborhood: The choir and its school must be saved.

“It represents the community,” said Sandy Lord, a longtime Harlem resident. “Its traveled all over the world and met presidents. There’s a feeling of disappointment about the sex scandal, but the choir is still doing wonderful things.”

Yolanda Toby’s son graduated from the academy, and her granddaughter currently sings in the Girls Choir and attends the school. The 65-year-old member of the choir board recalled many years ago putting fruit drinks in cups so the boys could practice holding a drink and talking -- as they would need to do in a reception line.

“It’s not only the training of children but also the training of parents,” she said. “We’d say, ‘You need to represent them properly -- you don’t come to a formal concert with dungarees and sneakers on.’ They hated me, but they did it.”

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Rising to a challenge

A native of rural Mississippi who dreamed of becoming an opera singer, Walter Turnbull graduated from the Manhattan School of Music and later performed as a tenor soloist with a variety of professional symphonies and orchestras. Deciding he wanted to do something for inner-city children, in 1968 he began teaching singing to boys in a church basement.

In 1975, the group became incorporated as the Boys Choir of Harlem, and in 1987 he opened the Boys Choir Academy, which, since it became coeducational in 1993, has been known as the Choir Academy of Harlem. Turnbull also started the lesser-known Girls Choir of Harlem in 1979; there are about 50 children in each singing group. The Choir Academy, which enrolls about 550 children ages 4 through 12, is part of the New York public school system and teaches all subjects. According to the school, 95% of its students go on to college.

“We’re using music as a tool,” said Turnbull, 60, who emphasizes that his goal has never been to create lifelong performers, but to teach children through music that they can achieve excellence -- a message that is too often lacking, he said, in the neighborhoods most of his students hail from. And he notes that roughly three-quarters of the children in the choir come from homes headed by single mothers.

Not all students make it. Even though a spot with the choir is highly coveted -- 1,500 to 2,000 are auditioned annually -- many children don’t find it easy to accept the hard work, discipline and even ridicule that could go along with being a choir member.

“It’s daunting to go out and sing songs that will be giggled at in your own neighborhood,” said Howard Manly, a Boston Herald columnist who co-wrote a book (“Lift Every Voice: Expecting the Most and Getting the Best From All God’s Children”) with Turnbull about the choir in 1995. If you were a member of the choir, “you were perceived as moving beyond everyone else, and that’s a very good thing over the long haul, but it was a tough call in a neighborhood where being smart and acting white was looked down upon. The boys could go home with their choir coats and get teased and beat up.”

In many ways, Manly said, Turnbull was “running a social agency as well as a school as well as a performing group.

“When some [of the children] got to the choir, they didn’t even know how to use a knife and fork, because they always ate finger food. Some didn’t even have coats.”

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Accolades and accusations

The choir is more than a symbol or social service agency. With its repertoire of classical music, pop, gospel and show tunes, it’s earned a reputation as a great children’s choir, said Lawrence Ferrera, professor and chairman of the music and performing arts department at New York University. “The first thing you notice is the energy, and the showmanship and energy from boys as young as 11 and 12,” he said. “They give due reverence to the classics, but in the second half they let loose with a burst of enthusiasm.”

It’s this energy and diversity, Ferrara said, that distinguishes the Harlem Boys Choir from other famous boys choral groups, such as the Vienna Boys Choir. Despite its world renown, however, the choir has ongoing financial troubles. The choir charges no tuition; about half its $3 million annual income comes from concerts and albums, the other half from foundations.

Every few years, an SOS goes out from the choir pleading for money, and every year enough trickles in, but Turnbull said it’s a hand-to-mouth existence that is very stressful. Last year, the Boys Choir performed at 125 appearances, too many, Turnbull said, but necessary to keep the money flowing in.

“We’re so high-profile, everyone thinks we’ve got it,” Turnbull said. “This has been my challenge all these years -- we’re hard-pressed to make money.”

Over the years, the Boys Choir and Turnbull have garnered accolade after accolade, singing for popes and at presidential inaugurations. In 1997, Turnbull was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Clinton. But some of the attention has not always been so welcome. In 1999, Turnbull pleaded guilty to filing a false personal income tax return in 1990.

He admitted to failing to report $55,000 in income that year. Although he could have been imprisoned, the judge overseeing the case sentenced him to one year of probation, citing his enormous contributions to the community through the choir. In the same year, a choir employee was found guilty on charges relating to inappropriately touching a male student he met at the Choir Academy, according to the school investigator’s report.

But it is the latest scandal that is by far the most damaging. The employee whom the Turnbulls are accused of covering up for, Frank Jones Jr., 53, is in prison for sexual abuse. The victim, who was 13 years old when the abuse started and has since transferred, has filed a lawsuit seeking $30 million in damages.

The Turnbulls have acknowledged that they made “mistakes” but said they do not believe that should overshadow years of good work. The choir’s board agreed; despite threats by the state education department that it would sever its ties to the academy if the Turnbulls didn’t leave, the board voted unanimously to keep Walter Turnbull on. Parents and students also held rallies, standing in the freezing cold this month outside the school in support of their leader.

The state education department, besides ensuring the Turnbulls will have little to do with running the school, has ordered other leadership changes as well. That means, choir board member Toby and others say, that the choir and academy are unlikely to remain the same.

While some may say that’s a good thing, Toby sees it as just “so sad after 35 years.”

“There’s a code of conduct and a code of respect now,” she said. “I see them rapping and talking street language, and then they put on those burgundy jackets and something happens. They become gentlemen.”