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Omagh choir sings for all the victims

THE voices of nearly 60 Northern Irish and American teenagers filled a chapel near the site of the World Trade Centre as they performed a concert to remember the victims of terrorism.
"Both countries have lost a lot of people in terrorist attacks," Daryl Simpson, musical director of the Omagh Community Youth Choir of Northern Ireland, said at St Paul's Chapel in New York. "For us, the significance of performing here is to share our experiences and emotions with people in New York.
Simpson (27) founded the choir shortly after a car bomb blast in Omagh, Northern Ireland, killed 29 people and injured more than 300 in August 1998.
His goal, he said, was to provide a salve for a community whose close-knit population of about 14,000 was shattered by the attack.
"Omagh is a very quiet country town," he said. "It only has one main street, and it was half destroyed."
The choir also helped to create bonds between the town's Catholics and Protestants, Simpson said.
And the strategy has worked, according to one choir member. "Before the bombing, there was more conflict in Omagh - fights in bus stations and so on," said Cathy Monteith (17), who is Protestant. "But now you never see it."
The Omagh choir was joined at the chapel in Manhattan yesterday by the Milwaukee Irish Fest Choir, a youth choir that helped sponsor the Omagh choir's transatlantic trip.
The two groups will also perform together this month in Philadelphia and Milwaukee - they gave a concert earlier this month in Washington DC.
Members of both choirs, all between the ages of 14 and 19, visited the World Trade Centre. The experience brought home the between Omagh's tragedy and the September 11 terror attacks, Simpson said.
"The kids are barely ever quiet, but they were quiet last night," he said of their trip to Ground Zero. "The scale of 9/11 was something that resonated for us."
Simpson looked sombre and reflective as he conducted the singers.
"A lot of feelings and memories were coming back to me of what had happened at home," Simpson said. "It becomes more difficult at this time of year, because it's leading into the anniversary (of the Omagh attack)."
All around the choir members, colourful banners given to the church after the September 11 attack hung from the balcony.
Following the September 11 attack, St Paul's, which is just a few blocks from Ground Zero, functioned as a makeshift lodging for exhausted rescue workers.