Reveille Men's Chorus Mission Statement
Changing Lives Through Music
Reveille's History
More Than 30 Years of Changing Lives Through Music
Founded in Tucson in 1995, Reveille has spent more than three decades creating music, building community, increasing LGBTQIA+ visibility, and telling our stories on stages near and far.
Today, we continue to evolve alongside the community we serve, bringing people together through music, joy, authenticity, and belonging.
Artistic Director: James “Jim” Gall | 1995–2001
1995 | A New Voice in Tucson
Reveille begins forming in February 1995 as part of the growing gay and lesbian choral movement. On June 2, 1995, 22 singers take the stage at the Southwest Center for Music for the chorus’s first public concert.
​
Founding Artistic Director James Gall leads the ensemble, with co-founder and Board President David Hoffman helping establish an ambitious vision: artistic excellence, community, and changing perceptions of gay men through music.
​
1998 | Telling Our Stories
Reveille presents Prayers for Bobby: For Love and for Life, a choral work inspired by Leroy Aarons’ powerful story of a gay young man and his mother.
​
Productions like this establish an important Reveille tradition: using the concert stage not only to entertain, but to give voice to LGBTQ+ experiences, struggles, hopes, and lives.
​​
2001 | The Passing of Jim Gall and a Season of Transition
Following the passing of Artistic Director James “Jim” Gall, Jim Taylor steps in as Reveille’s Interim Artistic Director. Taylor completes the season that Gall had planned, providing artistic continuity for the chorus during a period of significant transition and loss.
Taylor, a doctoral student at the University of Arizona, serves for one season while Reveille conducts its search for a permanent Artistic Director. His interim leadership helps carry the chorus forward until Linus Lerner is selected to begin Reveille’s next artistic chapter.
Artistic Director: Dr. Linus Lerner | 2002–2009
2002 | A New Artistic Chapter
Dr. Linus Lerner assumes artistic leadership of Reveille.
Under Lerner, the chorus expands its repertoire, artistic ambition, community partnerships, and reach beyond Southern Arizona.
​
2004 | Reveille Takes the GALA Stage
Reveille travels to Montreal to perform at the GALA Choruses Festival, joining thousands of LGBTQ+ singers from around the world. It begins a tradition that will take Reveille to GALA festivals in Montreal, Miami, Denver, and Minneapolis over the decades that follow.
​
2005 | Reveille Goes International
Reveille travels to Brazil, taking its music and message beyond North America and building connections through performance and LGBTQ+ visibility. International touring becomes another way for Reveille to live its mission beyond the concert hall.
2007 | Beyond the Border
Reveille returns to international touring with Beyond the Border: Mexico Tour 2007, performing in Guadalajara, Mexico City, and Puerto Vallarta. The tour includes benefit performances supporting local HIV/AIDS organizations, continuing Reveille’s longstanding connection between music, LGBTQ+ advocacy, and community health.
​
2008 | Growing on the National Stage
Reveille represents Tucson at the GALA Choruses Festival in Miami, performing alongside LGBTQ+ choruses from across the world.
Artistic Director: Shawn Cullen | 2009–2017
2009 | Shawn Cullen Takes the Baton
Shawn Cullen becomes Artistic Director, beginning an eight-year tenure marked by significant growth in membership, audiences, theatrical programming, and recognition.
​
Under Cullen’s leadership, Reveille continues developing the combination of musical excellence, storytelling, humor, and heart that has become a hallmark of its performances.
2012 | Back to GALA
Reveille travels to Denver for the GALA Choruses Festival, once again joining LGBTQ+ choruses from throughout North America and around the world.
2013 | A Historic Tucson Collaboration
Reveille makes its debut with the Tucson Symphony Orchestra in Broadway Rocks!
The collaboration marks another milestone in Reveille’s artistic growth and presence within Southern Arizona’s broader performing arts community.
2014 | Voices Without Borders
Reveille returns to Puerto Vallarta for Voices Without Borders, sharing the stage with the Puerto Vallarta Gay Men’s Chorus. The reunion carries special meaning: founders of the Puerto Vallarta chorus were inspired to create their ensemble following Reveille’s first visit to the city in 2007.
2015 | REVERB Takes Flight
Reveille creates REVERB, an auditioned small ensemble dedicated to community engagement. REVERB expands Reveille’s ability to bring music directly into Southern Arizona through nonprofit partnerships, civic celebrations, community events, fundraisers, and special performances.
2016 | Reveille Returns to Denver
Reveille performs again at the GALA Choruses Festival in Denver, while REVERB makes its first GALA Festival appearance.
​
After eight years with Reveille, Shawn Cullen departs Tucson to pursue doctoral studies in Kansas City, MO, where he soon thereafter is named Artistic Director of Heartland Men's Chorus.
Artistic Director: Jared Brayton Bollenbacher | 2017–2019
2017 | A New Generation of Artistic Leadership
Following a national search, Jared Brayton Bollenbacher relocates from Seattle to Tucson to become Artistic Director of Reveille Men’s Chorus and Desert Voices.
​​
2018 | Voices Like Ours in Ajo
Reveille and Desert Voices brought Voices Like Ours to the Sonoran Desert Inn and Conference Center in Ajo, drawing about 200 attendees. A community potluck helped build connection between Tucson’s LGBTQ+ community and rural Ajo, and all funds raised supported the Ajo High School music program.
​
2019 | Singing for Our City
Reveille is invited to perform for the inauguration of Tucson Mayor Regina Romero, bringing the chorus’s voices to an important moment in Tucson civic history.
​
That December, Reveille presents Snowed In!, a holiday production featuring a nonbinary central character and introducing audiences to they/them pronouns through theatrical storytelling. The production reflects an increasingly expansive understanding of who belongs within Reveille and whose stories belong on its stage.
Artistic Director: Keith Koster | 2020–Present
2020 | Finding Harmony Through a Pandemic
Keith Koster, a Reveille singer since 2013 and former Assistant Artistic Director, is appointed Artistic Director during the COVID-19 pandemic. With in-person singing suddenly impossible, Reveille moves rehearsals and auditions online and finds new ways to preserve music, friendship, and community through an unprecedented period of isolation.
2021–2022 | Returning to the Stage
After the disruption of the pandemic, Reveille returns to live performance. This return represents the resilience of our community and restores the shared experience of singing together after more than a year apart.
​
2023 | Reveille at the Arizona State Capitol
Reveille is invited to sing at the inauguration of Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs, bringing the chorus's voices from Southern Arizona to the State Capitol for a major statewide civic moment. The invitation reflects Reveille's growing visibility and its role as an LGBTQIA+ arts organization representing Tucson and Southern Arizona.
​
2024 | GALA Minneapolis
Reveille returns to the international GALA Choruses Festival, this time in Minneapolis. Nearly three decades after its founding, Reveille once again joins LGBTQ+ choruses from around the world in celebrating the power of queer voices raised together.
2025 | 30 Years of Reveille
Reveille celebrates its 30th Anniversary with Reveille XXX: 30 Years of Changing Lives Through Music.
​
Former Artistic Director Shawn Cullen returns as a guest conductor and receives Reveille’s inaugural "Changing Lives Through Music Lifetime Achievement Award."
On April 26, Tucson Mayor Regina Romero officially proclaims Reveille Men’s Chorus Day, recognizing three decades of music, community, and LGBTQIA+ visibility in Southern Arizona.
​
Reveille takes a significant step in its organizational development by hiring Michael Webb as its first Executive Director. The creation of the role brings dedicated executive leadership to Reveille for the first time, strengthening fundraising, operations, community partnerships, and long-term sustainability as the chorus enters its fourth decade.
Today | Our Story Is Still Being Written
What began with 22 singers in 1995, has grown into a vibrant community united by a belief in the power of music to bring LGBTQIA+ people and our allies together in song.
Reveille welcomes singers across all gender identities who sing within the tenor-to-bass vocal range, and continues expanding what an LGBTQIA+ chorus can look like, whom it can represent, and whose stories it can tell.
More than 30 years later, our mission remains at the heart of everything we do: