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MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin - The Cherokee National Children’s Choir won the Best Gospel Album award at the most prestigious Native American musical event of the year, the Native American Music Awards (NAMMYS). The choir, which earned two NAMMY nominations, was also invited to perform a medley of selections from their award winning CD, 'Voices of the Creator’s Children', featuring Rita Coolidge.

"It was a very moving performance", said Jamie Geneva, choir artistic director. "They had already won so they were really excited. It was just totally incredible to perform in a venue with artists who are so well-known. It was amazing, but it was also nerve racking to think that we were going to be performing with them."

Despite all of the pressure of performing in front of a large, live audience, and the presence of celebrities, the choir gave one of their best performances.

"They gave the performance of a lifetime, the choir sang a medley of our songs and they played a video of pictures depicting Cherokee history on a big screen behind them. It was such a beautiful display, I just kept thinking up on that stage were our babies representing the Cherokee Nation", Geneva said. "After the performance, the applause broke out and it was the only standing ovation of the whole night."

The Cherokee National Children’s Choir is composed of thirty children from Cherokee communities like Kenwood, Oaks, Leach, Briggs and Tahlequah. The choir members are between the sixth and ninth grades. Their album, 'Voices of the Creator’s Children', was the inspiration of Chad Smith, Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, who has always believed in the potential of the group.

"These children show the strength of Cherokee culture by continuing to sing our songs that have survived for hundreds of years", Chief Smith said. "We truly appreciate their talents, and it is good to see them get recognition on a national level."

Since the release of the album last year, 2002 has been an exciting time for the choir, with a busy performance schedule that has taken them as far away as New York City, where they performed at 'Ground Zero', and for several of the firehouses of the brave men and women firefighters who were called to duty on 9/11. That was followed with shows in Washington, D.C., at the Smithsonian Institution and the Department of the Interior. The Children’s Choir also made their voices heard with a stirring performance on the mall of the U.S. Capitol Building, and now, a show stopping performance in Milwaukee that the Cherokee Nation will remember for a lifetime.

The Cherokee National Children's Choir's next performance is Wednesday, September 11 at the Tulsa Performing Arts Center where they will perform at a memorial service to pay tribute to those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001.