Berklee’s Signature Series Presents Gospel Extravaganza 2023

Berklee's Signature Series celebrates the power of gospel music at the Gospel Extravaganza 2023, on Friday, April 28, at 8:00 p.m. at the Berklee Performance Center. The concert will launch the Berklee Gospel Music Hall of Fame, featuring a curated list of phenomenal artists, community members, and alumni who have made a significant contribution to gospel music.

Gospel Extravaganza 2023 will feature performances by Berklee’s Reverence Gospel Choir and Kurt Carr, a 2022–2023 visiting artist in residence in the Africana Studies Division. The acclaimed composer was honored earlier this year with the James Cleveland Lifetime Achievement Award at the 28th annual Stellar Awards. The evening will be emceed by Dr. Teresa Hairston, also a visiting scholar in residence at the division and a respected pioneer, scholar, historian, and journalist in the field of gospel music and ministry.

"It has been a tremendous privilege to have Kurt and Dr. Hairston work with our students, staff, and faculty during the 2022–2023 academic year as Berklee expands our commitment to gospel music and its dynamic influence on the industry and culture curricularly and cocurricularly,” says Emmett G. Price III, dean of the Africana Studies Division. “I am excited to bring our Reverence Gospel Choir back to the Berklee Performance Center as a fixture of what will be our annual Gospel Extravaganza."

The concert is directed and coproduced by Dennis Montgomery III, a professor in Berklee’s Ensemble Department, who has led the Reverence Gospel Choir for more than two decades. A virtuoso pianist, organist, and vocalist, Montgomery teaches the history and characteristics of traditional gospel music and how it has transformed over the years into the contemporary sounds of gospel being performed today.

Admission is $15–20 in advance and $20–25 day of show. Tickets are available online and at the Berklee box office. This is a seated event.