An interview with Joe Akpan, the chief conductor.Congratulations on your successful conduct of the largest number of carol choristers. How were you able to accomplish this'My brother, I appreciate you . Thanks. I was not the one who did it. It was not by my power, neither was it by my might and who am I in the first place to have done that kind of a feat' It was the grace of God which used me as a vessel of conveyance of duty. God deserves the glory and honor.How do you feel now'I am humbled by the fact that I was able to successfully carry out God's directive.Tell us, how did you come by the number'We started by rising up 10 choirs from each of the 31 local governments. We asked each of those choirs to give us 30 singers each; that was last year. It gave us 9300. This year, we increase the choir to 333.Which gave us 9,900. We sourced the remaining 9 singers from the State House Chapel.Having got the 9,999 singers, we selected five traditional carols and distributed to all choir masters. We now formed a choir committee which appointed choir supervisors which had to go round visiting the choirs.Every Choir in each of the local government had a venue of meeting for joint rehearsals which the choir supervisor must attend.We also assembled all the singers here for harmonisation.We had the rigorous session with the 200 brass band to accompany the singing,with the band, balancing the tempo, the sound and the songs was a great taskHow easy was it'Not so easy, listening to all sides, watching the sound men, taking note of the tempo from one side and the other, moderating the tenor was not easy but with the Grace of God, I was able to listen to every sound and moderated it well and we produced what we wanted the people to listen to.Do you think the whole exercise was worth it'It is. It is good for the spiritual growth of Akwa Ibom State. This is a state which is over 97 per cent Christian. The few moslems among us are our brothers in the faith. Most of the politicians are Christians, by the time we are developing the choir and feeding the church with the true words of God, we are developing and shaping characters for the betterment of the society.And when the church is blessed, the society is blessed. A state that prays together will live in harmony; a state that comes to worship together, will celebrate together. Such a state will live in unity of purpose and the people understand themselves well . This is the most symbolic achievement of 9,999.For a state like Akwa Ibom with different ethnic groups to come together to raise one single choir band to thank and praise the Lord is not only an epoch of spiritual dimension but the celebration of uncommon unity. For when I was on the podium conducting, I was not hearing the voice of the anan. Oron, the Ibiobio and so many. The only voice I was hearing was that of unity praising the Lord on behalf of all Akwa Ibom indigenes. This is the greatest achievement of it all.
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