Attend Ninth Annual Billy Givens Concert

News Articles
03/24/2003

Gospel music greats from around the East Bay appear in concert in Berkeley on Saturday, March 29, 2003. This concert will benefit high school graduates through the Billy J. Givens Memorial Scholarship Awards, sponsored by the East Bay’s Reach Out and Touch a Youth Project.

Gifted artists on the program for this year’s 2003 musical event, the Ninth Annual B. J. Givens Memorial Concert, include:

AC Transit Gospel Choir
Berkeley Mount Zion Praise Dancers
Berkeley Mount Zion United Voices
Dr. M. T. Thompson
Gospel Sounds
Children of the Sun
St. Louis Bertrand’s Gospel Choir
Sonny and the Seven Seals

Mrs. Dorothy Stanton, president of the Bay Area Religious Announcers’ Guild, is emceeing this exciting event, scheduled for 7:00 to 9:30 p.m. Saturday, March 29, at Berkeley’s Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church, 1400 8th Street in Berkeley.

Proceeds from the concert will fund scholarships for high school graduates from throughout AC Transit’s East Bay service area. AC Transit, the East Bay’s public bus system, is a participant in the benefit event along with Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 192, which represents AC Transit’s workers.

This annual gospel concert memorializes the late Billy J. Givens, a much-admired, highly-respected AC Transit bus driver who was slain more than a decade ago while at the wheel of his coach. Last year, the benefit concert assisted in garnering contributions for the Billy J. Givens Scholarship program to fund twenty $500 scholarships. Through the annual effort of the Reach Out and Touch a Youth Project deserving college-bound East Bay teenagers have received scholarships.