I feel so honored to be interviewing Broadway Conductor Joey Chancey about his second annual Christmas Time in the City concert.

This concert was initially created to help Joey find joy during the holidays after his brother and parents suddenly passed away.

His hope is that this concert will help others find joy during this holiday season, which for some, can be a very challenging time.

In this interview, Joey answered my call to share:

• Why audiences should get tickets to this concert
• How this concert has helped him find hope & joy during the holiday season
• How he feels this concert can help someone else going through a similar loss
• His favorite holiday traditions
• So much more

Connect with Joey: Website, Instagram

Christmas Time in the City will play Church of St. Paul the Apostle in NYC on December 12, 2024 at 8pm. Click here for tickets!

Christmas Time in the City features original Broadway-style arrangements of beloved Christmas classics, a 25-piece orchestra, and a 70-voice cross-borough community chorus. This year’s performers include Tony nominees Eden Espinosa (Lempicka, Wicked), and Chris Fitzgerald (Wicked, Waitress, Spamalot), Quinten Earl Darrington (MJ The Musical, Once on this Island), Tiffany Mann (Be More Chill, Orange is the New Black), Alysha Umphress (On the Town, American Idiot), Eleri Ward (Gatsby: The American Myth, Josh Groban’s Harmony Tour), and Jacob Keith Watson (Merrily We Roll Along, Carousel). 

This festive evening offers fresh and creative interpretations—grand, dramatic arrangements and tender folk melodies woven seamlessly together—while preserving the heartwarming nostalgia of the classics.

Joey Chancey conducting Christmas Time in the City, 2023
Photo Credit: Grace Copeland

1. This December you are bringing back your holiday concert Christmas Time in the City. What excites you about this year's festivities? Christmas really does come in July for me. That’s when the excitement starts as I begin to brainstorm with my Directing and Producing team, Jack and Hannah.

I love the process of crafting this concert from start to finish: searching for that “perfect” Christmas song, making endless Spotify playlists, overthinking Cheryl’s Christmas Cookie order, getting excited when the Christmas trees come out of their boxes, and getting more excited when all the tree lights work.

What excites me the most is collaborating with gifted artists, singers, musicians, and designers. The opportunity to create an experience with music that can remind people of the joy the Holidays can bring is the point of it all.

2. With so many holiday events happening in December, why do you feel audiences buy tickets to this concert? Christmas Time in the City is not just one style, one performer, one genre, or one musician… it is many and the best of those worlds. The concert is set in the stunning Church of St. Paul the Apostle, a NYC Historic Landmark.

It showcases the diverse and widely talented members of the Broadway community, it features a full Broadway sized orchestra, we highlight a seventy-voice choir comprised of members from the St. Paul the Apostle Music Ministry and the greater New York City area.

The styles of music range from big band, sweeping orchestral arrangements, nostalgic Christmas songs, gospel, folk, Broadway, and creative takes on classic traditional carols.

From left to right:
Joey’s Mom, Janice, Joey Chancey
Joey’s younger Brother, Michael, Joey’s Dad, Lee

3. Christmas Time in the City was actually created out of a very devastating event, the loss of your own loved ones. With so much loss & hurt, how did you find the glimmer of hope to create this event? 2021 was the first Christmas without my whole family. My brother passed away eleven years ago, and my mom and dad three years ago.

It’s funny, for the longest time Christmas was all "hot chocolate, candy canes, and stocking stuffers," but now with them gone the things that make up the season look just a little different. Christmas is often associated with family, friends, parties, presents, and decorations. For me, the season can shine a (bright) light on my missing family members.

The stages of grief I went through were unpredictable, often too long, devastating, and sometimes messy. I have worked (and am working) my way through those stages... mostly. I think anyone who suffers loss is always on a journey with grief. It ebbs and flows, it changes form and shows up when you least expect it.

On my journey, I realized I had to channel the intensity of those emotions into something positive. One thing that brings so much joy to my life is making something beautiful, regardless of what that it is. I think music is beautiful. People gathering for a collective event to experience music in a hopeful and joyful way is something very beautiful.

Since I was four years old, music has been my everything. It’s where I go when I’m happy, when I need to find inspiration, to reflect, to cry, to connect, and heal. Music first and foremost is my love language.

4. How did you putting your energy into this concert help you move forward in your life? This concert was the first big event I had produced since the pandemic. Still trying to process what the pandemic did to our industry (not to mention the world), I lost both parents too. It was a triple whammy of loss.

It has given me that project to pour my heart and soul into. It is a passion project. I get to blend both of my worlds: the Broadway and Theater world, with my amazing community of St. Paul the Apostle. I’ve been at St. Paul’s for almost nine years now.

I often use the word “experience” when describing this concert. I think it is much more than just hearing Christmas music, it’s about hearing with not only your ears, but to hearing and feel the music with your heart too.

Joy and hope, two words I also use, are things I have needed to feel most. I want to be reminded that there is hope in working through the pain of loss and to remember that joy is on the other side of that pain.

Creating this concert has helped in more ways than I could have ever imagined and I am still discovering new ways it helps me.

Christmas Time in the City 2023, Photo Credit: Grace Copeland

5. How do you feel this concert will lift someone up who is going through a similar loss? At the very least, it’s a two-hour escape. For someone going through their own loss, even a two-hour reprieve goes a long way. I think the songs we’ve chosen will invoke various feelings of nostalgia. My wish is for those feelings to be associated with happy memories. I always appreciate any opportunity to be reminded.

6. What was the first song you knew had to be performed in this concert? Ironically, the song that I knew we needed to bring back is “Auld Lang Syne.” I know, I know…that song is associated with New Year’s Eve. It is often sung in the midst of drunken parties at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve (comparable to a rousing version of “Happy Birthday”).

Last year we ended the concert with Mairi Campbell and David Francis' arrangement (the one from the Sex in the City movie). It’s slower and reflective. It has a feeling of gratitude and when we did it, the audience joined in singing. There was an air of respect and camaraderie in the church. You could hear a pin drop.

7. Why does that song mean so much to you? It is ultimately a song about remembering good times. "Auld Lang Syne" translates to “old long since.” After hearing a night of big, exciting arrangements and new takes on familiar songs, we (the audience) have a collective moment to reflect on how it resonates with us personally.

8. In a time where there is a lot of canned music/tracks being used, Christmas Time in the City stands out because all of these songs and performers are backed by a 25-piece orchestra and a community chorus, 70 voices strong. How do you feel this brings these holiday songs to life even more? It is not lost on me how lucky we are to have such a large orchestra and full choir to back these singers. It’s really about authenticity for me. Everything you are hearing is being created by the people you are seeing. To me, that’s authentic. Music is ephemeral and in that moment, the synchronicity of that group is creating the music.

Joey Chancey conducting Christmas Time in the City 2023
Photo Credit: Grace Copeland

9. In addition to Christmas Time in the City, what are other ways you honor the memory of your family during the holiday season? I brought a lot of my mom’s favorite Christmas decorations back with me after they passed. My husband Daniel (who is amazing at decorating our apartment for Christmas) always incorporates them beautifully.

Our family was always very loyal to our Christmas dinner menu. It never changed! My mom always made the most delicious Squash Casserole (I’m from the south…casseroles abound!). I am pretty sure the recipe is from the 1983 Southern Living Cookbook; it is really tasty and I still make it every year.

10. What is your Christmas wish for this year? My grandma is 99 years old. Mimi is incredible. She plays bridge several times a week (and wins), and is in great health. She is the last one left of what I consider my immediate family. My wish is to treasure every single moment of time with her.

I also wish to look at life through a lens of gratitude. I have an abundance of incredible things in my life and I always want to keep that at the forefront. Being grateful is everything.

Joey’s husband, Daniel Byrd and Joey Chancey
Photo Credit: Lauren & Jared Bowser 

11. What holiday traditions have you and your husband kept from your youths? We both grew up in families who went all out with Christmas decorations. I can successfully say, we’ve honored that tradition. Around the first of November, the Christmas tree appears, then the boxes of decorations, and by mid-November we’re walking in a winter wonderland… in our living room.

Also…stockings. We try to out stuff the others stocking with candy and fun knick-knack gifts. Daniel, if you’re reading this…I just want candy this year.

12. What are some new holiday traditions you have created as a couple? We always go to NYCB’s Nutcracker. It’s so beautiful. Getting to see the gorgeous ballet company, accompanied by that glorious orchestra…Holiday perfection!

During the Holiday season, we get to see our entire family! It’s a lot of traveling, but completely worth it.

After all the excitement of Christmas and the Holidays, Daniel and I opt for a quiet New Year’s Eve and spend it at our house in Long Island.

13. What is something we didn't get to talk about in this interview that you'd like my audience to know about you? When I was four years old I got a guitar for Christmas. For that reason, I always associate Christmas with music and that’s why it is the most special Holiday for me. Getting that guitar set my life on its course…music. It has always been a part of me and what better way to honor that then by creating a Christmas Concert.

Joey Chancey at Church of Saint Paul the Apostle 2019

More on Joey Chancey:

Joey Chancey enjoys a diverse career as a music director, conductor, pianist, and producer. He most recently conducted the sold-out concert of Follies at Carnegie Hall. Favorite credits include: Broadway: An American In Paris, Beautiful, Gigi, Annie & Elf (at MSG); Off Broadway: tick, tick…BOOM! & The Unsinkable Molly Brown (Cast Album). In Concert/ Symphonic: Nine, Mame, Sweet Charity, The Music Man, Man of La Mancha, Promises, Promises, A Man of No Importance, & Faith Prince and Anthony Warlow; Australian Symphonic Tour. Supervisor: A Chorus Line (with Antonio Banderas, Spain).

Joey produced and music directed the sold-out Holiday concert Christmas Time in the City, that hosted 12 Broadway stars, a 25 piece orchestra, and a 70 voice choir in New York City. He conducted Maury Yeston’s Nine in concert starring Vanessa Williams, Christine Ebersole, and Santino Fontana that featured the original Broadway orchestrations. Joey has served as Music Supervisor for A Chorus Line starring Antonio Banderas that opened Banderas theater Teatro del Soho in Malaga and toured Spain. He has conducted and played piano on Broadway for An American In Paris, Beautiful: the Carole King Musical, Gigi, Annie & Elf (at MSG). Off Broadway: tick, tick…BOOM! & The Unsinkable Molly Brown (Cast Album). National Tours: La Cage Aux Folles (starring George Hamilton), A Chorus Line, The Wedding Singer, White Christmas & Joseph. In concert: Rodgers and Hammerstein Songbook, Sweet Charity, The Music Man, Man of La Mancha, Promises, Promises & A Man of No Importance. International: Conductor/ MD for a Symphonic Tour with Anthony Warlow & Faith Prince (Australia).

Joey is the Director of Music at The Church of St. Paul the Apostle. Training: Shenandoah Conservatory. Joey is a native of Jacksonville, Florida and currently resides in New York City.