History of the Federation

The New England Federation of Greek Orthodox Choirs (NEFGOC) was organized by George Alevizos and authorized by His Late All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras I, the then Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America, during the Ninth Biennial Clergy-Laity Congress held in Boston, November 1946. The original Constitution was adopted in the summer of 1947 at the Annunciation Cathedral of New England. NEFGOC consisted of all the parishes in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Montreal, Canada.

Annual Conferences were held in the second weekend of June and were hosted by the large cities in New England.

In 1981, when the Diocese of Boston was created, the boundaries of NEFGOC were changed to include all the New England States but only four parishes in Connecticut (Danielson, Enfield, New London, and Norwich). NEFGOC undertook to service these parishes. The rest of the Church Choirs in Connecticut had the option to join NEFGOC or become a member of any other federation. During this time the Annual Conference date was changed to the first weekend in October.

Because NEFGOC was the first federation to be established in America and Canada, the founding fathers of the other federations being formed in America used the format of the NEFGOC Charter to establish their federations.

The Fiftieth Anniversary since the founding of NEFGOC was held in June of 1997 at the Annunciation Cathedral of New England in Boston, the church in which the charter was signed during the summer of 1947.

In June 2002, His Eminence Metropolitan Methodios of Boston appointed an Interim Planning Committee to rejuvenate NEFGOC. Elections were held at the 2003 Conference and the Executive Board was reestablished.

In 2002 the Interim Planning Committee established a yearly Church Music Institute (CMI) for Choir Directors, Organists and Psaltai.

At the Annual Conference held in November 2005, NEFGOC changed its name to the Metropolis of Boston Federation of Greek Orthodox Church Musicians (MBFGOCM).

The Sixtieth Anniversary of the founding of the Federation was held in November of 2006 at the Annunciation Cathedral of New England in Boston.