PEOPLE PROFILE: Teenage twins Tyler and Kyle Davis excel in music, sports

Local News

Related Photos

March 6, 2009

By Bill Wolcott<br><a href="mailto:bill.wolcott@lockportjournal.com">E-mail Bill</a> The Lockport Union-Sun %26 Journal Fri Mar 06, 2009, 10:39 PM EST

Twins Tyler and Kyle Davis play the piano, football and basketball and sing for Lockport High School.

Students can tell the 15-year-old sophomores apart because Tyler wears red and Kyle wears blue — when he isn’t dressed in black. “It started when they were babies,” said mom, Jackie Davis. “My husband (Vincent) and I would go to rehearsals and I would sing. He could tell whose bottles are whose. Tyler’s name ends in an R and we gave him a red bottle. Kyle in blue.”

Instead of dressing Kyle and Tyler identically, mom started them in red and blue. When mom bought young Kyle a green shirt, he looked at her and said, “I don’t wear that color.”

Tyler sings bass and Kyle sings tenor in the chorus, but they are versatile enough to do both.

“Their range is so great they can do either,” said Connie Allison, the director of the Symphonic Chorale. “They are great musicians. They read music well and we can move them around. Music teachers love them. They are very versatile.”

Mom Jackie Davis, a native of Pittsburgh, once was the featured vocalist for the Venango County Chorus. Vincent Davis, an investment banker, is from Jamestown. The parents met at Cornell University, where dad played football for the Big Red and mom was on a music scholarship.

“He’s the athlete. I’m the musician,” Jackie said. “We didn’t push our children towards either of those. When they showed promise for both, we encouraged them. Whenever I sat down to play the piano, I encouraged them.”

Jobs with National Fuel caused the Davis family move to Western New York. The twins were born March 31, 1993, four minutes apart at Mercy Hospital in Buffalo. Jackie and Vincent have two older boys, Vincent II, who is now 21 and attends Cornell, and Marcus, 18, who is a freshman at St. Lawrence.

“I expected a girl out of it at least,” said Jackie, who volunteers at LCTV and teaches at the First Baptist Church. Jackie studied music and biology at Cornell with a concentration in environmental studies.

“It’s just a wonderful family,” said interim pastor Abe Dueck. “She is a wonderful advocate for the community and the kids are very blessed with talent.” Vincent II plays guitar and Marcus plays drums.

Tyler and Kyle studied piano at the Lockport Music Center and push each other to do better. “If Tyler plays the piano and I’m not, I don’t want him to get ahead of me,” Kyle said. “I’ll start playing the piano more if he’s playing more. We kind of motivate each other.”

Tyler also plays the clarinet and Kyle plays the saxophone in the high school concert band. Their favorite is the piano, and that’s what they play at home.

“You can play so many chords and harmonize and do more stuff than bass clarinet,” Tyler said.

Tyler enjoys playing classical music, but offered a contemporary tune, Jim Brickman’s “Part of My Heart.” Kyle played “Boom Town” after nailing “Chop Sticks” in a duet with his mom. He plays jazz for fun.

They play background music before singing with the chorus.

“Both are great kids, easy going,” Allison said. “It’s fun to have them around. Kids enjoy working with them. They are just what the group needs to succeed,” the chorale director said.

Kyle plays tight end and outside linebacker on the junior varsity football team and Tyler plays linebacker and running back. The 5-foot-10, 155-pound twins are shooting guards on the JV basketball team.

They were invited to participate in regional piano competition at Frontier High School on April 24. If they score high enough, they will qualify for the state competition next fall at Fredonia. As members of the select chorus, they sang with the all-county chorus as freshmen.

Contact reporter Bill Wolcott at 439-9222, ext. 6246.

Text Only

Local News

Mild winter? S'no kidding!
Towns are stockpiling salt and saving on plowing, wear and tear on machinery and overtime costs thanks to the winter of 2012 that wasn’t — so far.
Somerset Supervisor Dan Engert joked that as soon as it becomes a story, the winter will arrive and blow the budgets down.
Highway workers, who could be called at anytime on any day to clear the roads, have been cleared to indoor maintenance jobs and have been able to get outside to get a jump on other projects.
The so-far mild winter has created a mixed bag for City of Lockport streets and parks workers. When there’s no snow to plow, crews have been out trimming trees, fixing storm receivers and maintaining heavy equipment. These are all chores that usually don’t get done in winter, according to Norman Allen, director of engineering and public works.

February 10, 2012 2 Photos
Town to aid in Wegmans pursuit
Maybe they should call it We Really Want Wegmans.
The group of local supporters who are hoping to attract a Wegmans supermarket to the Lockport area have received some additional support from the Lockport Town Board. At a meeting Wednesday night, town officials were presented a petition from the We Want Wegmans campaign with 8,000 signatures.
Given to the board by We Want Wegmans chairperson Charlene Bower, Supervisor Marc R. Smith said the petition was twice the size of a phone book.

February 10, 2012
Reform agenda touted
Empire State Development Corporation executive Sam Hoyt visited Lockport on Wednesday to tout Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s state budget and government reform plans.
Changing the way the state does business will bring fiscal relief to counties, cities and towns, eventually, Hoyt suggested.
It’s too bad the reforms won’t kick in before municipalities like the City of Lockport begin confronting fiscal crises, Mayor Michael Tucker said in response.

February 9, 2012 2 Photos
Tucker: 'Best days lie ahead'
The City of Lockport government is smaller than it was 18 months ago but is in a stronger financial place, Mayor Michael W. Tucker said in his annual State of the City address.

February 8, 2012 1 Photo
Trio of new classes proposed for Newfane
Newfane High School could have three new business courses in the fall, one of which would center on video game design.

February 8, 2012
Municipalities take wait-and-see approach on SPCA funding
The City and Town of Lockport are each withholding payments to the Niagara SPCA, while other Eastern Niagara County towns are taking a wait-and-see approach.

February 7, 2012 1 Photo 2 Stories
Rocky II
Friends of Deputy Craig Beiter of the Niagara County Sheriff’s Department plan a benefit on Feb. 26 to raise money to buy and train a new dog for the K-9 Unit.
Beiter’s German shepherd, Deputy Rocky, was killed while on duty in December, and the sheriff’s department is close to getting a replacement.

February 6, 2012 1 Photo 2 Stories
Basket Factory closes
The Basket Factory has gone out of business.
The owners, Julie Thompson Riegle and Dawn Thompson, made the difficult decision last Monday and put the sign on the door Tuesday.

February 6, 2012
No snow is no problem
Unseasonably warm weather didn’t keep Roy-Hart Winterfest from being a fun day for the families who came out to Roy-Hart Elementary School on Saturday.
More than 500 people attended the third annual festivities, which Gasport Lions Club officials said was a big increase from last year. The halls of Roy-Hart Elementary were filled with vendors, programs and movement as excited children rushed from one activity to another.

February 6, 2012
Shovel-ready park has perks
At first glance, the big, orange road sign announcing vacant property on Lockport Road as a “shovel ready certified” building site seems a bit gratuitous.
To companies looking for new places to launch a business, it’s not. The sign in their eyes is a welcome mat, for in three words a community pronounced itself ready, willing and able to make a deal quickly.

February 3, 2012 1 Photo
More Local News Headlines

Local News

Search Results

Related Photos

PEOPLE PROFILE: Teenage twins Tyler and Kyle Davis excel in music, sports

Site Map

Contact Us