Boyz II Men Accused of Miming their Performance

American R&B vocal group Boyz II Men have been accused of miming their performance during the 78th New York tree lighting ceremony on November 30 at the Rockefeller Christmas Tree Lighting. However a spokesman for the group has been quick to point out that a technical error caused the out-of-sync performance.

US TV viewers noticed that the broadcast images did not match up with the band's vocals of "This Christmas." Publicist for the Boyz, Jo Mignano, moved quickly to quash any rumours about the band miming, by telling The New York Times: "Boyz II Men is the best-selling R&B group of the last 20 years. They do not lip-sync."

And a further comment from an NBC official: "During last night's Christmas in Rockefeller Center special on NBC, a production issue caused some background musical tracks to play out of sequence. The musical acts on stage at the time, Boyz II Men and Charice were performing live. The issue was corrected for the West Coast telecast."

Boyz II Men are an R&B group best known for their emotional ballads, having sold over 60 million albums worldwide. Other big names who featured in the famous annual event at the Rockefeller Center included Mariah Carey, Susan Boyle, Jessica Simpson and Kylie Minogue.

About 50 000 people attended this year's event in the centre of New York. A huge 12 ton Norway Spruce tree has been decked out with 30 000 LED lights. The huge tree towers 74 feet above the square.

The tree, this year, came from New York City firefighter Peter Acton's backyard. Peter was September 11's first responder. He stated: "Over the years, people would say to us that the tree belonged at Rockefeller Center, but we never really paid much attention. Even now, my wife is disbelieving that our tree is really going to be this year's Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree."