Figure 1: Church choir members performing

The S. A. Gestig church choir originated from the slave church in Long Street, Cape Town.  Br. Andrew Louw was the first choir master of the church choir at the S. A. Gestig in 1987. Dr Roderick Julies succeeded him as choir master from the early 90’s until present.

The church choir resorts under the auspices of the church council. It’s a religious organisation, and is often being referred to as “an extension of the pulpit” because of its purpose of serving God through music and song. The choir has a constitution which serves as guide to the ethos of the choir. It comprises 20 to 30 members at most times. The choir members are practising every Thursday evening from 19:45 to 21:15. There are times when we practise more than once a week.

The church choir has its own executive committee and all its members are divided into smaller committee’s e. g. music and song, evangelical and organising committee, all having their own responsibilities. Much discipline and commitment is needed from choir members as expectations are quite demanding in our endeavour to honour our purpose. The church choir forms part of the mass choir of the presbytery of S. A. Gestig. Apart from its performances in church and mass choir, the choir gets many requests to sing at funerals as well as invitations to perform with other choirs as part of their celebratory program and or fundraising efforts e.g. Piketberg choir, All Saints church in Belhar, Worcester South congregation, Slot congregation, Retreat and Emmanual in Wellington, etc. It has done many a Cantata e.g. The Rolling seasons, The Rock of Ages, Night of miracles etc. and has performed of these as far as Springbok. The choir is also involved in fundraising efforts for the church and mass choir and performs every year at the S. A. Gestig museum in Long Street. Furthermore it celebrates its work annually with a choir weekend.

Figure 2: Church choir annual week-end celebration

We celebrated our 25th birthday in 2003 and released a CD named “The strength of God” in 2004.

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Figure 3 Memento’s of Church choir’s 25 years celebration in 2003.  Figure 4: CD released by church choir in 2004.

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The choir has participated in the Suid- Oosterfees twice and has on both these occasions won 2^nd and 3^rd price respectively in the category it resorted under. In 2018 we participated in fundraising for our church where we performed alongside the famous Libertas choir.

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Figure 5: Church choir performing as part of fundraising program with Libertas choir.

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We raise funds and organised many bus and train trips, including 3 boat trips. The choir has been blessed with every fundraising effort it undertakes and therefore could donate an electric piano together with 2 music stands and other donations to the church. Donations were also afforded to various organisations of the church e.g. seniors end- of -year function, G4G and music drums of the Praise and Worship group and donations to other organisations, to mention a few.

The choir also experienced member losses e.g. the loss of our oldest member (referring to time served in choir) Sr. Pauline Dowries in 2013 as well our youngest aspiring choir member Quinlin Barlow in 2017. We thank God for their contributions made to the choir as well as so many who passed on before and after 2017.

We thank God for the church organist/pianist Br Martin Bailie who recently joined us as the choir had been challenged in finding a permanent pianist after Marissa Persens.  There’s much room for younger members as the choir members are aging and therefore we wish to appeal to younger people to join us.

Compiled by Sr. M.E. Mc Lachlan (choir member)

2019-08-11

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