Angelic voices he will miss the most
It is the innocence and angelic voices of children that will most likely see retiring Eastern Cape Children’s Choir musical director Lionel van Zyl look back with nostalgia at the decades spent touring the world with the choir, he reckons.
Since 1986, Van Zyl has been the driving force behind the choir’s showcasing of musical talent at countless national and international festivals.
Now, as he hands over the baton, the award-winning director says he will mostly miss spending time with these talented children.
“I will miss working with and inspiring children. I will miss those angelic voices and their sweet, innocent sounds and I will always have memories of how the children were introduced to, enjoyed, loved and interpreted classical music,” he said.
Van Zyl began his musical education career at De Villiers Graaff High School in 1971, which he left to start as senior director of the Drakensberg Boys’ Choir in 1973.
He left there in 1976 and was appointed as a lecturer at Pretoria’s Opera School before later being asked to return to the Drakensberg Boys’ Choir for another three years.
Van Zyl moved to Port Elizabeth in 1982 to lead the then UPE Chorale (now Nelson Mandela University Choir) for the next 10 years. Although he officially retired from the university in 2012, he still teaches music at the institution.
During his 32 years of directing the Eastern Cape Children’s Choir, Van Zyl has toured to Scotland, Germany, the Netherlands, the Slovak and Czech republics, Austria, Hungary and other countries.
His zeal for music and inspiring budding young musicians is depicted in his journal entries where he has documented daily experiences at each of the tours since the first 1992 trip to Italy, on the choir’s website (www.eccchoir.co.za).
“The tremendous amount of touring we’ve done has had us discover that the choir from SA is very often at a higher standard than many choirs from abroad.
“People think everything that comes from overseas is better but that is not the case.
“The most rewarding part of this work is seeing children grow up to become famous musicians such as Andiswa Makan, now internationally recognised,” he said.
Van Zyl passes the baton on to seasoned choir conductor Marilise van Rooyen.
He will have his last prestige concert at the Summerstrand Dutch Reformed Church at 6.30pm on Friday September 7 at which hosts the Eastern Cape Junior Children’s Choir will perform alongside the Eastern Cape Children’s and the Eastern Cape Youth choirs.
Van Zyl’s retirement plans include more travelling and walking the famous Camino de Santiago.