Glyn Lloyd-Jones

I was born in Cape Town in 1989 and grew up in the tiny village of Swartberg, some 45 km north of Kokstad in the East Griqualand region of KwaZulu-Natal. Coming from a musical family, I started singing at a very early age. Although opportunities for the musically inclined were few and far between in "EG", I sang occasionally in church services and school productions. When I was seven, I started learning to play both the violin and the piano.

In 1998, things changed: the prestigeous Drakensberg Boys' Choir under Christian Ashley-Botha performed a concert in Kokstad (our closest town), which I attended with my parents. I was entranced. At the end of the concert, they asked if there were any boys in the audience who might want to audition. I certainly did! I passed the audition and entrance exam and joined the school the following year. This was where my love for choral music really began. I spent five years at Drakies, touring extensively within South Africa, and twice internationally to Japan.

After leaving Drakies, I continued my musical education and my choral singing. I spent a few years in the KwaZulu-Natal Youth Choir, with whom I toured Germany, Russia, Czechia and Estonia. In this last country, I took part in the 10th Estonian Youth Song Festival (X Noorte Laulupidu). This was quite an experience: singing in a choir of 25,000 young people!

I went on to study music at Rhodes University, where I earned a Bachelor of Music, specialising in singing and choral conducting.

While at Rhodes, I followed in my parents' footsteps, and joined the Rhodes University Chamber Choir (they had met in the Choir in the late '70s). I was a member of the RUCC for ten years, eventually following my parents' footsteps again, marrying Jessica, whom I also met in the Choir.

While all of this was going on, I also majored in Classics, Latin and Ancient Greek, and ended up graduating with an MA in Classics. When not singing, I lecture Latin and Roman history.

As part of my BMus, I also did some composition. I'm lucky to have Saeculum Aureum as a tame "guinea-pig" group for whom I can write music. I find myself arranging music for the most part, but Saeculum has also sung a few of my original compositions (about which, they are polite enough not to complain too loudly!).