The Cape Malay community’s colourful and spirited heritage was showcased on Saturday as a myriad of malay choirs competed in the ‘Champs of Champs’ showdown at The Good Hope Centre. Nine Cape Malay Choirs or ‘Hollandse teame’ competed to be crowned the best in the Mother City.

Competing teams were the Rangers, Young Coronations, Shoprite Jonge Studente, Boarding Boys, Young Zinnias, Ottomans, Violets and Modern Boys. Teams were ranked from 1st to 5th prize. Judges judged teams on their presentation, instrumentals and melodious ability in the Junior Solo, Senior Solo, Comic Song, Nederlands and Combined Chorus catergories.

“Some of Cape Town’s finest choirs competed and all choirs were of a good standard,” said Shafick April. president of rhe Cape Malay Choir Board.

The competition kicked off with the Rangers who belted out their Combine Chorus- Maria and Nederlands- Davie. The adjudication allocated extra time for the first team’s performance due to the needed to familiarize themselves with the equipment. Each team was given 40 minutes on stage to perform their instrumentals until the Nederlands song.

During the Young Coronation’s performance, crowds erupted with applause and cheer. The adjudication panel requested that they be silent as they struggled to hear the diction and melodies above the crowds. Hoards of tpeople danced to their entertaining rendition of their Combine Chorus of the ‘sokkie dans’.

After careful deliberation, the judges decided to award the prizes to the following teams:

Junior Solo
1st Young Zinnias
2nd Young Men
3rd Rangers
4th Ottomans

Senior Solo

1st Ottomans
2nd Shoprite Jonge Students
3rd Boarding Boys
4th Violets

Comic Song or Moppie, as it is famously known

1st Shoprite Jonge Studente
2nd Zinnias
3rd Boarding boys
4th -Young Men

Nederlands Lied
1st Shoprite Jong Studente
2nd Ottomans
3rd Young Zinnias
4th Young Men
5th Rangers

Combined Chorus
1st Ottomans
2nd Boarding Boys
3rd Young Men
4th Shoprite Jong Studente
5th Zinnias

“The Nederlands lied is the most talked about song,” says April.

The covered prizes were awarded to 3rd Young Zinnias with 17 points and 2nd Ottomans with 25 points and 1st Shoprite Jong Studente with 26 points.

“Our phone has not stopped ringing since the competition as people demand to know what are the names of the winning team,” says April.

April notes that the malay choirs have expanded since their inception and that the standard of performance is always of a high quality.

“In 1939 a band of men decided to form the Cape Malay choirs. They started with 8 choirs and grew to 34 choirs today. The standard is forever raising and increasing due to the large standard in The Cape Malay Choir Board. These competitions are important as they preserve the traditional Nederlands songs by their forefathers. They used to sing at rugby matches and in the streets they formed clubs,” says April.

The Board may be bidding farewell to its usual venue after its ninth consecutive year at the Good Hope Centre. The City of Cape Town will lease the venue to a film company to be used as a production studio. April says the Board will be objecting to this proposal, as the Good Hope Centre has become the “home” for the choirs.

“We have always hosted the event at the centre. It is the best venue as it can hold about 7000 people. Our heritage is at stake because if we lose the battle against the City for the venue, then we all lose another major part of our local history and culture and not forgetting our heritage,” says April. VOC (Nailah Cornelissen)