“From Heaven Above” 1996 Kampala Pentecostal Church Christmas Cantata with Ken Serukenya
It was a dark and stormy night…
No!
It was a cool Tuesday afternoon on December 23rd,
1996. News of Kampala Pentecostal Church’s (KPC) free Christmas cantata rippled
through town. Eager church goers rushed to find seats in former Norman Cinema
turned KPC, located in downtown Kampala.
Behind the scenes, music director and producer, Ken
Serukenya gathered the choir. Dressed in black, the choir circled the church reception
area. It was almost time!
“Choir, thank you so much for coming” Ken said, “…I have learned
the closer we get to God, the more our sins are exposed. Let’s dedicate ourselves
to God.”
The choir was comprised of believers from all walks of life
- students, teachers, businesspeople, accountants, lawyers, musicians, doctors,
job seekers, housewives, employers, name it.
Ken continued, “Yesterday was amazing! God showed up. Let’s pray
for strength and for God to be glorified again.” The choir lifted a resounding “Amen!”
Lights were turned off! Andrew (aka De’Angs) was the
meticulous, serious sound man on duty.
The choir - soprano and bass at one entrance, alto and tenor
at the other, walked in with lit candles that illuminated the auditorium like
giant fireflies in the dark. The audience gasped.
God’s presence settled in the upper auditorium and flowed
down to the stage like a royal robe – The King of Kings was in the building.
Away on holiday, Pastor Gary and Marilyn Skinner placed Ken
Serukenya in charge of the first local Christmas cantata production in KPC (now
Watoto church).
A Civil Engineer by profession, Ken worked a regular job but
also composed Christian music. Ken wrote every song then taught and directed five,
two-hour long productions over three days at KPC.
On the first day of rehearsal, Ken picked a new cast of lead
singers; Sheila Dorcus a senior four student, Rose an administrator at Ian Clark’s
International Medical Center, Trinity a young man in the choir, and another lawyer
who’d comfortably tucked himself in the back with the bass guys. The choir
quietly exchanged looks as we all wondered what on earth had just happened.
Under Ken’s encouragement and mentor ship the soloists owned the songs and sang
them with passion.
Every day of rehearsal, every production, Ken brought all of
himself to the choir, to the instrumentalists, to the actors and dancers, to the
sound men and the audience.
1996 KPC Christmas cantata “From Heaven Above” was a year of
firsts; - first African themed cantata, first live-music cantata, first dance-heavy
cantata. From light ballerina moves in previous presentations to Ken’s “We must
include dance” This was big!
Ken and I made our way to the Uganda National Theatre to buy
beads and ruffle-skirts. He suggested dance moves and often checked on our
progress. Would the Church embrace dance as an expression of worship? Would the
moves stumble the crowds? How conservatively creative could we get with the costumes?
What would Gary and Marilyn say? Whether these were questions on Ken’s mind, it’s
hard to tell.
As music director he had a vision board and went about its
execution. Following God’s rescue plan, the production started with Adam and
Eve’s disobedience in the garden of Eden through the genealogy of Christ’s
birth, His death and Resurrection.
Set to music, Ken scripted and taught Christ’s genealogy to
the choir: “Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac was the father of Jacob,
Jacob was the father of Joseph, Joseph was the father of Judah, Judah was the
father of… was the father of…” until we came to Jesus and testified how He came
into our lives. Now we knew our ABC’s and hoped that next time the audience
would sing with us.
On the nights of, actors and dancers got into position. Butterflies
fluttered in our bellies. The drumbeat set us in
motion. Danstan, immersed in creating rhythm, rolled his drumstick over the cymbals
and the butterflies floated away. We moved, we grooved. “From Heaven above, to Bethlehem,
down the Nile, the Lord came down into my life.”
With Albert’s gentle hands on the keyboard and Abed plucking
the bass guitar right on cue – the choir soared as Ken belted his signature
tenor, “I have seen Him, I have seen Him – the Savior of the world as He
promised in His Word…”
December 25th, 1996 at 2:00 pm we closed out the
last show exhausted but on a high. The lights came on, the audience clapped
endlessly. Every space was occupied; the stairs were filled, all standing room taken
and for a while there no one wanted to leave while some clueless people came in
hoping for another show.
I got home to scraps of Christmas lunch, took a nap and
later watched this movie about a Fiddler on the Roof? 😊
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