PINEVILLE – Former members of the Louisiana College Baptist Student Union worship band Hosanna will meet in late July to remember the early years of the group during a special weekend reunion.
The Hosanna reunion weekend and concert July 21-22 will feature the band’s original members from 1981-84. The band began in 1981 and held its final concert in 1987.
The reunion will begin at 9 a.m., Saturday, July 21, with a day full of rehearsals. Later that afternoon, Hosanna members and their families will tour the campus and head over to Kingsville Baptist Church in Ball for a catered supper.
The following day the group will rehearse at Kingsville Baptist and their reunion concert will begin at 5 p.m., followed by a fellowship for the general public at the church.
Deloy Chapman, who started the band with then-LC BCM Director John Moore, said he is anticipating reuniting with some members he has not seen since they graduated.
“Looking back, we were young, idealistic college students who enjoyed spending time together and serving God,” said Chapman, who was a member of the group from 1981-84. “I know how busy college students are and I’m amazed we committed like we did. We’d practice two to three times a week and then we would go out almost every weekend of the month, on top of being full-time college students.
“Then I look at where everyone has come, and we have members who are pastors, worship leaders and directors of missions,” said Chapman, bi-vocational worship leader at First Baptist Church of Amite. “This was a time when we cut our teeth on ministry. We learned about serving in churches and doing what a church needed.”
Moore, BSU director at LC from 1977 to 1986, said the Hosanna band members from the early years were some of the best he worked with during his tenure on campus.
“It is evidenced by the fact that every one of them have exceptional careers,” said Moore, now an interim pastor at Utopia Baptist Church in Utopia, Texas. “They are all tremendously talented and I loved to hear them sing, but they are all great leaders and deeply committed followers of Christ. It was a blessing for me to be on the journey with these folks.”