Kingstree Was Site of Historic Choral Performance

Main Street's Kingstree Live series is developing an enthusiastic following as it begins its second full summer of concerts. The first performance on May 10 saw many in attendance dancing with members of Flashback, The Party Band–the entertainment for the evening–while children chased beach balls, and played games. Historically, Kingstree broke new ground on the music scene seventy-nine years ago, on March 13, 1940, when it became the first town in the state outside Columbia to host the 150-voice Shandon Choral Society in concert with the 60-piece Southern Symphony Orchestra directed by Hans Schweiger, performing Felix Mendelssohn's Elijah Oratorio. It was a very big deal.

Line dancers having a good time at Kingstree Live on May 10, 2019

The Elijah performance was sponsored in Kingstree by The Williamsburg Choral Society. According to The State newspaper, the Shandon chorus met at 1 p.m. on March 13, 1940, at The Township Auditorium in Columbia to form a motorcade of 30 cars which would leave at 1:30 to take them to Kingstree. The cars were numbered and each member of the chorus was assigned to a specific car. Each car carried a banner reading "Columbia Chorus." The parade of cars would go through both Sumter and Manning before reaching Kingstree between 3:30 and 4 p.m. Columbia businessman and chorus member Claude P. Davis drove the lead car, which may have also carried Columbia Mayor Dr. L.B. Owens, who attended the concert at the invitation of Kingstree Mayor T.M. Gilland.

The Southern Symphony had played in Manning on Tuesday night and its members remained there until the Columbia Chorus motorcade reached that town. There, the two buses carrying the orchestra joined the procession and they made their way to Kingstree together.

Children having fun playing with various games at the May 10 Kingstree Live.

Meanwhile, in Kingstree, officials were planning to give the orchestra and chorus a "royal welcome to the Royal Town." Mayor Gilland, members of the sponsoring Williamsburg Choral Society, E.W. Stokes and E.L. Long of the South Carolina Highway Patrol, and the Kingstree High School Drill Band met the motorcade several miles beyond the Black River bridge on Main Street. When the two groups met, the mayors greeted each other, and then the band, led by Drum Majorette Mary Kent Seignious, preceded the motorcade as it came, according to The County Record, "bringing Elijah to Kingstree." Once the band reached the Confederate Monument, then located in the middle of the intersection of Main and Academy streets, it stopped and continued playing as the procession turned down Academy Street and moved on to Kingstree High School on Third Avenue, where the performance was given in the gymnasium, beginning at 8 p.m.

Drum Majorette Mary Kent Seignious, who led the procession into town.

Photo courtesy of Peggy Kelley Jenkinson

Three of the four lead soloists were professional singers with the Metropolitan Opera in New York. They arrived in Kingstree by train earlier in the day of March 13, and were staying at the Carolina Hotel.

According to The County Record, several hundred people attended the performance. Tickets were $1 for adults and 50 cents for students. The paper noted that some people who had witnessed the only other performance of Elijah given by the two groups in Columbia in January, 1940, had driven to Kingstree to see it again, along with many Columbia residents who had missed the first performance. Tickets were sold to music lovers from all over the Pee Dee, as well as many residents of Kingstree. Harvey B. Jeffries was chairman of ticket sales. 

A letter from Eli Kozma in a subsequent issue of The County Record proclaimed the performance as "superb."

Members of the Flashback Band, center, join dancers at the May 10 Kingstree Live.

The current Kingstree Live music series may not have as much pomp and circumstance as the coming of Elijah to Kingstree, but residents are appreciating the opportunity to spend one Friday evening a month during the spring and summer with friends and family, enjoying each other's company and the music of different bands. The next Kingstree Live is June 14 from 7-10 p.m. The Maxx Band will  perform at that event.