Emily Graves spoke to Sylvia Dalziel about her book THE JOYSTRINGS: The Story Of The Salvation Army Pop Group

Sylvia: Actually, it was just five months old. I was in college, but the girls, the original girls - selected at a time we didn't know it was going to be a group - they were almost at the end of their time in college: they were due to be ordained and commissioned. So they were moving on very quickly. Three more girls had to be selected from the first year students. That's when I came in, just a few months afterwards; it was just after the Joystrings had been named and recorded their first track.

Emily: So you were in the position where God wanted you to be?

Sylvia: Well, we all thought that - we all thought we were called to be Salvation Army officers. There was a specific format to the way we were going to be trained. All that sort of went out of the window when the Joystrings were birthed. We had to start doing other things which were not in the format of our normal training as theological students. We had to encompass that was well - still with a point in our minds that we would eventually become Salvation Army officers. At the end of those years in training we were ordained and commissioned the same; but we were encompassing this new stuff in a group. Then for three years after we were ordained, we still continued as a group, because they just couldn't stop us at that time.

Emily: How was it juggling your studying with touring - because you even went into Europe as well.

Sylvia: We did. That was difficult. The training principal and the tutors had to change our times of doing exams and the times we went to classes. We had such visionary leaders and a training principal willing to change the rules of the day, because they felt this was God-inspired, and they ought to take some risks and run with it - see what was going to be happening with this group, who were now getting into places the Christian Church had never been allowed in. To play in the Playboy Club on the second floor, and be allowed to stay afterwards to talk to business clients who were there about the Gospel was a wonderful opportunity.

Emily: Did you feel prepared for what was going to be a rollercoaster of a journey?

Sylvia: We weren't prepared, because we weren't prepared for it happening in the first place. I was 19 at the time - I was 18 when I went in first of all as a student - so barely out of school. We weren't spiritual giants. It all just happened around us, and being very disciplined students we just did as we were told. First of all, we weren't asked if we wanted to be in the group, we were just selected by our voices or skills. From then on it was just, "You do this", "You go there"; and we did it.

Emily: What's one of your favourite memories from your time in the Joystrings?

Sylvia: I think it would have to be the way that the Lord used our concerts - particularly at the end. Obviously this all evolved over a period of time as we became more familiar with the way a group should give a concert, and putting our stuff together. But always, at the end, because we were a Christian group, we would have an epilogue, we'd have a short reading and then we'd give an invitation to those in the audience - be it thousands of people, or a smaller group, whether in a prison or whatever - for them to find the Lord for themselves. Those moments are the very precious moments we have in our memories, to see so many people coming forward, standing in the front of the stage - or an altar, if it was in a church - and saying, "I want to be a Christian too." That's what it was all about. Incidentally, every session that goes into the training college to become Salvation Army officers has a sessional name, and ours was Proclaimers Of The Faith, which really captured the essence of what the group was about - proclaiming the Christian faith, and then seeing people accepting the faith for themselves.

Emily: What was it like for you guys when it came to the end of the group?

Sylvia: I married the bass guitarist; Peter and I had been married a year before the group concluded. In that final year, Bill, our lead guitarist and vocalist, was marrying his childhood sweetheart, Jean; but she wasn't in the group, and being on the road is such hard work, all the time - all kinds of long hours across continents. We felt that after five years we really needed to perhaps get on with what we'd been trained for, our life's work as ministers of the Gospel - not that we weren't doing that in the group, but we all knew it wouldn't last forever. It sort of came to a natural conclusion, and by that time we had thousands of groups already in place: they copied our style. Groups had flourished across the continent and in other parts of the world, so we felt that the mission of the Joystrings was going to be continued by other groups in other churches. Bill would not be marrying Jean only to have to leave her: he would stay with his new wife, and they would continue their own work.

Emily: Why did you decide to write this book now?

Sylvia: Up until now we've only warranted two lines in Salvation Army history. People who weren't involved in the group had no idea. Just lately we've been doing a book launch tour and we've had evenings called An Audience With Sylvia And Peter; we've been telling the story of how it all happened. People have been amazed. I felt I ought to write this story. I was fortunate to have our number one fan of those days phone me up a few years ago and say, "I've got all the press-cuttings, all the programmes: scrapbooks and scrapbooks. Would you like them?" I thought, "Gosh, this is an inspired moment. I could write a book. It's time to do this: to let the whole world know how this group came about, inspired, engendered, stimulated by God the Holy Spirit." I thought the story should be known. It was always my intention to have a book of the '60s, that whole genre - it really is retro-style, more than 200 photographs which have never been seen, and I think it's come together very well. Congratulations to my book editor and the designer who have really captured the spirit of the '60s. I hope people will be inspired: not only people who remember the Joystrings, but I hope young people, new Christians will read it. God works in miraculous ways; I think he's just waiting to do wonderful things, to show us new ways in which we can spread the Gospel. But we have to be open, we have to be ready, we have to have church leaders willing to take risks. It may not happen in this way - probably won't - but there will be other ways that God is waiting to inspire us, to get us to really connect with what is happening with the world out there. I believe that. I'm hoping people will buy this book, read it, see the miraculous way God worked, but also, more importantly, what can be done today.