Some findings from my dissertation surprised me. This one didn’t, but the size of it still made me smile. In my 2014 survey, 95.2% of the Georgia Baptist churches I studied have a designated choir loft, and only 4.8% don’t. For all the conversation in worship circles about tearing out choir lofts in favor of stage risers or moving choirs off to the side, the loft itself is still, overwhelmingly, where the choir stands.
I don’t think that number is really about architecture. A loft is a statement, whether a church means it to be one or not. It puts the choir in full view, facing the congregation, physically elevated and visually unified as one body rather than scattered instrumentalists or a handful of vocalists clustered around microphones. Whatever your opinion on worship style, a loft communicates something to a watching congregation. This group, together, is leading you.
What I love about a well used loft, intergenerationally, is that it forces proximity. I’ve stood in a loft where the bass next to me had forty years and a good eight inches on me, both of us elbow to elbow, sharing an octavo, breathing together on the same phrase. There is simply no substitute for that kind of closeness from separate stage positions. A seventy eight year old alto and a sixteen year old soprano standing shoulder to shoulder, robed the same, reading off the same octavo, that’s not something you can fake. Paul’s charge to the Ephesians comes to mind every time I look out at a full loft. Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Ephesians 4:1-3 (ESV). A loft doesn’t create that unity by itself, but it’s hard to find a better physical picture of it than generations standing literally elbow to elbow, all facing the same direction, together.
If you’re one of the 4.8% without a loft, I’m not telling you to build one. Plenty of churches lead beautifully without one, and the unity Paul’s describing is a heart posture before it’s ever a floor plan. But if you’ve got a loft and you’ve stopped thinking about what it’s actually saying to your congregation, this might be a good week to look at it with fresh eyes.
Does your church still use a traditional loft, or have you moved to something else? I’m curious what’s driving that decision where you serve.
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