Ottawa Citadel Band

Ottawa Number 1 Corps, now known as Ottawa Citadel, was formally opened on March 25th, 1885. The Ottawa Citadel Band started its ministry a year later, in 1886, and has provided uninterrupted service to our Corps/Church, the Ottawa community and most importantly to God, ever since. The first band consisted of seven men, including William Smith, one of the Army’s first converts in Ottawa. He served as drummer for over 50 years. Seventeen men have served as Bandmaster, the longest serving, James Harris, led the Band for 40 years!  The more recent leadership includes Archie Smith, Doug Burden, Peter van Gulik and the present leader, Geoff Linklater.

The Ottawa Citadel Band continues to be a resilient and dedicated group that strives  to serve the Lord with that same fervent spirit as in the past. This is especially evident in the way the Band dealt, for almost three years,with the Covid Challenge. Throughout this period, the Band and its individual members exhibited a strong and successful resolve to continue to witness through music.  Utilizing the latest available technical resources, the Band was able to contribute to every Church service – even when officially limited to a 10-member ensemble, and in person services were not permitted. Most notably, in spite of the many restrictions they faced, the Band combined with the Songsters to produce three very successful Christmas Concerts in 2020, 2021 and 2022.  Today, our membership has returned to its pre-covid numbers of approximately 30.