A CHORISTER has clocked up 83 years of singing in church choirs - and at 91 he has no plans to hang up his cassock and surplice.

Rowland Guest, who sings at All Saints' Parish Church in the village of Ripley, near Harrogate, has been awarded a certificate by The Royal Society of Church Music to mark his tremendous achievement.

For 25 years Mr Guest was a stalwart of the choir at St Simon's Church in Kirkstall Road, Leeds, which is now the site of Yorkshire Television's headquarters.

He left Leeds to embark on a job in the Iranian oil fields.

Mr Guest's singing talents were in demand when, with his wife Doris before she died, he went cruising around the world on P&O Lines.

Mr Guest, whose favourite hymn is Jesu Lover of my Soul, has sung in choirs while afloat from Southampton to Sydney, sometimes at the captain's table.

Mr Guest says of his singing: "All my heart goes into it all of the time.

"My voice is a talent given me by God. I have been able to use this talent for 83 years and have no thought of giving up because I still enjoy it so much. Only God will get me to retire when he calls me away."

He firmly believes church music still has a great future because of the constant stream of newcomers taking up their places in the choir stalls.

He says Ripley Church underlines those claims with a 20-strong choir.

When Mr Guest, of Hamps-thwaite Road, Harrogate, is not busy singing in the choir he acts as a welcomer for the many visitors to Ripley church.

Last year alone he welcomed 5,000 people to the historic building, spending time with many by giving them his now famous conducted tour of the ancient place of worship.