Joyce Barker, SA soprano, is born in Mooi River, Natal.

On 6 June 1931 Joyce Barker was born at Mooi River in the Natal Midlands. At the age of nineteen she started training under Daisy Holmes in Durban. Barker made a significant contribution to the growth of opera in South Africa. She won the Ernest Whitcutt Memorial Cup three years in succession and gained three different bursaries. She was awarded an overseas bursary by the Natal Society for the Advancement of Music and trained in London for three years. During her career she won a variety of awards including the Gold Medal of the International Concours de Chant. She performed during the Cartebury Festival in 1954. Barer appeared in numerous South African Broadcasting Corporations (SABC) broadcasts such as the Brittens War Requiem and on concert platforms as a soloist with major South African orchestras. After an absence of ten years, she returned to South Africa where she established herself as a leading soprano in 1963. Joyce Barker passed away on 23 May 1992 after a long illness in Johannesburg.