Each week more than 250 choristers attend the Music Centre to sing in one of the relevant choirs – The Oldham Girls’ Choir Junior, The Oldham Girls’ Choir Senior or The Oldham Boys’ Choir – which rehearse on Wednesday evenings.
When students are ready to move from The Oldham Girls’ Choir Senior or The Oldham Boys’ Choir they are auditioned for a place in The Oldham Youth Choir. This is a mixed voice choir with an age range of approximately fourteen to twenty one years of age.
The aim is to develop the highest standards of choral singing and students are introduced to all aspects of vocal technique, tone production, breathing, posture, musicianship and choral discipline.
Over the past three decades the Oldham Choirs have gained a national reputation for excellence in choral singing. The choirs have won awards at a number of national and international competitions including the International Eisteddfod at Llangollen, The Elgar Festival in Worcester, the Malta International Choral Competition, the National Festival of Music for Youth and numerous smaller festivals. They have travelled widely in this country and abroad produced a number of recordings and CDs, taken part in both radio and television broadcasts and appeared at the Royal Albert Hall as part of the Schools’ Proms.
In addition to choral work the Department offers the opportunity for students to have singing lessons either in a group situation or as an individual lesson and charges for these sessions vary according to the type of lesson
As can be seen from the above the Voice and Choral Department is an extremely active and exciting one. It offers all its students the opportunity to develop their voices and to sing a wide range of music from a number of different genres, to the highest possible standards, together with other young people who share a common interest.
Teachers working within this Department assist in the delivery of National Curriculum Music in primary schools. This work may be used by headteachers as school based in-service training whereby members of the Curriculum Department train non- specialist teachers in the delivery of National Curriculum Music. In some schools the peripatetic teacher is responsible for the delivery of the Music Curriculum and offers guidance to headteachers and class teachers on developing music policies, schemes of work and appropriate resources.