A CASTLE BROMWICH school choir is hoping to hit the right notes at a prestgious concert at the Royal Albert Hall next week.
Park Hall Academy’s Creative Choir will join over 50 choirs in London with pupil Alysha Maddocks-Spooner at the helm.
More than 2,000 singers from across the UK are set to join forces at the Armonico Consort’s education programme AC Academy Does the Royal Albert Hall concert in front of The Duke of Kent.
The choirs are formed through its in-school Choir Creation scheme, after school choirs and Special Educational Needs (SEN) projects.
Alysha has been the student choir leader of the Water Orton Road School’s Creative Choir for over a year.
The 16-year-old said: “We try to be as creative as possible so that we live up to our name.
“We perform mash ups of well-known songs that we know an audience will love, or take a well-known song and include our own creative twist by adding new harmonies or overlaps of singing.
“Our rehearsals for a performance can be intense or relaxed but I try my hardest to make sure that they are also fun.
“Everyone can be a perfectionist at times so when a song is finished we don’t stop there because there’s always room for improvement. When my singers perform, their talent shines through along with all the evident hard work.”
The young performers will raise the roof with massed singing of music as diverse as Take That and The Lion King to opera and Baroque.
The performers, and the 3500 audience members, will also join in a piece created by children with moderate and profound learning difficulties as part of AC Academy’s ground-breaking SEN work.
The choirs will be accompanied by a professional band of West End musicians and joined on stage by special guests, Strictly Come Dancing stars Gorka and Dianne and actor Mark Williams, known to millions as Arthur Weasley in the Harry Potter films.
Emilie Cullum-Kenyon, the school’s head of performing arts said: ”The Creative Choir is a very special part of our school.
“Without a music department we try where possible to embrace the students’ passion for music and as a result with Alysha we have opened the door to a world of possibilities through the power of singing.
“We are all extremely proud of Alysha and the members of the choir and look forward to standing united with other schools at The Royal Albert Hall.”
