How Thetford Voices Began

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Anticipating the nationally successful Sing Up programme, Thetford Voices was launched by Thetford Music Project with funding from Youth Music in January 2007. In an initial project over fifteen months, six junior schools worked with specialist music leaders to develop singing, primarily with years 5 & 6.

 

A programme of six evening sessions introduced non-specialist teachers to singing with junior age children. Summer and Spring workshops for children from Thetford and beyond
worked on a breadth of music in a variety of styles. The project climaxed in the Living Songs Concert of March 2008.

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This concert benefited from partnership with the adults of the
Thetford Singers and the involvement of local professional
instrumentalists but above all it brought together children from all the Thetford schools for some magnificent music making.

In June 2008 in-school rehearsal led to All Come Together, an evening concert with singers from three Junior Schools while four schools took part in Who are we?, a singing day in March 2010 with a theme of ‘personal development’.

Guest Song Leaders
Lin Marsh, one of the most significant figures in the
national ‘rebirth’ of singing, led our first workshop in 2009.
Since then we’ve hosted Scottish singer-composer Ali
Burns (2010) and, for KS1 pupils, multi-instrumentalist and song writer Steve Grocott (2013 & 2016) and ‘choral activist’
Kirsty Martin (2014).

Music Theatre Projects
With over thirty visits to schools in and beyond Thetford, the Voices team toured for five years with a Rehearsal Workshop leading to a Performance within a Day. The 2012 show had an
Olympic theme with original songs from John and James Weeks who combined again in 2016 to tell the Earthsea story of YOUNG WIZARD. In 2013 GIANT was based around Lin Marsh’s songs retelling the legend of Tom Hickathrift. In 2014
Russian folk-songs provided the music for MEETING BABA YAGA while MASKED (2015) told the story of Thetford’s Man in an Iron Mask.

 

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