The Main Choir boasts between 60 and 100 singers aged between 9 and 18. The choir performs a wide variety of music in genres ranging from Pop, Classical, Gospel, and Folk. The repertoire is carefully selected to best engage young singers, whilst also allowing them to develop a sound vocal technique. Skills in part-singing are honed, providing a professional finish envied by all who hear the choir sing. Here are just a few of the events of recent years:
• In 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000 and 2002 the choir were semi-finalists or finalist in the Sainsbury's Choir of the Year Competition broadcast on the BBC.
• The choir sang at the opening of the Millennium Dome, and at the first Holocaust Memorial Service at Westminster.
• In 2008 the choir entered the BBC Radio 3 Choir of the Year open category and won the national finals. This led to a place in the grand final the following month where the choir were successful in being crowned BBC Radio 3 Choir of the Year.
• The choir were invited to take part in the BBC Proms 2009 performing Handel's Messiah at the Royal Albert Hall.
As part of the Cultural Olympiad in 2012 the choir, along with Proper Job Theatre Company commissioned a massed open-air stage work called Cycle Song. The project was awarded a prestigious Gramophone Award in 2013.
• In July 2015, the choir joined forces at Scunthorpe’s Baths Hall with hundreds of junior school children, a combined orchestra, and an adult choir of over 100 to perform in a concert inspired by the BBC Ten Pieces project. Handel’s Zadok the Priest was the centrepiece of this monumental event, and the sound was mind-blowing.
• The choir regularly take trips abroad and, in the past, have visited Australia, Canada, Wales, France, Germany and Italy.
In 2022, Britten Pears Arts invited the organisation to premiere the 2022 Friday Afternoons set of pieces, composed by Joanna Lee, text by Andy Shepherd, the 12 pieces reflect on set of books, 'The Boy Who G