The History of the Choir

Since October 2005 Ampleforth Abbey Church has provided the venue for a choral outreach initiative designed to encourage singing in Primary Schools. Ampleforth offers further opportunity for children who enjoy singing to participate in a weekly activity outside school. Choristers from St Martin's Ampleforth have spent three afternoons each term visiting local primary schools to rehearse pieces with the children. This is followed up by visits from singing teachers who work for the North Yorkshire Music Service. The culmination for each primary school is a plenary event in the Abbey Church, during which all the schools visited during that term come together and perform the pieces they have learned.

Early in the project it became apparent that there was a demand for even more singing, so the idea of setting up a children's choir was discussed. To gain some measure of how successful the project might be, in November 2006 all pupils who had previously taken part in the choral outreach programme were invited to come to the Blackden Building at St Martin's Ampleforth for a singing morning, culminating in a performance of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.  Around 70 children attended, and the morning was a great success.

The well-known composer and TV presenter Howard Goodall, who was appointed as "ambassador" for singing in England at the beginning of 2007, had kindly agreed to be the choir's patron. Mr Goodall has written much music for television and film , and is the recipient of the 2007 Making Music/Sir Charles Groves Prize for Outstanding Contribution to British Music.