About
Oxford Youth Choirs is a group of six choirs for children up to age 19, the most recent being Musical Mayhem for babies and toddlers.
These include the acclaimed Oxford Girls' Choir. Founded in 1984 by Richard Vendome, Oxford Girls' Choir was a pioneering vision for girls' singing and is now the oldest group of its kind in the UK. Richard Vendome continues to direct Oxford Youth Choirs - now in its 38th year.
We meet on Saturday mornings in Oxford and perform a wide range of music from ancient to modern, from opera to jazz.
Our children are drawn from all backgrounds. We provide a welcoming atmosphere allowing their confidence to grow and their musicality to bloom. We encourage younger girls to sing alongside older girls, to stimulate their potential, whilst older girls support the teaching in the younger choirs, building new skills.
Our choirs are musically ambitious and perform to a consistently-high artistic standard. We perform regularly at home and abroad, and have recorded and commissioned a wide range of repertoire.
Our success is built on discipline and teamwork, developed by our outstanding teachers. The choirs benefit enormously from exposure to workshops run by experts such as Roderick Williams and Edward Higginbottom (former Organist & Director of Music at New College).
Our senior students regularly attain ABRSM Diplomas while still with the choir.
Former members have gone on to become successful Oxbridge choral scholars, singer-songwriters, opera singers, music theatre artists, music educators, composers and choral directors.
Roderick Williams OBE says:
"Since my undergraduate days three decades ago, I have seen the choir grow from strength to incredible strength and have worked alongside them in opera, concert, jazz and dance, in London, across the UK and abroad - this is no ordinary choral training!
Wherever I go, I keep bumping into ex-choir members making their way in all aspects of music making. I recently hired studio rehearsal rooms in central London from an ex chorister, who then reappeared as a member of the Holst Singers when I sang the Duruflé Requiem. On a tube escalator I found myself chatting to an ex-OYC mezzo-soprano now singing roles at summer festivals and understudying at English National Opera. I am writing music for three ex-choristers who are enjoying terrific success with their own vocal ensemble.
All this serves to remind me of the unrivalled range of opportunities this unique choir affords and of the benefits the singers receive as they carry their music-making with them into their varied futures."
Roderick Williams - opera singer, composer and Oxford Youth Choirs' patron