The Altrincham Children’s Choir is “a million miles” from your average choir – and founders Claire and Tina O’Brien have changed its name to prove it.
The 35-strong choir is now known as Little Belters and the O’Brien sisters are looking for new members between the ages of five and 11.
Launching the choir in 2011 to provide local children with high quality, out-of-school vocal training – with a strict no-audition policy – their formula has proven a hugely successful one.
So why the name change? “Many children, boys in particular, react negatively to the word ‘choir’,” says Claire, who along with her sister is a former professional singer who’s performed for The Queen and Paul McCartney.
Below: Founders Tina (left) and Claire O’Brien
“That idea of the formal, old-fashioned choir is a million miles away from how we run our rehearsals and how we perform.
“We don’t stick to the traditional formula. We try to run our sessions like high energy, fast-paced singing lessons, delivered en masse.
“The way we work is really effective in developing the kids both as singers and as performers and there’s also great variety. They don’t know from one week to the next whether they’ll be singing an indie anthem or an obscure folk ballad. We like to keep them guessing.”
Anyone who has seen the Little Belters in action will not forget the experience.
Whether singing their own version of an Arctic Monkeys classic to an audience of thousands in Altrincham, recording dance music vocals for European house DJs or duetting with opera singers, the youngsters have shown that they are not your average choir.
The O’Briens have set up a second group in Chorlton and more are “likely” to follow.
“More than anything we work hard to give the kids fantastic and memorable performance opportunities,” adds Claire.
“This Christmas we performed at Manchester Cathedral for Genesis Breast Cancer Research, in November we were on the telly performing on CBBC’s Friday Download, we’ve previously won the award for Best Entertainment at the Manchester Marathon and CBeebies star Alex Winters had us singing in the Big Top at last year’s FunFest at Red House Farm.
Below: Little Belters in action
“We’ve also been into the recording studio twice! It’s good to think that the children, and their families, now have those memories.”
Many of the choir members’ mums are also involved with Absolute Belters, the mums’ choir, who brought Market House to a standstill with a “flash mob” performance before Christmas.
“It was something we’d suggested to Nick (Johnson, market manager) a long time ago,” says Claire.
“We had no idea whether it would work, whether we could execute it properly (especially when we realised that Market House was going to be so busy!) but Nick really liked the idea of having something spontaneous breaking out in Market House so we decided to go for it.
Below: Absolute Belters perform their flash mob in Market House
“We had about 50 women on board and none of them had ever done anything like this before. We chose to sing Clean Bandit’s ‘Rather Be’ as the lyrics seemed appropriate for the new market and how local people have embraced it.
“None of us could’ve anticipated how well it worked. From the moment the first women started singing people started filming on their mobiles. People were standing and singing who weren’t even part of the choir which I think is the sign of a really good flash mob. The singers and the audience were all elated afterwards. It was a really emotional and uplifting three minutes.”
To book a taster session with Little Belters, contact Claire on 07779 668204 or visit www.littlebelters.co.uk. Rehearsals take place every Tuesday in term time from 5.15-6.15pm at The Hub in Altrincham.
Below: Little Belters
