Bedford Choral Society

Bedford Choral Society is one of the oldest in the country. Founded in 1867 as Bedford Musical Society, it is, we believe, the seventh oldest, equal with Edinburgh University Musical Society, which dates from the same year.

Currently we have about 130 active members and have an open door to welcome any new singers interested in joining us. The music we sing includes the traditional choral repertoire of the great composers like Bach, Handel, Mozart, Brahms, Mendelssohn and Elgar. However we also like to tackle more unusual or contemporary pieces, such as Eric Whitacre’s Five Hebrew Love Songs, which we performed recently.

We are fortunate in our experienced and approachable Musical Director, Ian Smith, and talented accompanist, Tim Grant-Jones. For most of our concerts we perform with local orchestra Bedford Sinfonia.

One of the Choir’s commitments is to the encouragement of singing for young people. We are supporting singing in schools and for some of our concerts we team up with a local school choir, giving these young people the excitement of performing on a stage with orchestra and soloists!

As well as our full-choir performance schedule, we also put together smaller choirs to sing recitals or for weddings, funerals or other special occasions. Our repertoire for these smaller events is growing all the time and provides a different kind of choral singing opportunity for the members able and willing to volunteer.

For more information and to find out how to join us as a singer, please visit the BCS website.