12 Oct 2026
A festival that began in St Albans in 2016 and has since taken singers across the globe will celebrate its tenth anniversary next weekend – with a public concert bringing more than 200 voices together.
World Voices Festival – formerly UK Choir Festival – returns to St Albans for its flagship event on October 17-18. It will see choirs from across the UK and beyond gather to learn, share ideas and perform, before audiences join them for a Sunday evening concert at St Albans Cathedral.
The weekend features Craig Lees, Volney Morgan, Charles MacDougall and Russell Scott, with music spanning gospel, pop, a cappella and musicals.
At the heart of the festival is a non-competitive approach: singers come together to develop their skills and share their love of music. For journalists, the weekend offers stories beyond the stage – from the people and journeys behind the visiting choirs to the experience of preparing a massed-voice finale.
The anniversary also marks a new chapter. Following its first overseas event at the Berlin Philharmonie in 2025, the festival is preparing for Vienna’s Konzerthaus in 2027. St Albans provides the setting to celebrate that growth while bringing the festival’s international outlook to a local audience.
Founder and musical director Russell Scott said St Albans was the flagship event for the festival, a city which he had always enjoyed a close affiliation with, especially given the vast number of choirs which perform locally.
“Having been in the industry for 45 years, I felt that I could do something really special and bring choirs together for a weekend festival. It was the most phenomenal event. We had workshop leaders teaching all aspects of gospel singing, pop singing, vocal technique, how to blend performances, and from there it’s just got bigger and bigger.
“The idea is to bring choirs from all over the world in one place to learn together – we’ve had choirs from Iceland, the US, India, Germany, Ireland – but this is the first time we’ve done a concert for the general public.
“Normally it’s all behind closed doors, but this time around as part of the anniversary we’re taking it to the Cathedral. We’ve got more than 200 singers who will work all weekend and then perform on the Sunday night, both as individual choirs and then as one unit for the grand finale. It’s going to me amazing!
“One of the most exciting things about this is not just the music, but the fact that you’re going to have 200 singers performing together and not in the traditional classical sense either – you’re going to see contemporary music, acapella music, songs from the shows, pop music, gospel music, it will be really uplifting and amazing to watch.
“Aside from watching the individual choirs on stage themselves, the electricity is going to come from the atmosphere, from 200 singers performing Bon Jovi for example!”
The four coaches will work with the choirs to produce the event, teaching them their different specialities and then coaching them individually before bringing them all together.
Although this year’s concert is to mark the festival’s anniversary, Russell says if there is a sufficient appetite for repeat performances then they’ll definitely consider doing it again.
He also reflected on how choirs have changed over the past 10 years.
“I think things have changed a lot, and singing has become much more of a mental health topic. Choirs are no longer just for an older generation, or church music, or for Sunday afternoon, or school trips, they’re something that everyone can do.
“I think there is a choir for everyone, whether you’re going for a community choir, or a choir where you can just sing together and make it sound like a community. It’s there for anyone and everyone. That’s what’s fantastic about it.
“For us, on the same stage as a youth choir will be a community choir featuring people who have been members for 50 years, and that’s just extraordinary. It’s great to be able to give people what I think are life-changing opportunities where they make friends and they do something they love doing and they create amazing experiences.
“What’s amazing is hearing people who say they can’t sing, and then they take the plunge and join a choir, and then suddenly you see the transformation. I think there is something so powerful about seeing an experience like that where neither I nor they knew that this moment was going to change them for a lifetime.”
For tickets to the concert visit here: www.russellscott.live/worldvoices
