Looking for a boarding choir school for my DS with a strong academic program

[abowley]

Hello everyone,

My DS is now 6 and he loves singing and playing the cello, and what it's true is that he does it very well for his age. For this reason, he wants to join a choir school. I have to say that he is very clever and also the pedagogic team of his current school told us he was gifted. Even though he always says that his dream is to sing in a choir, and we'd like to fulfil it.
Please we'd be very glad if someone could recommend us some choir schools with a strong academic program.
An important point, we are looking for a school that offers boarding at Y4 as usually, it's when the majority of choristers start training.
We were thinking with King's College Cambridge, Westminster Abbey, St John's College Cambridge or Winchester College.

PD: We're interested in Eton for secondary so we'd like a school with an academic program suitable for it

I'd appreciate so much any advice.

These are the ones for the moment we want to visit. We'd appreciate recommendations.

Some useres told me great things about SPCS and SGSW. Any experiences with the others?

@mumsnoangel it's not so much the results as the very small numbers of children taking the exams. 24 children taking GCSE music as opposed to 220 + for each science tells you a lot about the direction of travel of a school.

@abowley, might be worth thinking about what size and type of school might suit your DS, as you have a mixture in your list.

• WACS is tiny (the only pupils are the choristers) and boys-only - the size might suit some boys but feel claustrophobic to others (especially in the upper years).
• SPCS is co-ed and has non-chorister day pupils, but the choristers are the only boarders so the friendship pool at school is bigger but the boarding house is small.
• Pilgrims' (boys-only) and all the others (co-ed) have non-chorister pupils and also non-chorister boarders, so boarding life doesn't only focus on the choir.

Lonny, all the boys will do science. Music is always going to be an option.

Our Godson went to Kings in Cambridge as a chorister when he was 8 and then onto Eton when he was 13.
He is now 18 and in the 6th form at Eton and about to take 4 A levels.
He has had the most wonderful school experience
He was awarded scholarships for both schools 🙂

@TheatreTaxi thanks for your advice

@fudgesmummy thanks for shareing your experience it's very useful

Canterbury cathedral Boys choir is a boarding choir and the boys attended one of the local private schools (we have three)

Moomin my dd is very likely to do music a level and I obviously think it’s great and don’t consider it to be at all a lesser option, but I have been told historically some schools steered kids away from music

@Rosieposy4 that's kind of my point... if a boy is gifted enough and keen enough on music to devote his entire primary school years to it, perhaps a senior school where all the boys take music and science is only ever going to be an option would be a better fit?

Maybe a bit out of date but I went to St. John's and it was amazing. Both my brother and I then went on to local independent schools and got straight as, then Oxford. More importantly to me as a parent I have very warm feelings about the experience as a whole and feel it was a very safe and caring school. I don't remember any of our year heading to Eton, but many went to big public schools across the country.

Having applied for a teacher role recently in their preprep department I know they have a bit of a radical way of teaching now. Seems intriguing. I don't know how far up the school that extends tho. From year 4 on as with most preps they start being taught by specialists.

Go look at all these schools and work out what is important to you and what would suit DS. It's going to be different for every child!

@xine15 thanks for shareing your experience