Rehearsals are under way across the city for next week's huge Big Sing event in York city centre.

Hundreds of schoolchildren will join together in song in a mass outdoor concert in Parliament Street, York, next Thursday.

Singers from 42 York schools, including the choir at Clifton Without Junior School, will be joined by pupils and community choirs from Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield and Doncaster for the event.

It is being held as part of the BBC Music Live event, which this year is being based in York, Leeds and Bradford, and which runs over the May Spring Bank Holiday weekend.

The main schools' Big Sing event will start at 1pm on Thursday, May 24, and there will be another event on the Monday, May 28, for community choirs, starting at 11.30am.

Big Sing is being organised by City of York Performing Arts Service, which organised last year's 2,000 Voices for 2000 event at Huntington Stadium, and is being funded by the National Foundation for Youth Music.

Updated: 11:30 Wednesday, May 16, 2001