A CHORAL spectacular is set to raise the roof of Kidderminster Town Hall this Saturday.

The globe-trotting Kidderminster Male Choir is poised to performits annual concert and hopes to raise more than £2,500 towards its running costs.

The singers, who helped put Wyre Forest on the world map with a trip to the twin town of Husum this summer, will be joined by guest soloist and renowned pianist Jonathon French and will perform a number of new arrangements never performed in public before.

Singer Paul Brown said last year's annual concert attracted 500 people, generating £2,500, and added he hoped Saturday's concert would match this figure.

He went on he was looking forward to performing new numbers including Cole Porter and Beatles medleys and Welsh hymns Cwn Rhondda and Tydi A Roddaist.

"We are members of the Welsh Association of Choirs so that's why we have some Welsh songs in our repertoire.

"We've been members for years simply because we're so close to the Welsh border and actually won the Welsh Association of Choirs' competition in 2001. We're also in the English Association of Choirs."

He added his choir performed a wide range of songs to appeal to many different audiences.

"We have popular stuff like the Cole Porter medley which includes Another Opening, Just One of Those Things, You Do Something To Me and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, and the Beatles medley," he said.

"But we also have a brand new song called Prayer of the Children which was written by Kurt Bestor who was in Bosnia in the early 1990s when the war was going on.

"It's about what children endured during the war and is a lovely song because it's a plea for peace - and it's the first time we've ever performed it in public before."

Any money raised by the concert will be used to pay for the choir's running costs during their centenary next year.

"We're hoping to sell out and when we do we get about 500 people in," Paul added.

"It's the one concert each year that we tend to do exceptionally well at and whatever tickets we have left over will be available to buy on the door."

More information and tickets for the event can be obtained by calling 01562 700118.