IT'S been called the Three Choirs Festival for most of its 300 years, but at least six choirs unite in Hereford next month to sing in the main concerts and cathedral services in the longest-running classical music festival in the world.

The professional men and boys of Hereford Cathedral Choir are joined by the men and a slightly smaller number of boy choristers from Gloucester and Worcester Cathedral Choirs, while the 50+ amateur members of the Hereford Three Choirs Festival Chorus are also augmented by a substantial number of colleagues from the other two cities.

Then there is Hereford Cathedral Voluntary Choir, which will sing Evensong on Sunday, July 26, conducted by Peter Dyke with William Fox playing the organ; and the Three Choirs Festival Youth Choir, which meets at the Hereford Academy in the week before the festival to rehearse with conductors Bob Chilcott (whose Requiem they will be performing at their concert on Monday, July 27) and Peter Nardone from Worcester Cathedral.

There are guest vocal ensembles Voces8, the Orlando Consort and Juice, not to mention all the young singers taking part in the Three Choirs Plus programme that runs throughout festival week – and Hereford Cathedral School's very own Cantabile, winners of the Songs of Praise School Choir of the Year Competition 2015, in concert at noon on Tuesday, July 28 in St John’s Methodist Church, St Owen Street.

The biggest choir of all is The Gathering Wave, made up of singers from community choirs across the city and county, brought together by The Music Pool to bring the festival to a close in Hereford Cathedral on Saturday, August 1 (7.45pm) with a hugely varied programme including Echoes: A Song of Poland, a new work by Pete Churchill inspired by the Polish community that lived at Foxley Camp in the years immediately after the Second World War.

The Three Cathedral Choirs have spent two Saturdays rehearsing their music for the festival and singing Evensong together. Last weekend they gave the first performance of one of this year’s festival commissions, Bob Chilcott’s Three Choirs Service, which will be performed again in the festival and broadcast live on BBC Radio 3.

Radio 3 will also be featuring composers associated with the Three Choirs Festival in its ‘Composers of the Week’ slot at lunchtime every weekday in festival week, repeated in the evening.

Coaches from Gloucester and Worcester have brought members of the festival chorus to massed rehearsals of the mighty works which they will be singing with the Philharmonia Orchestra and a variety of conductors in the main evening cathedral concerts.

They range from Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius, for ever associated with the Three Choirs Festival, to Verdi’s operatic Requiem and less familiar works such as Hymnus Amoris by the Danish composer Carl Nielsen, born 150 years ago; Lux Aeterna by William Mathias, a Hereford Three Choirs Festival commission from 1982; and Morning Heroes, written by World War One veteran Sir Arthur Bliss as a memorial to his brother, who was killed in the war.

The narrator for this performance is Samuel West, currently best known for his television appearances in Mr Selfridge, and a real lover of classical music who makes a speciality of working with orchestras in this sort of piece.

Don’t forget the festival is not all about singing. There are lunchtime concerts every day at Holy Trinity Church, Whitecross Road, featuring young singers and instrumentalists who are tipped for the top; and the Courtyard Centre for the Arts hosts Ensemble 360 from Sheffield on 26 July and the Ferio Saxophone Quartet on 1 August in concerts of summer music. And there’s late-night jazz at All Saints.

Look out for the Three Choirs Festival and Three Choirs Plus Booking Brochures around town, check their website www.3Choirs.org for more details or give them a ring on 0845 652 123 if you want to know more.