MUSIC-making in Salisbury is getting an exciting boost, thanks to the creative thinking of Fiona Clarke, musical director of Salisbury Community Choir.

Opening the 2009 Salisbury International Arts Festival in Salisbury Cathedral will be a specially commissioned choral work by acclaimed composer, conductor and former King's Singer, Bob Chilcott.

Estimated cost to stage is in the region of £40,000, and the 55-minute performance will draw on the varying strengths and experiences of Salisbury's musical groups.

Salisbury Community Choir will be joined by Salisbury Musical Society, the St John Singers, Farrant Singers, Sarum Voices as well as Salisbury Cathedral Choir and a schools' choir for this special collaboration.

All in all some 550 singers will take part in this world premiere in an unprecedented celebration of the city's musical talent.

Bob Chilcott has been commissioned to write a work, which will make full use of the Cathedral space, placing choirs at various points around the building, and each supported by small instrumental ensembles, with a main orchestra at their heart.

Working together will be quite challenging for the singers, who range from professional or semi-professional to having a more recreational focus.

And charged with co-ordinating not only these choral groups but Salisbury Symphony Orchestra is the Cathedral's director of music, David Halls, who is no stranger to conducting large musical events.

John Powell, musical director of the St John Singers is chairing the steering group: "This is a unique venture," he says, "because it will involve virtually all the musical organisations in Salisbury in a choral work by one of Britain's best-known composers."