13 Year Old Choir Boy Stuns Cathedral With Inspiring Ave Maria Performance

Cormac Thompson is a young choir singer from Lancashire, UK, who started singing at just 8 years old. In 2020 he opened a YouTube channel and began uploading videos before being found by Decca Records who wanted to work with him to make an album.

The video below is from a competition Cormac entered on the BBC called, “Young Chorister of the Year”. This competition is held annually by BBC Songs of Praise and Radio 2. He reposted this performance as a tribute to the Queen, Cormac said, “It was always my dream to sing for you but sadly that was not to be. Sharing my ‘Songs of Praise’ solo for you (recorded at Salisbury Cathedral Dec. 21) is the next best thing”. He sings Ave Maria (Bach / Gounod).

His treble performance of “Empty Chairs at Empty Tables” from “Les Misérables” was recorded in London’s Masterchord Studio. The track was recorded and released as a charity single in aid of “Acting For Others” who provide financial and emotional support to all theatre workers in times of need – much needed throughout 2020.

In the video above Cormac is 13 years old. He is already showing incredible musical maturity with his vocal delivery. During 2020 Cormac was unable to see his nannie, due to government orders to stay at home. She loves listening to Cormac sing, so his mother began videoing him to share with her on YouTube. He later said, “It wasn’t until I uploaded videos to YouTube singing songs for my Nannie in Northern Ireland that I realised just how much really I love it”.

From that moment on his passion for music has kept him singing everyday as he pursues what looks to be a very bright music career. In 2021, he was contacted by professional pianist Dominic Ferris who was interest in recording a few tracks. Dominic has collaborated with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra multiple times resulting in over 3 million album sales worldwide! He has also performed on six albums that have charted in the top 10. He recently worked with Michael Ball on his latest release “Coming Home To You”, which charted at No.1 in the UK album charts. Along with Cormac’s mother and father, Dominic can see how much talent and passion the young singer has. To date, they have recorded 8 songs together.

You may also have heard Cormac’s spine-tingling vocals on the television in the UK too. He competed in the “BBC Young Chorister of the Year” making it to the final in 2021 which was held at Salisbury Cathedral. You can see clips of this on Cormac’s YouTube channel. (links at article end)

When talking about his musical influences, Cormac said, “I like to listen to all kinds of music, I love Ed Sheeran and I’m learning to play one of his songs on the piano to sing to at the moment too. I really love singing songs with beautiful melodies that really show my voice at it’s best and I am keen to sing these sorts of song before my voice changes to a man voice and that is only ever getting closer every day. I will be very sad when I lose my treble voice but I know that it is a gift that was only ever mine to borrow for a short time and hopefully I wont sound too awful when I get my adult voice too.”

If you would like to listen to more from this talented young singer and follow his music career as it unfolds, subscribe to his YouTube channel or follow him on Facebook or Instagram. You can also visit his official website for more information. You can also donate to the “Acting For Others” charity on Just Giving which Cormac is currently raising money for. If you want to see more from the talented pianist in the videos, you can follow Dominic Ferris on Facebook too.

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