School children are preparing to take centre stage as the lives of the Bronts are transformed to opera.

Youngsters from four primary schools in the Bradford district -- including Lees -- are performing in Haworth Parish Church on Thursday, at 1.30pm and 6.30pm, to an invited audience.

The opera - "The Wind on the Moor" - is the result of a nine-month project managed by the Bront Parsonage Museum in partnership with Operahouse, which offers music-based creative projects for primary schools across the country.

The children have taken part in various activities focusing on the parsonage, its collection and the local landscape. They have responded creatively to what they've learned with musical composition, writing, singing, dance, drama and mime.

The project -- made possible through funding from the Arts Council, Yorkshire Museums Libraries & Archives Council and the Paul Hamlyn Foundation -- is based on the early lives of the Bronts.

Virginia Rushton, the project director and Operahouse artistic director, said: "The journey from blank page to performance is always exciting for a composer, but on this project we have had 120 young composers/performers and their teachers so we're off the scale in terms of excitement!

"As the journey has progressed it has gathered pace and is now racing towards the premiere.

"Harnessing all the energy and ideas, keeping the creative process on track, supporting the class teachers as they came to grips with techniques for writing songs, and simply managing such a large group of children, has been a challenge. But we knew what we were aiming for, and I think we have achieved something unique for each of us and for our audience."

Andrew McCarthy, audience development manager at the Bront Parsonage Museum, said: "We have focused on the Bronts' experience of childhood in Haworth and the contrast between this industrial village in which they grew up and the extraordinary imaginary worlds they created in their early writing.

"The children and teachers involved have enjoyed themselves immensely and have totally engaged with the project. They are looking forward to the performance with much anticipation."