What to know
- BELT is a musical theatre experience founded by Jaimee, Sam and Sydney Hall in Toronto.
- BELT held a choir night for theatre lovers to get together and sing ‘For Good’ from the musical Wicked.
- The Hall sisters say they founded BELT for a love of community and the need to connect with like-minded people.
For theatre lovers, We are BELT’s sing-along nights are the stuff of dreams.
Founded by Jaimee, Sam and Sydney Hall in 2025, BELT’s choir nights are a welcome haven for Torontonians who love musical theatre and singing their hearts out.
BELT’s sing-along nights, or “BELTChoir”, organized monthly by the Hall sisters, involve getting a couple hundred Broadway lovers into a shared space where experienced choir directors lead participants in practicing through a pre-chosen song from an iconic Broadway musical.
This month’s song was “For Good” from Wicked. In December, participants crooned their way through “Seasons of Love” from Rent.
Sam said the idea for BELT was born after her sister Jaimee made a callout on TikTok to other theatre lovers in Toronto. The video went viral.
“We grew up as theatre kids, and for years, we had this idea of, ‘Wouldn’t it be so fun to go to a karaoke night and sing musical theatre and not have people be annoyed that we’re singing musical theatre?’ Finally, we were like, ‘we should just see if there’s other people that want to do it,’” she said.
“Jaimee made a Tiktok, and it blew up. It got thousands of views and thousands of comments of people being like, ‘Yes, finally, tell us when!’ So, that was [when] we found our people, and then we started making events for those people.”
Sam explained that BELT was started for a love of community and the need to connect with like-minded people, especially for those whose love of theatre faded as they became adults. The three sisters realized they couldn’t possibly be the only people whose penchant for musicals stayed strong.
“Every friend group has one friend that loves musicals and can never tap into that part of themselves. And so we decided we need to make a space to bring those people together. And I think we have,” she said.
What to sing?
Not only are the sing-alongs and karaoke nights community focused, but the Hall sisters always take into account online feedback when it comes to song choices, although the initial idea stems from a wholesomely selfish place.
“It was a trial and error of like, ‘We really want to sing Rent. Do you guys really want to sing Rent?’ It has been selfishly like, what are our favourite musicals? But we do gut checks with our community. It’s very by theatre kids, for theatre kids.”
We’re all sisters
There’s no “me” when it comes to BELT. Despite how hectic the planning and logistics can get, the Hall sisters think of every participant at choir and karaoke nights also as sisters.
“Those are sisters out there. Everyone’s a sister. They’re gonna have fun when we have fun. So, that’s what’s made the events not feel like work, because we just come and we’re singing ‘For Good’ for two hours. That’s the best night of my life,” Sam says.
Euphoric harmonies
To help participants learn to sing in the key best suited to their voice — whether that’s sopranos, altos, tenors or baritones — the Hall sisters have choir directors teach each part of the song.
Anika and Britta Johnson, who are also sisters, led participants through each bar of “For Good” on Wednesday night. For them, BELT’s choir nights are a chance for like-minded people to congregate in person, work hard and get better at something.
“I think there’s such a desire for something live that isn’t on a camera, isn’t digital. It’s real vibrations in the room. It couldn’t happen unless we were all there together. And every time, the first time we sing through and the harmonies lock in together, we cry. And it’s euphoric. We love to cry,” Britta says.
The Johnson sisters commend the connectedness of the theatre community in Toronto and love being able to bring together theatre nerds who have never been part of a professional scene and watch them strive for excellence.
“This is a really unique thing, because we usually are working in professional spaces, and in this case, we get to bring together people who maybe haven’t been part of that professional scene, haven’t sung together for a long time, but they get to kind of interact and participate in something that is still striving to be kind of excellent.”
