The director finds her calling more fun than leading adults.

Some people live on the edge skydiving or tightrope walking, but for Kathleen Bullivant, thrills come with conducting a children’s choir.

“Kids have spontaneity,” she said. “They’re all nuclei which come together. You live a little more on the edge.”

Bullivant, who has been conducting children’s choirs for 19-20 years and now teaches music at the Island School, is establishing the Bainbridge Island Community Youth Choir. A first round of auditions has been held, and more will be scheduled based on demand.

The choir is open to first-graders and older who can read music. The group will perform mostly secular music from folk songs to classical to pop, Broadway and jazz twice a year. Rehearsals will be held at the Island Music Guild Hall in Rolling Bay.

Bullivant, who also conducts the youth choir of the Rolling Bay Presbyterian Church, says she enjoys the give and take of working with kids and sees opportunities for additional concerts for the community as well.

“We’re doing things together. I’m not iron-fisted,” Bullivant said. “I learn as much from them as I think they learn from me.”

A case in point was a piece she was teaching that she felt had a weak resolution. A student came up to her and said, “I’ve been singing a different ending.”

They looked at it together and Bullivant, liking the student’s version better, used it.

Bullivant sang in choruses at age 7 in her town of Penzance in Cornwall, England, where the tradition of choir singing was “entrenched” in the society.

“I have great memories of singing. What I liked was the feeling of working together…that feeling you get when you’re 20 (people) singing a part but it sounds like one,” Bullivant said. “With adults it’s hard to get that unified sound. It’s easier to mold the (child’s) voice to sing the same way, so you have this more pure sound.”

She was formally trained in violin and piano at the Royal School of Music in London and later received voice training at the Westminster Choir College in New Jersey where she also ended up writing the curriculum for early childhood music.

What distinguishes music for children is mostly the range – how high and low the notes go – and accessibility of the words and rhythm, Bullivant says. She looks for music that her charges can learn well in six weeks.

After a spell of serious youth choirs in the 1970s was followed by a waning during the ’80s when kids found more interest in sports, Bullivant says there has been an upswing in interest since the 1990s.

Its renaissance is partly thanks to a larger repertoire in the 20th century, with works by composers such as Helen Kemp and Henry Leck.

The Internet has also made more music accessible, particularly music of other cultures.

“The multicultural angle has really come to the fore because the world is smaller and more accessible today,” Bullivant said. “I think it needs to be reflected in what they sing and say.”

The Bainbridge Island Community Youth Choir is open to youth in first grade and up who can read music. Rehearsals are 4:30-5:30 p.m. Wednesdays at Island Music Guild Hall, 10598 Valley Road. Tuition is $300 for the October through May season. For an audition, call 780-0799 or email biyouthchoir@yahoo.com.