Going to Chorus Management School

When I first took over as president of my choral group, my head was buzzing with ideas as to what we needed (serious fundraising, a stronger board of directors, a marketing-oriented approach to publicity), but I had little idea as to how to go about making any of these things happen.

Well, this weekend I attended a chorus management seminar sponsored by Chorus America and I learned a lot. The official seminar had presentations on Strategic Planning, Governance, Fundraising, and Marketing/PR. Lots of good information was presented. More importantly, I was able to compare notes with my counterparts in forty other choral groups to find out how they do things. The essential idea is that we have to start thinking of ourselves as a Nonprofit Organization [tm] and not just as a bunch of folks west of Boston who sing in churches every now and then. Unless, of course, we want to stay where we are, scratching for donations and playing mainly to our own friends and families...

I'm going to distill my impressions of this and present it at our Annual Meeting which is in less than a month's time... we'll see how it's received...