NORTHWEST CHORAL SOCIETY
MEETING MINUTES
October 9, 2012
CALL TO ORDER:
The October 2012 Board Meeting of the Northwest Choral Society was held at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church, 1095 Dempster/Thacker, Des Plaines, IL. The meeting was called to order at 6:31 PM by NWCS board president Penny Perles. The following board members were present:
Noreen LaValle John Schindler
Mary Jane Matecki Diane Szuberla
Penny Perles Ruta Veitmanis
Also present: Alan Wellman, Artistic Director
MEETING MINUTES:
The meeting minutes of the September 11, 2012 board meeting were reviewed and two corrections were needed.
▫ Under Old Business, the first bullet will be deleted. The change of name for our group will be delayed until next season.
▫ Under New Business, third bullet, the second sentence should read: “The invitation is from Bert Matulis’ godchild who has also attended our concerts.”
Noreen LaValle made a motion to accept the corrected minutes. The motion was seconded by Diane Szuberla. The motion passed.
The meeting minutes of the September 18, 2012 Special Meeting of the Whole were reviewed. No corrections were needed. Diane Szuberla made a motion to accept the minutes. The motion was seconded by Noreen LaValle. The motion passed.
TREASURER’S REPORT:
Noreen presented the treasurer’s report for September. Cash disbursements totaled $5,440.15. Cash receipts totaled $8,661.50. Our regular account balance was $13,754.50. Including the J. Melcher Memorial Fund and petty cash, our final total was $16,826.50. Ruta Veitmanis made a motion to accept the treasurer’s report. Diane Szuberla seconded the motion. The motion passed.
Noreen also presented the Profit & Loss Budget vs. Actual report for July through September.
Of the budgeted income of $22,950.00, we have received $10,150.00. Of the budgeted expenses of $28,280.00, we have spent $7,461.15.
We will need to buy additional insurance for the June concert because of the larger capacity of the auditorium.
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR:
Alan Wellman will arrange to have our December concert recorded at a cost of about $250.00. Although our music is in the public domain, he will get written agreement from the soloists and orchestra members for this. We will sell the CDs to our members as a fundraiser.
Alan introduced us to the website Goldstar, which sells to its members half price tickets to concerts and other cultural events during the last week before the performance. We simply give them information about the concert and tell them how many tickets we have for sale – e.g. 20 tickets at $10.00 each. They do the advertising and selling. On the day of the concert they email us the names of the people who have bought tickets and we have these tickets for them at the door as ‘will call’. Goldstar sends us a check for the tickets sold. There is no expense to us, neither for the tickets sold or not sold. The member buying the ticket pays the fee to Goldstar. The advantage is all ours – exposure to a new set of possible audience members.
PROMOTIONS:
All information for the program book must be submitted by the end of October.
In the program book, the categories and dollar amounts for donors will change:
▫ Patron – $249.00 and under
▫ Sustaining member – $250.00 to $499.00
▫ Guarantor member – $500.00 and above
Due to requests by audience members and advertisers, in the program book, chorus members will be listed by section followed by the name of their town.
ADVERTISING COMMITTEE:
All ads must be submitted to Noreen by October 23rd.
A suggestion was made to trade concert advertisements with the Northwest Symphony Orchestra. We each advertise the other’s concerts in our program books.
DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE:
We have sent out donation requests to last year’s donors.
We are now working on sending requests to everyone on our mailing list, approximately 750 people. Alan will help with the computer program to put each person’s name on their request letter.
FACILITIES COMMITTEE:
Steve Godfrey still has the key to St. Martin’s, which he will give to John Schindler.
PUBLICITY:
We are starting to prepare press releases for this new season.
SUNSHINE COMMITTEE:
Chris Stukel and Ann Jensen will be co-chairmen of this committee.
OLD BUSINESS:
We will delay the change of name project for our group until next season. Our main emphasis for this season is to establish a donor base, both private and corporate.
Reminder of our next two outreach performances:
▫ Northwestern Hospital on October 13, 2:00 PM
▫ Des Arts festival October 21, 3:00 PM
NEW BUSINESS:
Our Holiday party will be December 4th, Little Villa restaurant, Des Plaines, 6:30 PM.
Soprano Soozie Cotter-Schaufele is a music therapist at Lutheran General Hospital. She has invited us to sing a concert at the hospital which will be recorded and then broadcast to patients in the hospital. This will take place Monday evening, November 26th. We will sing the Messiah and some Christmas carols.
Martha Conlon has volunteered to manage our Twitter page. Penny will take care of our Facebook page.
We will not display a copy of our Mission/Vision statement. It is in our program book and on our website.
NEXT MEETING:
Our next Board Meeting will be November 13, 2012, 6:30 PM, before rehearsal at St. Martin’s.
ADJOURNMENT:
The Board Meeting was adjourned at 7:21 PM by a motion from Noreen and a second from John Schindler. The motion passed.
Ruta Veitmanis
Recording Secretary
Northwest Choral Society