NORTHWEST CHORAL SOCIETY MEETING MINUTES
March 12, 2013
CALL TO ORDER:The March 12th 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 6:34 PM by NWCS board president Penny Perles. The following board members were present:
David Hitch Penny Perles
Noreen LaValle Diane Szuberla
David Martin Ruta Veitmanis
Mary Jane Matecki
Also present: Alan Wellman, Artistic Director
MEETING MINUTES:
The meeting minutes of the February 12 board meeting were reviewed and no corrections were needed.
Noreen LaValle made a motion to accept the minutes. The motion was seconded by Mary Jane Matecki. The motion passed.
TREASURER’S REPORT:
Noreen presented the treasurer’s report for February. Cash disbursements totaled $991.69. There were no cash receipts. Our regular account balance was $16,044.87. Including the J. Melcher Memorial Fund and petty cash, our final total was $19,116.87. Ruta Veitmanis made a motion to accept the treasurer’s report. David Hitch seconded the motion. The motion passed.
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR:
Alan Wellman presented our concert program for the next concert season:
° For the December concert the first half of the program will include Benjamin Britten’s Ceremony of Carols – a piece for women’s voices, and will also include a piece for men’s voices. The second half of the program will be John Rutter’s Joy to the World.
° The spring concert will be called Crown Jewels and include Anglican Church music from the British choral revival.
° The June concert will be announced later.
Alan also stated that preparing two concerts from January to June is very stressful due to the limited number of possible rehearsals, the possibility of bad winter weather and many other activities taking place in the spring. For example, this winter we had to cancel two rehearsals due to snowstorms. He suggested that next concert season we prepare only two concerts, but perform each one twice at two different venues. Taking a concert trip could be our third program which we could also perform locally.
The proposed concert trip to St. Louis or New York City was also discussed. Because too much of the first and last day of the trip is taken up traveling, we would extend the St. Louis trip to 4 days and 3 nights. Minneapolis is also a possible destination. We will present the trip idea to the membership after the April concert. We will also present a budget plan so that members can begin payments gradually. Mary Jane made a motion to go ahead with the plans to travel in 2014 and use this trip in lieu of a June concert. David Hitch seconded the motion. The motion passed.
PROMOTIONS:
Posters are ready for distribution, tickets have already been given to members and the program book is being prepared.
DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE:
David Hitch stated that if we wanted to apply for a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, we would need to do an outreach program for an impoverished group. He works with a group called Heartland Alliance which does such programs. We have already done three outreach programs, but they have been in our communities.
To thank our donors, we will give them flowers at the April concert. Geoff Green is preparing the donation envelopes to insert in the program books.
Mary Jane stated that she needs Geoff to place a new member roster on our website.
FACILITIES:
David Hitch will help with facilities while John Schindler is ill.
PUBLICITY:
Mary Jane will send a picture and short press release to TribLocal.
Martha Conlon will put the press release on Facebook.
We will also put our concert on the WFMT Arts Calendar, WBEZ community events and Time Out Chicago.
SUNSHINE COMMITTEE:
We will ask Chris Stukel to send flowers to John Schindler who is in the hospital.
OLD BUSINESS:
David Martin presented the final version of our revisions for the Handbook section “Member Support for Chorus Activities”. Two corrections were made:
Under Financial contributions, first sentence, the word ‘Giving’ will be replaced by ‘Support’:
“Each member is expected to make a financial contribution to the Annual Support Fund.”
Under Ticket Sales, last sentence, the word ‘three’ will be deleted: “Each member is responsible for selling or purchasing at least one ticket for each of the main concerts during the season.”
Mary Jane made a motion to accept the Handbook revisions with the two corrections. Diane Szuberla seconded the motion. The motion passed. (The full text of the revisions can be found at the end of the minutes.)
NEW BUSINESS:
We will give 5 sets of tickets for our June concert to WFMT for their quiz winners.
We will also give tickets for our April concert to WFMT for their ‘two tickets for the price of one’ for their membership drive.
This year’s Chorus America Conference is in Seattle, June 12-15. Would one of the board members like to attend? The fee is $400.00 if we register by March 15.
Penny presented a sample of a Meet and Greet event by the Elmhurst Choral Union. How can we improve our event and make it more open to the community?
Penny also asked board members to check out the website: Americans for the Arts.org. This is an umbrella organization for all the arts which helps members with the business aspect of the arts. For a membership fee of $50.00, one person may attend the meetings.
In order to expand our ‘information network’ we should ask all our friends to ‘like’ us on Facebook. We will also ask our audience to do this. Martha will look into getting us on LinkedIn.
Alan will give April concert tickets to sell by Gold Star.
David Martin asked that, for the next two weeks, we stack our chairs after our rehearsals.
NEXT MEETING:
Our next Board Meeting will be April 9, 6:30 PM, before rehearsal at St. Martin’s.
ADJOURNMENT:
The Board Meeting was adjourned at 7:17 PM by a motion from Noreen and a second from Mary Jane. The motion passed.
Ruta Veitmanis
Recording Secretary
Northwest Choral Society