Well good evening readers, as promised this is the outcome of the concert that I was involved in organising earlier today, was it a total disaster, I leave it to you to decide, on the other hand I suppose there were some very good positives, so here we go, I may want off a little, but I had been on the go since early this morning.
Should I mention the good bits first or last, will start with the bad debts and build up, the first was as I was getting ready to go to the concert and set things up this morning, my phone went and it was a friend of mine I was going to see later, who decided to come and visit, well time passed and eventually I had to remind him that I had things to do, at that point he put it on mini disc decided to buy a ticket which was very kind, but he never turned up at the show, plus I was now starting to run late.
The other thing that will matter as I tell the story was that I had problems transferring the music for the dances, of which there were from cassette to disc, so had put it on mini disc and took along all sorts of connections to fit the sound system.
But when I got there nobody else had arrived, but I met Brian, the manager a kindly set everything up for us just where we asked for it, just then the dancers arrived they were all female young & not called Sever but Fever, I had a feeling it was the first of a long set of problems today, well next the pianist arrived, she wanted the piano moving in front of the curtain, well that was okay but what about the 2 young people who were playing, set pieces, well we reached a compromise.
Now what else could go wrong well our intrepid sound person had got stuck in road works, so I could not try out the music, nor could the dancers, so with heavy heart I went to se how many people were outside queuing up for tickets, you have guessed it none, there were now about 20 performers & no audience, uumm.
Well eventually we set up the sound system & everything worked as it should , but then the 2 principal singers from the operatic society explained they both needed microphones, well you would be impressed with me I managed to sort that one out without to much of a problem.
Well now to the running order I wrote down the various things as instructed by Jackie & we seemed to be on our way, I was on a run I met our two talented young people Matthew & Johanna, & their mum & they seemed very organised. So over to Jackie & let the show begin, Alison & John had very good voices, next was Matthew & Johanna, playing the piano violin then Johanna, dancing, I just wish I was so talented or my children were, we finished the first half with Affetside choir doing their usual beautiful singing.
I forgot to say through all of this Fever dancers were watching & dancing along to the music, in the wings which for me was just as well because I was unable to see the show, due to being curtain person & assistant sound person.
Well in the interval I went to have a look at how things had gone on with ticket sales, well I think the volunteers & entertainers outnumbered the customers 2 to 1, but they all seemed to enjoy themselves & talking to people the various acts had enjoyed the others,
Well all seemed to of settled down we were on a roll, “oh no we were not” we should of started with Johanna doing a dance, well guess who messed up the music & the curtain not once not twice but three times, but I do have to say Johanna was a total professional putting up with me & my deliberate(if only) mistakes, her performance once she started was well worth the wait though.
Now just looking at the timetable I have spotted my next deliberate mistake, now how could anyone forget a choir of 30 people, well I did, then they started & sang & sang, I went out front & really enjoyed the whole set, but I had decided that Jackie was doing her piece & had set the stage for this, but the cue never came, why not, because I had made another minor mistake.
Finally they finished & now back to Johanna & her last set of dancing, well how could I possibly get it wrong after the last time, well opening the curtain may of helped, playing the right piece of music also, who could I blame, well me, but again what a pleasure she was again.
Now you & I would think Jeff you have had a bad run of luck but we are alright now, wrong again, it was finally Jackie’s piece, which she needed a music stand & a microphone on a stand, as well as the radio mike she already had, well what could go wrong well the mike would not work the stand would not take the wider mike so guess who was summoned to stand looking stupid holding the microphone for Jackie for the duration of her song.
Well at long last the lovely young female dancers time came, they were dancing initially to very upbeat music, then a whole range of music in different styles, but the most worrying for me & maybe our sound person was when they wore very! Short skirts for one of the numbers, I have to say at this time my back was aching with all the standing & I thought how wonderful to be so fit & capable as they & Johanna were, in fact I shut my eyes when she & one of the dancers at separate times did the splits.
Finally that was the end, I missed asking people in the audience how it had gone on but felt the applause was a true indication that people had enjoyed themselves.
When I checked we had about broken even with ticket sales against expenses, therefore was it all worthwhile yes of course it was we all enjoyed ourselves
Now for the future, never ever ever have an event on mothers or any other day like that, because this was I feel why we struggled for the acts & audience.
Make sure who is going to perform & get the publicity sorted out very early on.
Make sure that any music or other items are sorted out well before the day
Remember to check the running order & get someone else to assist where their brain works better than mine
Get people to buy tickets well in advance, so that we make a profit at least.
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