Newsletter!

St Albans Symphony Orchestra Newsletter

October 2008

Hello everyone and welcome to this first occasional newsletter, aimed at keeping you up to date with orchestra matters.  Following the recent AGM and first Committee meeting of the new season here are the headlines, new initiatives, some dates for your diary and news of leavers and joiners.

I am also pleased to announce a major improvement in the way orchestra communications are handled – see Website below. 

Committee  

First of all, I would like to express my thanks to you for electing the new committee - including myself!  And a special word of thanks to Peter Lyndley for his work as chairman over the last three years. The current list of committee members and other officers are on the Website at “Contacts”. 

I am very pleased to welcome two new members to committee meetings. Karen McLaren is taking on Publicity Officer, where her work will complement the work of David Utting as Press Officer; and Chris Ludwig is taking on Concert Manager, where he will work alongside Jim Pringle as Stage Manager.   

Richard Payne, in addition to his current roles as webmaster and programmes editor, is taking on fixing for wind and brass. Fixing for strings and percussion stays with myself, at least for the time being.   

Publicity

We need to increase audience numbers, which over the last year have shown a small decline. Financially, last season showed a relatively small loss – nothing to worry about, as we have adequate cash reserves, but nothing to be complacent about either. We have two choices – either increase our revenues or decrease our costs. Costs are already kept under tight control, and the only way to make a big impact would be reduce the number of concerts we give in a season. Your committee has ruled this out – after all, we all joined the orchestra to make music! 

So we are working to increase our publicity efforts and reach more potential audience members and attract them to our concerts. Everyone has already been invited to join the drive to display more posters and distribute more flyers, and these efforts will continue, with your active support, throughout the season.  

Rotas

You will have seen Clare Noble’s recent email regarding the duty rotas for preparing refreshments at rehearsals and the after–show parties. The rota has been slightly modified to be fairer to the violas (why? I hear you ask) and is shown at the end of this newsletter. It is also on the Website.

The most immediate change is that second violins are asked to organise the Oct 18th after-show party, as they missed their chance to do a party at the end of last season.

Acoustic screens;  rehearsals layout 

It can at times be uncomfortable for those members playing immediately in front of the brass section – when in full flight, our brass achieve a very healthy volume! But this can be too much for the woodwinds. 

For rehearsals in Homewood Rd we are constrained in layout. We have been debating for some time how to improve matters, and are taking the following immediate initiatives. (For our concert venues, we usually have more flexibility in layout but will be taking special care at these too). 

a)  We will move the strings forward to make space for the woodwinds to move onto the floor of the church, leaving the brass on the raised altar section – a little further away and a little higher up.

b) We have also acquired two special acoustic screens for evaluation. If these are found to be a success, we can look at acquiring more.  

Setting up for rehearsals will now take a little longer and I would ask that more people make the extra effort to arrive by 7.10pm in order to assist Jerry and Frances and the one or two other stalwarts who always arrive to help set up.  This applies especially to those members who sometimes manage to get away early at the end of rehearsal (hint: it is never the strings) – it would be great if you can arrive at 7.10pm every now and then.  

At the end of the evening everyone should be helping to clear up. 

Dates 

In addition to our published concert dates, there are two St Cecilia Society dates to note. The Society is made up of ourselves, St Albans Chamber Choir, Hardynge Choir and Radlett Choral Society. 

28th February 2009 – the Society will be running a charity fund-raising bring-and-sing event in Homewood Rd Church, for choirs and orchestra.  The work will be Brahms’ A German Requiem and will be conducted by John Gibbons, Music Director of St Albans Chamber Choir.  

17 October 2009 – the Society will be performing Verdi’s Requiem in St Albans Abbey. 

More details closer to the dates.

Website 

Richard has done his stuff as webmaster and we now have a sparkly new Members section at www.saso.org.uk. Here you can see this newsletter, the duty rotas and, for anyone who wants all the boring detail, the full minutes of this year’s AGM and the committee meetings.  

Leavers and joiners

After 4 years with the orchestra, Gwyneth James (cello) has moved to Welwyn and is now playing with the Welwyn Garden City Music Society (conductor James Ross).

After many more years with the orchestra Alan Millard (violin) has decided to put down his violin and retire from orchestral playing.

We hope to see both Gwyneth and Alan at future concerts.

We are delighted to welcome Jo Copestake (violin) and Emily Reynolds (cello) who have recently moved into the area.

And welcomes too for Tony Coles (double bass) who has guested with us on and off for several years and is now joining full time; and Andrew Hackett who is also playing double bass with us.

Your views please!

Let me know if you find this newsletter useful – and of any topics you think should be included in future.

 Many thanks!

Kieran