Cantamus Information for girls & parents

Minutes of the Meeting of the Cantamus Parents and Friends Committee


Held on Friday, 30th November, 2007


In Sherwood Hall School, Mansfield

     
Present: Margaret Vince Hilary McCaughey (Chair)
  Mary Martin Julie Revill (Treasurer)
  Sheila Haslam Sue Taylor (Deputy Chairman)
  Brian Vardy Julie Cooper (Secretary)
  Jadzia Carlin Pam Stevenson
  Marek Kuczynski Anne Adams
  Sylvana Stenson Michael Stenson
  Lisa Roberts Neil Houldsworth
  Angela Parkes David Parkes
  Gary Taylor-Ward Lisa Taylor-Ward
  Jane Holmes Caroline Baldwin
  Alison Britten Jeannette Austin
  Julia Lowe Ann Woods
  Shona Astbury Mary Burton
  Rose Bowskill Alan Bowskill
  Rachel Adams Eileen Bentley
  Bev Ward Sophie Barker

 

Apologies:                  Steve and Haley Hocking

 

Minutes of the Last Meeting

 

Agreed

 

Introduction

 

The Chairman began the meeting by welcoming and thanking everyone for attending.  It was noted how encouraging it was to see so many new faces, in particular, because next year is going to be such a big year in the Cantamus history, but also because of the impending Christmas concerts, and all the help that will be required.   There are many exciting concerts and opportunities planned for next year, and a sheet outlining commitments will be sent home with the girls today, the Chairman informed members after giving a brief overview.   It was explained how any offers of help are most welcome, no matter how small.  The Secretary introduced the Committee to attendees.

 

Christmas Concerts

 

The first concert we require some help for will be on Sunday, 16th December, at the Palace Theatre Mansfield.  We will be selling raffle tickets, programmes and CDs.   Offers of help came from Julie Cooper, Pam Stevenson, Gary Taylor-Ward, Mary Martin, and Lisa Roberts. 

 

The next big event after that will be Friday, 21st December, at Southwell Minster.  Margaret Vince offered to help Sue Taylor with the girls’ dresses.  Sue Taylor at this point said it was relevant, in order to give parents reassurance, to mention that anyone who helped when the girls were dressing at concerts were CRB (Criminal Records Bureau) checked. 

 

Sheila Haslam said it was not appropriate to hold a raffle at the Minster.  We agreed that programmes and CDs only should be sold at this venue.  Help was offered by Julie Cooper, Rachel Adams, Pam Stevenson, Brian Vardy, Bev Wardle, Lisa and Gary-Taylor.

 

The Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham, concert on Sunday, 23rd December, will present a marvellous selling opportunity for us.  We have sold 1,800 tickets so far.  It will be extremely busy and we have the opportunity to sell programmes that have been printed for us free of charge on the three levels of the theatre.  This will require 2 or 3 sellers on each floor to cover both the doors on each level.   Offers of help came from Neil Houldsworth, Sophie Barker, Lisa Roberts, Bev Ward, Jadzia Carlin, Jane Holmes, and Caroline Baldwin.   

Because of the numbers of people involved we discussed other fund-raising opportunities at this event.  A tombola (possibly bottles/wine) was considered, and Sheila Haslam will make enquiries as to whether this would be permissible.

 

All the offers of help are greatly appreciated.  If any other attendees of the meeting feel they may be able to contribute in some small way, if only to relieve another helper for a short period, either before, during, or after a concert,  please do not hesitate to contact Sheila Haslam who is co-ordinating this programme.   Could all volunteers please confirm their availability to help by contacting Sheila Haslam e-mail sheilahaslam@ntlworld.com. 

Many apologies if we have left some names out of this list but so many of you were willing to help that we were quite overwhelmed by the number of names.

 

We require a license for selling raffle tickets and our license is due to expire on 30th December.  Hilary will apply for a new one.

 

Sue Taylor asked for help in connection with moving the platform the girls sing on at the end of the night.  This is a heavy job for Geoff Thompson and Ivan Haslam, who usually remove the platform, load, and then unload it into storage at the end of many concerts.  An extra pair of hands just to help dismantle and load into the van at the end of the Royal Concert Hall and the Palace Theatre concerts would be greatly appreciated.  Again, could volunteers please contact Sheila Haslam to confirm their offer?  In respect to help at these theatres, back-stage helpers must be named prior to the event because of the security aspect. 

 

Sheila informed us that both the Royal Concert Hall and the Palace Theatre will be videoed, and copies will be available for sale after.   Sheila will be pleased to take any prior orders you wish to make.

 

Funding of New Dresses for Main Choir

 

Hilary said that next year is the 40th Anniversary year, and promises to be an extremely exciting and busy year.  The girls have a hectic schedule including many important concerts and a trip to Spain.  The two main anniversary concerts will be on 6th September at the Royal Concert Hall, and 16th November at the Palace Theatre.   We have again provisionally booked the Royal Concert Hall for Christmas.  2009 will also see the girls hopefully going on a tour of Australia, dependent upon funding.  It was put forward to the Committee that this would be a good time to consider replacing the pale blue Ghost dresses with something more practical.  The present outfit has many shortfalls in that there are no more replacements, there are now too many variations, and many girls are unhappy with their outfit, but an alternative has been difficult to provide.    The red dresses have been and continue to be a success, so it was suggested that something along the lines of that design in a similar shade of the blue Ghost dresses would be suitable.  Although we are planning to have the dresses made to a similar design for each girl we currently have a designer working on a range of over tops so that each girl will be able to show their individuality with these and diamante jewellery.

 

We presently have £15K in our account and wonder whether the Parents Committee would be happy for the funding of the new dresses, approximately £3k, to come out of that money.   Hilary asked for a show of hands, and it was generally agreed to be a good idea.  Some parents made the point that they had quite recently purchased a dress for their daughter, but understood the situation, and agreed that it was an issue that needed dealing with as it is a problem the choir as a whole are faced with, and that this wouldn’t immediately come in to effect anyway.  Hilary thanked Jadzia for the considerable amount of time she has spent researching fabrics, etc.

 

Hilary said the Council will be approached to provide £500 towards funding of the dresses. 

 

Sue Taylor kindly requested that when girls are performing, could they please ensure that the dresses are hung on hangers that ensure that the straps of the dresses do not slip off, and thereby save many hours of repressing.  It is very important that all dresses are named. 

 

We are hoping to launch fund-raising for Australia in January 2008.  We need to raise a total of £50K for the whole choir to go to Australia, a considerable sum.  We felt as a Committee we could not possibly raise that amount of money.   A more achievable target for us to be working towards would be £15K.  We anticipate raising this amount for this particular trip will be more difficult than we found the drive to raise funds for the Olympics, in that supporters may not be as excited by or sympathetic to this cause. However we were all fully on board with the fund raising cause.

 

At the next meeting on 11th January, we will be looking for people to take on/help with small fund-raising projects to try and raise some money.   Any suggestions will be most welcome, and it would be appreciated if parents could between now and the next meeting give some consideration to fund-raising.  Any suggestions, no matter how low-key or high-profile will be most welcome.  

 

Newsletter

 

Marek said he had had an idea for the Cantamus newsletter.  He could put the newsletter on the website for us. This will remain hidden and only be accessed by going to the Home page, hovering the cursor just under the "Updated..." line, (below the "N" in "November") and clicking there will take you to a page that will include any new information relevant to choir members, e.g. changes to rehearsal times, etc.  A cut-off date for changes to rehearsals will be agreed with Miss Cook and members of staff and members will be informed of this.

 

 

Dates of Future Meetings in 2008

 

7 pm, Friday, 11th January

7 pm, Friday, 22nd February

7 pm, Friday, 7th March

7 pm, Friday, 18th April

 

 

Distribution:

Anne Adams

Rachel Adams

Shona Astbury

Jeannette Austin

Caroline Baldwin

Dave Barker

Sophie Barker

Eileen Bentley

Alan Bowskill

Rose Bowskill

Alison Britten

Mary Burton

Jadzia Carlin

Pam Cook

Sheila Haslam

Graham Hills

Haley Hocking

Steve Hocking

Jane Holmes

Neil Houldsworth

Marek Kuczynski

Julie Lowe

Mary Martin

Hilary McCaughey

Angela Parkes

David Parkes

Tina Papadopoulos

Julie Revill

Lisa Roberts

Sylvana Stenson

Michael Stenson

Pam Stevenson

Sue Taylor

Gary Taylor-Ward

Lisa Taylor-Ward

Ann Woods

Pam Stevenson

Brian Vardy

Margaret Vince

Bev Ward

                                                                                    Minutes prepared by:

                                                                                    Julie Cooper