Monday evening was the first rehearsal of the season for the Greenville Chorale. This fall we’re doing some of my absolute favorite music – Rachmaninoff’s All Night Vigil. We’re doing it in Russian, which has caused me no small amount of headaches – not because of the difficulty in singing, but because of inability to say no.
Musica Russica is a company dedicated to making Russian choral music available for performance. They have also produced an audio pronunciation guide for the Church Slavonic in the vigil. We have a license to provide the audio guide to the group, and Bing Vick asked if I could find some way to distribute it.
My primary mode of distribution was the Ning website I had created for the Chorale. It was the perfect method. Only those who signed up for an account would be able to download the audio files. Anyone without Internet access could purchase a CD.
I know it shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. The number of people that claimed they weren’t able to download the files blew me away. There are 160 people in the group, and as of this evening 87 had signed up for accounts on the website. That’s barely over half.
There are some older members of the group that might not have a grasp of the latest technology, and I understand that. That’s why we made provision with the CDs. But, I still had one that wanted me to make a cassette. I had one that wanted me to hand-deliver a CD because she would be out of town for the first rehearsal, and would be leaving before the mail could deliver one. Amazing what some people assume you’re supposed to do.
Those that have signed up for the website seemed to be appreciative and are actively using it. I’ll just be happy for a time when a method such as the website can be used to reach ALL of our singers.
Regardless, I think things will still come together well, and it will be an excellent concert. Saved the date – November 1.
I haven’t signed up yet. LOL.
Hmm, I hadn’t spotted that!