Schedule

All workshop times/locations are subject to change. Please consult the conference program when you arrive in Atlanta for a final schedule.

Thursday Oct. 10th

Friday Oct. 11th

Saturday Oct. 12th

Sunday Oct. 13th

 

Thursday

5:00pm
Best In Show	Great Room Prefunction	5:00pm - 7:00pm
6:00pm
GALA Leadership Symposium Reception	Sun Terrace	6:00pm - 8:00pm
6:30pm
Best in Show Presentations	Great Room Prefunction	6:30pm - 7:00pm

 

Friday

9:00am
Board Hangout	Great Room A	9:00am - 9:45am
Artistic Director Hangout	Great Room B	9:00am - 9:45am
Artistic Director Hangout	Great Room C	9:00am - 9:45am
Youth Chorus Hangout	Studio 1	9:00am - 9:45am
Manager Hangout	Studio 2	9:00am - 9:45am
10:00am
Concert Marketing Plan	Great Room C	10:00am - 10:45pm
Perfect Pitch 1	Great Room B	10:00am - 12:00pm
Youth Chorus Brainstorm	Studio 1	10:00am - 10:45am
TTBB Repertoire Session	Workroom	10:00am - 12:00pm
Music for Run-Outs and Audience Participation	Great Room A	10:00am - 12:00pm
11:00am
Consensus Validation - A New Tool for Teams	Great Room C	11:00am - 12:00pm
GALA Operations Survey Results	Studio 1	11:00am - 12:00pm
Ask Eve	Studio 2	11:00am - 12:00pm
12:45pm
Lunch Roundtables	Great Room B and Sun Terrace	12:45pm
2:00pm
The Board Meeting of Your Dreams is Not a Nightmare I	Great Room A	2:00pm - 3:15pm
SATB Repertoire	Great Room C	2:00pm - 3:15pm
Basic Video Production for Communications	Great Room B	2:00pm - 3:15pm
SSAA Repertoire	Studio I	2:00pm - 3:15pm
The Joys and Challenges of Working with Youth	Studio 2	2:00pm - 3:15pm
Music for Run-Outs and Audience Participation II	Workroom	2:00pm - 3:15pm
3:30pm
The Entrepreneurial Organization	Great Room C	3:30am - 4:45pm
Transgender Voices	Great Room A	3:30pm - 4:45pm
Choral Arranging for Choirs	Great Room B	3:30pm - 4:45pm
Copyright, License, The Web - Oh My!	Workroom	3:30pm - 4:45pm
Ask Eve	Studio 2	3:30pm - 4:45pm

 

Saturday

9:00am
Copyright, License, The Web - Oh My!	Great Room A	9:00am - 10:15am
OUTreach	Great Room B	9:00am - 10:15am
Basic Video Production for Communications	Workroom	9:00am - 10:15am
New Tools and Ideas to Build Your Audience	Great Room C	9:00am - 10:15am
Kathy Kingston Unleashed	Studio 2	9:00am - 12:00pm
10:30am
Managing High Maintenance Members	Great Room C	10:30am - 12:00pm
Get OFF Those Risers!	Great Room A	10:30am - 12:00pm
Festival Liason Training	Great Room B	10:30am - 12:00pm
GALA 411 Advisor Consultations	Studio 1	10:30am - 12:00pm
Mission Based Programming	Workroom	10:30am - 12:00pm
1:30pm
Executive Director - Open Agenda	Great Room C	1:30pm - 4:00pm
Artistic Directors - Open Agenda	Great Room A	1:30pm - 3:45pm
The Board Meeting of Your Dreams is Not a Nightmare	Great Room B	1:30pm - 3:00pm
GALA 411 Advisor Consultations	Studio 1	1:30pm - 4:30pm
Perfect Pitch	Workroom	1:30pm - 4:30pm
3:15pm
Sustainability Best Practices	Great Room B	3:15pm - 3:45pm
5:15pm
Reception/Auction	Great Room	5:15pm - 6:45pm
7:15pm
Concert: Finding Your Own Light	Peachtree Road United Methodist	7:15pm - 8:15pm

 

Sunday

9:00am
The Entrepreneurial Organization	Studio 2	9:00am - 10:15am
Raking in the Dough: Creating an Unearned Revenue Plan	Great Room C	9:00am - 10:15am
iSing, iDance, iPad	Workroom	9:00am - 10:15am
Rehearsal Crowdsourcing	Studio 1	9:00am - 10:15am
10:30am
Youth Chorus Hangout	Studio 1	10:30am - 11:15am
Manager Hangout	Studio 2	10:30am - 11:15am
Board Hangout	Sun Terrace	10:30am - 11:15am
Artistic Director Hangout	Workroom	10:30am - 11:15am
11:30am
Brunch	Great Room	11:30am - 12:30pm

 

Session Topics - GALA Leadership Symposium - Atlanta, Oct 2013

Best in Show
Jeff Heine, Facilitator

Have a great story to tell about your Chorus from the past year? A clever and successful marketing campaign? Tools to help your singers promote a concert? An outreach performance that captivated singers and audiences? A new website? Social media successes on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram? Share your story with Symposium delegates at the Best in Show! Each chorus will have table space to display your story. Be creative! Audio, visuals, costumes, photos, and handouts are all encouraged. At 6:30 pm each chorus will have five minutes to share your best idea with everyone in attendance.

Back to Top

GALA Leadership Symposium Reception

Open the Symposium with a cocktail overlooking famed Peachtree Road! Greet colleagues and take the opportunity to meet those attending their first GALA Leadership Symposium. A cash bar will be available.

Back to Top

GALA Hangout
Eve Campbell, Jeff Heine, Susan Haugh, Bob Mensel : Facilitators

Networking is one of the most valuable elements of GALA events so here is your chance to hang with your peers. Hangouts are designated for Board Members, Managers (volunteer or paid), Artistic Directors and Youth Choruses. Hosted by our new GALA 411 Advisors the Friday morning Hangout offers an introduction to the Symposium weekend and the Sunday Hangout is a final chance to share ideas and wrap up the weekend together.

Back to Top

Perfect Pitch
Kathy Kingston, Presenter

Finding the right story to "sell" your chorus mission is key in recruiting singers, chorus leadership and soliciting individual donations, grants and sponsors. Participants will have the opportunity to practice their chorus pitch and receive coaching from a professional fundraiser. Delegates attending this session should arrive with a list of the points they would expect to cover in pitching their chorus. This session is offered twice - once on Friday and once on Saturday.

Back to Top

Youth Chorus Brainstorm
Susan Haugh, Facilitator

Join youth chorus delegates to share ideas, brainstorm how youth choirs can work together and support emerging youth choruses.

Back to Top

Repertoire Reading Sessions
Cathy Roma, SSAA facilitator
Robert Glor, SATB facilitator
Kevin Robison, TTBB facilitator

Join your colleagues to share programming ideas and sing through repertoire submitted by Artistic Directors. Bring along your top 5-6 repertoire recommendations to share.

Back to Top

Ask Eve
Eve Campbell, Presenter

Eve has been working with GALA Choruses on board development issues for over 20 years. Schedule an individual consultation with Eve to discuss your chorus board issues.

Back to Top

Music for Run-Outs and Audience Participation
Elise Witt, Presenter

Drawing from her love of diverse melodies and rhythms Elise leads a session of group singing and vocal improvisation, teaching in a style so easy that, before you know it, the room is singing in harmony! Play with melody, rhythm, language, harmony, vocal production, and soul connection. Get the gritty, technical, sensual sense of how the voice can draw powerfully on vocal wisdom from many cultures. All songs are broken down into easily learnable parts and can be tools for impromptu and run-out setting for your chorus as well as ways to engage your audience as singers.

Back to Top

Consensus Validation - A New Tool for Teams
Mindy Taylor, Presenter

"Consensus Validation" is one of the strongest and most effective techniques a choir or board can use for problem-solving and making decisions. A key tool in the process is testing and polling the group during the conversation process. This session demonstrates techniques for deciding when a consensus process can strengthen a planning process and how to make consensus building strong and effective.

Back to Top

GALA Operations Survey Results
Robin Godfrey, Presenter

Over the summer GALA launched a comprehensive operations and compensation survey. Join us for an overview of the results and a description of the complete report.

Back to Top

Lunch Roundtables

Run out for a quick lunch and then join one of the roundtables. The discussion topics will be as follows:

Back to Top

The Board Meeting of Your Dreams is Not a Nightmare
Mindy Taylor and Eve Campbell, Presenters

Are your board meetings engaging, interesting and productive? Join a mock Board meeting which will demonstrate both good and bad Board practices and offer tips for keeping board members engaged, dashboard reporting, encouraging productive conversation and decision-making, and identifying appropriate topics for board conversation. This session is offered twice - once on Friday and once on Saturday.

Back to Top

Raking in the Dough: Creating an Unearned Revenue Plan
Robin Godfrey, Presenter

Participants will work in groups to develop a contributed revenue plan for the year based on a given set of assumptions. Will you place more emphasis on grants or individual donations? Will you bet it all on a fundraising event? Each group will then have an opportunity to present the plan they have developed.

Back to Top

The Joys and Challenges of Working with Youth
Susan Haugh, facilitator

Thinking of starting a youth chorus in your community? The dynamics can be unique and challenging. Join Susan Haugh who started Dreams of Hope in 2003 and now has an organization that is strong and growing. Participants will discuss what it takes to begin a successful youth chorus and how to keep it sustainable.

Back to Top

Choral Arranging for Choirs
Tim Sarsany, Presenter

Need to adapt a choral work or song for your choir? Sometimes it is the only way to get to do the songs you want! Join Tim for tips on arranging music to fit your chorus including creating arrangements from scratch, but also re-voicing existing arrangements for SATB to TTBB, TTBB to SATB or SSA, etc. Steps for obtaining copyright permission will also be addressed. Bring your questions for Tim and he will help you get started arranging for your choir lickety-split!

Back to Top

Get off those Risers!
Eric Lane Barnes, Presenter

Why stay on the risers when you have an entire stage to work with? Join Eric to explore the advantages and pitfalls of programming music off the risers, choralography, integrating media and video elements and other visual elements. How do we keep our artistry strong while introducing new visual elements in to our programming?

Back to Top

Managing High Maintenance Members
Dr. Michael Ramsey, Presenter

Have you ever struggled to deal with a: problematic patron, salacious singer, bothersome board member, scurrilous staff, violent volunteers, or demanding donors? Join Dr. Michael Ramsey, Child, Adolescent, Young Adult, and Adult Psychiatrist for an introductory discussion about appropriate boundaries, communication techniques, anger management, and general tips for working with difficult individuals. This group may eventually lead to a series of sessions that can delve into the finer points of communication and HR issues that will help your chorus grow and be more productive.

Back to Top

Rehearsal Crowdsourcing
Ben Riggs, Facilitator

Join your GALA conductor colleagues to share our collective wisdom on rehearsal related issues: bridging diverse musical skill levels, dealing with unbalanced sections, singer breaks that turn into social marathons, integrating memorization into rehearsal time, creative options for sectionals…. The floor is yours. Bring your rehearsal problems and your wisdom.

Back to Top

Copyright, License, The Web - Oh My!
John Quillin, Presenter

I can't find the composer of the song that Very-Gay Chorus gave me. Can I just use it? I've recorded my concert and would like to sell download recordings. What is a YouTube Broadcast channel and how can I use it to promote my chorus? Join this discussion on copyrights, licensing and the unique opportunities and challenges offered by the internet. This session is offered twice - once on Friday and once on Saturday.

Back to Top

Mission Based Programming: Why We Sing What We Sing
Charlie Beale, Presenter

How does our concert programming relate to our core values, our audience and our context? If political advocacy were our number one priority, could we also generate more donor money, sell more tickets, attract more singers AND increase our musical excellence? How does our mission interact with our artistic content? This provocative and interactive workshop for ADs, managers and board members will ask challenging questions, offer new strategies to help your organization answer them, and help you think differently about your organization's programming and song choices. It will help you to focus ever more tightly on singing well, being entertaining and on speaking the truth. Above all, it will help you identify new ways for your organization to connect with your audience and community, so that your concerts are firmly grounded in the fertile soil of your area's GLBTQ context.

Back to Top

OUTreach
Anthony Cabrera & Jane Ramseyer Miller, Presenters

Need inspiration to take the mission of your chorus beyond the concert hall and into the community? Join us for practical tips on integrating outreach into your programming including planning steps, tips for performing in schools, check-lists for outreach tours, how to capitalize on the energy and interests of your singers, utilizing collaborations to connect your chorus to the wider arts community, and ways to attract foundations and sponsors to your outreach work. Participants will create their own outreach plan based on their chorus' mission and local community.

Back to Top

New Tools and Ideas to Build Your Audience
Greg O'Neill, Presenter

Eugene Carr, CEO and founder of Patron Technology, LLC, has recently released a new book entitled “Breaking the Fifth Wall: Rethinking Arts Marketing for the 21st Century.†Greg O'Neill, Sr. Account Executive of Patron Technology, will attend the conference and speak about the research that led to the new book. Topics will include getting the most out of your email marketing, effective use of social media, and the advantages of utilizing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) technology to benefit your organization.

Back to Top

Kathy Kingston Unleashed
Kathy Kingston, presenter

This is your chance to spend one-on-one time with auction fundraising expert Kathy Kingston. Don't miss this opportunity to work with Kathy on ways to increase your chorus' fundraising prowess.

Back to Top

Festival Liaison Training
Joel Davis, Presenter

This session is intended for both individuals who are likely to serve as their chorus' festival liaison or who are involved in selecting their chorus' festival liaison. Festival liaisons are key people to manage information and help your chorus have a great experience at Festival. In this first annual session leading up to Festival 2016, we'll focus on lessons learned in 2012.

Back to Top

The Entrepreneurial Organization
Jeffrey Nytch, Presenter

At Festival 2012 Jeffrey Nytch shared the core principles of entrepreneurship and how they can be utilized to define your organization's mission. Now Nytch builds on those ideas to develop a strategic plan: How do you define your product? Who is your market/audience, and how do you deliver that product to them? What resources do you have on-hand, and which ones do you need? How can you make your organization more financially sustainable? Nytch brings his experience as a composer, arts administrator, and professor of music entrepreneurship at The University of Colorado-Boulder to create a unique and practical workshop you can take home to your chorus.

Back to Top

GALA 411 Advisor Consultations
Bob Mensel, Eve Campbell, Jeff Heine, Susan Haugh

Schedule individual time with a GALA 411 Advisor on any topic. Get advice on a quick question or discuss scheduling a longer consultation after the Symposium.

Back to Top

Transgender Voices
Reid Vanderburgh, Presenter

Transgender singers play a significant role in our GALA community. This workshop offers tips on working with transgender voices, transitioning voices, use of inclusive gender language and Trans 101 terminology . Reid Vanderburgh was 1986 founding member of the Portland Lesbian Choir and now sings baritone with the Portland Gay Men's Chorus. Reid has been a trans therapist and educator for over ten years and is the author of "Transition and Beyond: Observations on Gender Identity."

Back to Top

Artistic Directors - Open Agenda
Bob Mensel & Jane Ramseyer Miller, facilitators

Join us for an open space, open agenda conversation on whatever topics emerge.

Back to Top

Stop Reinventing the Wheel: Best Practices for Organizational Sustainability
Robin Godfrey, Presenter

Has your chorus had the experience of just getting things going really well and then leadership burns out and it seems like you are starting all over again? A disgruntled volunteer leaves and no one knows what happened to the database of donors? Join us for a discussion of what practices and procedures can help create sustainable administrative systems in choruses primarily run by volunteers.

Back to Top

Basic Video Production for Communications
Paul Kruse, presenter

Join this hands-on crash course in shooting and editing video for non-profit communications. The workshop will focus on shooting and editing basic interviews and events. Paul offers practical tips including how to capture the best sound, image, and performance from your subject. Learn how to plan and execute a video project from start to finish, complete with equipment and software recommendations. Participants are welcome to bring your own video/audio recording and editing equipment for hands-on practice!

Back to Top

i Sing, i Dance, iPad: Mobile Technology for the Conductor, Singer and Composer
Mark Howarth, Presenter

An exploration of ideas and apps that are available to the modern musician with the iPad; focus will be on preparing resources for rehearsal, apps that can be used during rehearsal and apps to assist the lay composer/arranger. Participants are encouraged to bring their iPad and/or smartphone; apps will be shared and explored during the session. Time will be given for sharing your ideas and experiences in using technology as a part of your choir rehearsal.

Back to Top

Preparing a Concert Marketing Plan
Matthew Arnold, Presenter
Social media has provided endless options for concert marketing while print and radio advertising, mailings and posters still may have a role to play. Get updates on the latest tricks of the trade and build a marketing plan for your next chorus concert.

Back to Top