Throwback Sunday?
- I'm reminded of an older post in which I lamented that I'm much more likely to attend a concert if I know what you're playing. I've now received two emails from a small chorus that not only don't tell you what they're performing, except in general terms, but which don't contain a link back to the group's web site. And if you look up that web site, it doesn't even contain a list of composers whose works will be performed. This...is not a way to get people to your concerts.
- Email from a different small organization identifies it as "the San Francisco Bay Area’s premier professional chamber choir." Did this come from Volti? SFCA? the chorus of PBO or American Bach? No, it came from a chorus that has not yet performed in public. This, too, is the kind of publicity that makes me want to stay home.
- Lastly, I received a Facebook invitation to a concert, but the page for the concert.... doesn't appear to mention who the performers are. Come ON.
This is really basic who/what/where/when stuff, ya know?? Check out my publicity basics page for basic information about publicity!
7 comments:
The Dior Quartet was scheduled for a 90-minute program at Stanford on Friday. But nothing in the publicity said what they were going to play. I wound up not going.
More evidence!
The American Bach Choir (I think that was the organization) had a concert featuring Arieh Nussbaum Cohen very recently. We might have attended but it never said where it was going to be. Some venues are hard for me and so we didn't pursue the matter.
That's so strange. Their web site does have the locations.
<a href="https://americanbach.org/Aryeh-Nussbaum-Cohen-sings-Bach.html>Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen Sings Bach</>
If one may be allowed to play devil's advocate, other classical musicians, admittedly very high-profile classical musicians, have taken the route of deliberately not announcing some programs in advance, basically asking audiences to trust their judgment. The most prominent recent example is Andras Schiff. A few years back, when David Robertson was music director of the SLSO, when he conducted the New Year's Eve concert, he made a big deal of not revealing the program until you walked into the hall and saw the program. That tradition of the SLSO not disclosing the New Year's Eve program until the day has continued since DR moved on.
Granted, it should be basic/PR 101 for classical ensembles to observe the basics of links back to their parent websites, or core correct data. And maybe my examples above refer to more established acts compared to a start-up. But it does also raise the question that classical seems to be the one genre where it's a given to post the "set list", as it were, in advance. For jazz and folk concerts like what I see in STL, no one besides the group knows the set list in advance. The sound engineer at the venue will get the set list before the show, but that's it.
It makes a lot of sense for folk, jazz, and rock musicians to hold the set list,. Classical musicians can certainly do this too, but I think some special handling is required: disclose the length of the program, or disclose the composers (or period). But publicity should make clear that this is a deliberate choice, not an oversight.
I realize that I meant to comment weeks ago on this post.
Paul, if you still have the communication from American Bach (formerly American Bach Soloists/ABS) that omits the concert locations with Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen, I would love to see it. Both the organization's web site and the countertenor's list the venues.
https://americanbach.org/Aryeh-Nussbaum-Cohen-sings-Bach.html
https://www.aryehnussbaumcohen.com/recentengagements
lhirsch@gmail.com
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