Quantity is Quality

"Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, 'Make me feel important.' Not only will you succeed in sales, you will succeed in life." 
                                                                                     -Mary Kay Ash

Recruitment is always a relevant topic. Choral conductors, regardless of their level of achievement, are always looking for ways to generate more interest in their choirs among the singers in their community. Church choirs, school choirs, community choruses, even union-level opera choruses- all choral organizations are on a never-ending quest to get more singers in the door. We've never heard a single choral conductor complain about too many auditionees.

In last week's post, we discussed the importance of personalized e-mails. This practice is perhaps even more important during the recruitment process. People are busy, and have no shortage of excuses to avoid getting involved in a choral ensemble. When recruiting, our primary objective is to get people in the door. More often than not, once they come through the door, they end up sticking around. The ones we lose, we usually lose before we ever meet them. But in our e-mail communication, we're always trying to do whatever is necessary to simply get people through the door.

We were recently hired to recruit choristers for the Ogunquit Playhouse's production of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, a musical based on the 1996 Disney film (we helped launch the first U.S. production of the Hunchback musical at the La Jolla Playhouse in 2014). The score, by Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz, is unique in that it calls for a 32-voice choral ensemble placed onstage in a stationary position for the entire show. The choir's material is influenced by Gregorian chant and 19th century French opera, and is heavy by musical theater standards.

The Ogunquit Playhouse is a major summer stock theater in Southern Maine, and they had planned a long run: 32 performances during the course of 4 weeks. That's a lot of consecutive shows for a 32-voice choir! The Associate Producer had done a tremendous amount of work getting the word out in the local choral community, but no one anticipated that it would take the total focus of at least one (if not two) individuals to recruit enough qualified choristers to fill out all of those performances. Due to our previous success working on the show, we were brought on board about a month before rehearsals were to begin, with the task of recruiting and organizing the choir.

In doing so, we had one guiding principal: Quantity is Quality. We needed bodies on the stage: 32 of them a night, in 4 balanced sections. We knew we weren't going to find 32 singers who could commit to every single show, so our aim was to recruit as many singers as possible so that we'd have a large pool to draw from. Of course, some choristers would be more experienced than others, but we weren't concerned with that during the audition process. Ultimately we knew that the more singers we had, the easier it would be to schedule 32 per night.

The rehearsal and performance schedule was demanding, and many interested singers that we contacted expressed concern about the schedule before auditioning. We had to address each singer individually by phone or e-mail, assuaging their concerns about the schedule and assuring them that we would be flexible and try to accommodate their pre-existing conflicts.

This practice was crucial in getting singers through the door for auditions and getting them excited about the project. And it didn't take long for singers to begin prioritizing our rehearsal schedule over other commitments, once they realized how fun and unique the experience was going to be. In the end, we exceeded even our own expectations in recruiting the choir for this show.

The hardest part of recruitment is getting singers through the door. Of course, once they're there, you have to make sure that they have a positive experience that makes them want to stick around.

People instinctively get nervous when asked to commit to something they've never done - even for just one weekly rehearsal for a semester. When recruiting choristers for high school choruses, we initially ask them to attend only three rehearsals. Three rehearsals is a great number - it ensures that the new chorister really gives it a try. After three rehearsals, they are allowed to leave if they feel it is not a good fit, with no hard feelings. This usually makes the students more comfortable - they don't have to commit long-term. It's a tough sell to ask people to commit to something that they may not end up liking. Ask for a small commitment, get them in the door, and then make them LOVE IT by approaching them individually and having your other choristers be warm and inviting. You'll easily double your numbers in no time with this approach.

Nobody wants less interested choristers- everybody wants more. You may find yourself in a position where you need to turn singers away because of space restraints onstage, etc. But that's a great position to be in, and you at least want to keep those "extra" singers engaged in your organization, either as patrons, or as potential performers in the future. The process of recruitment is a "getting to know you" process, and even those who don't end up singing in your chorus may prove to be important connections down the line.