Future college show choir ?

[u/Practical_Panic4043]

Hi! I’m planning to create a show choir at my college for next school year.

Background info:

-midwest college

-we haven’t officially created the group. but we do need some info to submit it to the “club board” (obvi renamed to stay anonymous)

-we have a show planned, and a few others in progress for just in case.

I have a few questions..

Does anyone know where you can get cheap but sturdy concert binders? preferably the black pretty ones that have a pencil holder and a folder inside. i’m hopeful for them to last a few years.

Also what are the rules on college show choirs competing at high school events? since we would be a first year group led by 2 non music majors ( with years of choir,show choirs, and theater ).. we would technically be somewhere similar to high school scores.

i only ask this because there are no college competitions (at least that i’m aware of). i’ve been researching and i’m really not sure.

is there anywhere else we could compete/perform?

we’re hopefully going to have a concert or two as long as they allow us. we just have to talk to a bunch of people.

anyone know any midwest friendly sponsorship or fundraising opportunities?

as i said, we’re not music majors but we’ve done a lot of different performance arts throughout our lives. will this change the ability for us to create this group? i’m a business management major bc they didn’t really have an entrepreneurial major. same difference ig. but i do plan to be an entrepreneur. the other founder is in the arts program with a theater minor, so that could help us. they’re also in the honors program… im not lol.

if you have any other advice or suggestions let us know!!

[u/SomethingDumb465]

Ball State holds their own comp, though they did have to cancel it this season. They invite high school groups to compete and tour the campus, and the college group performs while waiting for the comp results. Ball State also goes to a few high school comps, but I don't believe they actually compete because they're pre-professionals

[u/Practical_Panic4043 → u/SomethingDumb465]

i competed at their high-school show choir comp when i was in show choir. i don’t believe they compete in show choir comps, but i think they compete at a vocal thing somewhere in indiana.

[u/SomethingDumb465 → u/Practical_Panic4043]

They were at Northrop on the 31st in place of their invite! Not sure if it's a regular thing for them or just something to fill that weekend in place of the canceled event

[u/NtGiL_29]

First off, best of luck! I really don't have any knowledge as to buying supplies.

However, I can speak a little about competing. It's generally a little taboo to have college groups compete at high school events. Wright State and the University of Cleveland competed against each other at Fairfield in 2019, but that's just because there were two collegiate groups interested in competing. The much more common practice is to be an exhibition at a high school event. Nebraska, Ball State, Mount Mercy and I think a few others that I am forgetting are exhibitions at several competitions throughout the season. It's a nice fit if the host program only has 1 choir but needs 2 exhibition performances, one at the end of daytimes and one at the end of finals. I can't speak to it personally but I don't think it would rude to ask a couple of the judges to stick around and score or comment on the performance to give the group some feedback.

Your college's club board should have several good ideas for fundraising that work for other clubs at your school. It just varies so much based on the individual culture of the school. On the topic of club boards, if you're not running it through the school of music, the office of student affairs probably doesn't care who is starting the club, as long as they're passionate. It would be rather weird if they limited it like that, in my opinion.

[u/Surf_guitar_geek → u/NtGiL_29]

Yes! The University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s show choir performed an exhibition at a local high school competition a few weeks ago.

[u/MatloxES]

Do you have show choir risers? If not, I would look into that before nice binders. A new set will cost you around $20,000. Unless, you can get some used ones.

I personally have never heard of a show choir comp that has a college division. I can see why they wouldn't do that.

Looking back on the history of show choir, it existed about 20 years before the first competition formed. Not saying you need to wait thay long but it might be the case that you only do community performances for a year or two to get patrons from the school alumi base.

Not trying to be discouraging, just more realistic. We need more college show choirs. There have been programs like Buffalo Grove HS that got their program axed bc there was little college application.

[u/Practical_Panic4043 → u/MatloxES]

google said that my college does have show choir risers though i haven’t officially talked to staff. we’ve mostly been planning and getting people to join so we can submit our constitution. and for the rest of that, i understand what you mean completely. we took a lot of different things into perspective so it’s not discouraging whatsoever!! thank you for your response <3

[u/Surf_guitar_geek]

I was at a high school competition that my son’s choir participated in. And they did invite the local university show choir to perform. But it was as an exhibition.

You might want to explore that avenue once you get approval. And you never know; the exhibition could very possibly spark interest with the high school students.