Minstrel Report

Well, as expected, a really good month, punctuated by chaos after the last show in October when the Nor'Easter hit. David Pawlowski, the head staff of Friday night's show with Frank Vignola was left without power, and couldn't get the figures in from that show. I am also without electricity, and took my computer into work, where I'm able to do business. So this will be a less than complete report without the usual figures. But if the attendance last Friday was somewhere around 150, as I expect it was, our average attendance for the month would have been 130, and we probably came out somewhere around $750 in the black for October.

Even the Open Stage drew 55 paid attendees, and was highlighted by a killer performance by 86-year old American Songbook singer Niomi Sunshine, accompanied by Grover Kemble. One interesting note about that open stage: All the reserved slots were snapped up by 12:04AM, an event I have been anticipating with dread since we started the current system of signing up. Starting in 2012, we're going to try taking reservations starting at noon on Saturday, rather than midnight Friday. They may go just as fast, but people won't have to stay up until an ungodly hour just to get a slot.

I got a last minute notice from MUUF that their cancellation of our December 16 show was cancelled. Grrrr. At this late date, I'm not going to try to scramble to fill the date, but if something falls in our lap (at NERFA for instance) I may use the date.

I've been very busy booking this month:

• • December 30: The Cotillion singers to open for the rescheduled Dugan's Hooligans' farewell concert cancelled due to the power outage after Irene. I'm planning on making this an ongoing event for the Friday between Christmas and New Years. (The Cotillion Singers, not the power outage.)

  • January 6: funny man John Forster (a latter day Tom Lehrer) with songwriter Tony DeSantis opening

  • March 2: The Nuala Kennedy Band: a young rising star flute & whistle player and singer from Ireland

  • April 27: The resecheduling of the December 16 show with the acapella group The Accidentals headline and Fibonacci (The Folk Project Bar Band) opening.

  • June 1: Italian flatpicking guitar wizard Beppe Gambetta

  • Sept. 7: Bill Staines

  • November 2: Lou & Peter Berryman

November is likely to be almost as good as October.with three top drawer acts: Tracy Grammer on the 4th, Dala on the 11th, and Irish harper Patrick Ball's one-man musical play on the 18th. (Open Stage is moved to Thursday the 10th.) Plus the Young Project on the 25th.

Respectfully submitted

Mike Agranoff

Program Chairman

The Minstrel

Morristown, NJ USA

www.FolkProject.org

Minstrel Report Postscript (sent November 7, 2011):

It was a rough week last week. A whole bunch of us were temporarily evicted from our homes and the normal course of business could not proceed. So my report to the board was missing its usual attachments with charts and figures. I finally got the data and it's attached.

I was close in my estimate for the Frank Vignola show. I guessed around 150 paid. Sadly, it was only 149. I guessed about $750 profit for the month. Happily, it was $809. My freeware PDF printer won't do more than one page of the upcoming schedule, so it's missing the stuff in the pipeline after September 14, 2012. That includes a pencilled-in April Verch show sometime in October, and confirmed dates for Lou & Peter Berryman on November 2, and Brother Sun on November 30.