Andy Waggoner – Community Choirs R&R Chair
Collaboration: Everyone wins!
Hello SWACDA Friends.
The 2025-2026 season marks the 50th Anniversary for the chorus I have the privilege of conducting. In planning for this momentous occasion, we have had a lot of conversation around collaboration. While we certainly won’t do all of these suggestions, I wanted to share some ideas with you. These would be appropriate for ANYTIME of your season! But especially during a time of celebration.
Collaborate with other talented people in your community.Team up with other area singers in a joint choir concert or festival. All ages welcome! One of my favorite concerts was when we partnered with a local children’s choir.
Hire some dancers from a local dance company. (again, all ages!) A few years ago, we had a wonderful time presenting “Step in Time” from Mary Poppins and we featured an incredible tap dancer. One Christmas we had children dancing in the aisles with ribbon sticks while we opened with a huge fanfare piece. It changes up the landscape and adds LIVING color to your work.
Feature a local artist. In St. Louis, we have a few artists who paint “live” during musical performances. We also featured their work in the lobby for our audience to admire during the break. You could hire an artist to design your concert program or some projected images.
Collaborate with professional musicians.
You don’t need to hire a full orchestra to have an impactful instrumental moment. Some of my favorite pieces have STUNNING instrumental solo parts. Perhaps you could feature a talented high school student who was chosen for all state band or orchestra. Or reach out to your local symphony orchestra to see if someone would like to play for you.
Universities are often looking for performance opportunities for their students. We once presented a concert with a phenomenal university string quartet. They accompanied us on a couple of songs and we featured a few solo spots for them.
Collaborate with Composers.
Commissions are a wonderful way to celebrate special occasions or to honor someone. The process is much easier than you think! Usually, all it takes is an introduction. I’d be happy to share some great options for you so feel free to reach out. To make it even more special, bring the composer in for the premiere performance! They could even conduct some of their songs, offer a masterclass and, if they are a musician or singer, perform on the concert with you. “Composer weekend” type events are always fun, even if you don’t do a commission. Singers love to hear stories from the source! Most composers LOVE this sort of thing!
I hope this gave you a few ideas for collaborations. An important note would be to make sure you are having conversations about compensating them if you are asking them to do work. For many, this is their profession. BUT many people would be open to collaborations where your group could offer something to them as well. Typically, a mutually beneficial arrangement works so that each entity has the opportunity to share their performance with new audiences.
As always, please reach out to me if I can help in any way. Hope to see many of you in Dallas!
