In 2003 my husband and I moved to North Carolina to an area with one of the largest historic districts in the country. After my husband, Steve (pianist, conductor, coach), and I performed in one the historic homes during the city’s annual Christmas by Candlelight Tour, we walked around the beautiful historic area thinking the festival desperately needed some costumed carolers to make the event complete. There was nary a carol or costume to be found. That started us thinking.
After ascertaining that there were no other such groups in the area, we decided to go ahead and form a quartet. We made up one half (soprano and bass) and went looking for the other half. Since both my husband and I had been doing this sort of thing since middle school, we thought it would be a cinch to find others that could. In a bigger metropolis, with a bigger pool of singers, I imagine it would have been easier. But not everyone with a voice degree or experience singing in a choir could do what we wanted. They had to be able to find their starting pitch from a single pitch-pipe note, hold their part alone (a cappella), and stay on pitch. Eventually, through various gigs in town, we rounded up a willing and able tenor and mezzo.
A friend who was a whiz at sewing offered to make our outfits for free if we paid for materials. Other cost-saving methods for costuming could be recruiting a sewing relative or two or shopping eBay for the appropriate costumes and accessories. In fact, that is also a good place to look for historic patterns to sew them yourself. I found a set of patterns (Simplicity #4851) that were easy to make and embellished them at will. Be sure to invest in good-quality fabrics that will hold up to a lot of wear and tear. Wal-Mart was a great resource for the trimmings without breaking the bank. I ended up making some of the easy bits myself, like petticoats, sashes, and neckties.
We bought some out-of-print caroling books on eBay that included a lot of European and lesser-known carols as well as the old standards. We also purchased some choral octavos for a few secular, crowd-pleasing arrangements of popular songs. I had to rework most of these to make them work for an a cappella quartet. The level of musicianship of your members will dictate the amount of rehearsal you’ll need. Try to match the levels of the other singers with your own so that no one feels their time is being wasted.
In the beginning of that fall, I cold-called and cold-mailed brochures and postcards, printed on my printer at home, to country clubs, restaurants, store owners, event-planning companies, and anyone I could think of that might be having special events during the holidays. The very first season, we were totally booked! We even got booked into a concert series and did a full-length concert with narration and some accompanied pieces played by my husband. The entire idea turned out to be a huge success. Each singer made $50 per hour and we paid off our investment in the costumes in the first week! Everyone was happy, and we seemed to fill a need in our city.
Our gigs included country clubs (this could be challenging work as we were often singing over canned music and lots of talking), a couple of concert series, churches, the local chapter of Toastmasters, a historic shopping area, the city’s Christmas Tree Lighting (we were on TV the first year), a private dining club hosting a Dickens Dinner, a radio show, the local botanical garden’s Festival of Lights (singing outdoors), and private parties where we often did a “door knock” service. We would “happen” to knock on the front door during the party and would go inside to entertain and do a carol sing-along with the guests.
Honestly, some of these gigs were as unglamorous as they come. On those nights, I was grateful for my huge hat and hoped no one would recognize me. But, the majority of bookings were a delight. When we began, I never thought about the sheer joy and excitement that just seeing us in our costumes would generate in people of all ages. That never let up and it never got old!
Here is a list of the ways you could benefit from starting a group in your area:
1. Build Serious Vocal Stamina
When you are the only one singing a part, there is no dropping a syllable to get a breath as you can in choral singing. Some of the gigs will be multiple hours with the usual 10-minute breaks every hour. This can add up to more continuous singing than you would do even in a leading operatic role. It was tough at first, but fantastic for building stamina and technique.
2. Pure, Unadulterated Singing Joy
This one might be a surprise—it was to me. I have been soloing publicly since grammar school and thought I had experienced all the elation that was to be had from singing. I was so wrong! Corny as it may sound, it was thrilling to see how excited our audiences were and how a song that we had all sung since grammar school, like “Ukrainian Bell Carol” would make them cheer us. Isn’t that why we train to do this singing thing—to bring joy to others?
3. Real Money
Not only could we pay our bills with it, we made enough during that time of year to not worry about buying Christmas gifts. And, over the years, the extra income helped us to achieve some long-term financial goals.
4. Friendships
Long-lasting friendships are often built from going through shared experiences, both good and challenging. Standing out in the cold and trying to sing without your teeth chattering the entire time will do just that. We really had some hilarious adventures over the years (think huge hats and petticoats in small cars) and made some life-long friends in the process.
5. Repertoire
Running a caroling group will expand your knowledge of all vocal Christmas music. You can sing “Jingle Bells” and “Silent Night” only so often. When we finally hung up our petticoats and top hats, we knew over 125 songs. And, thousands of listeners had been exposed to, and applauded wildly for, songs in French, Latin, and German.
6. Giving Back
After that first season made us “famous” around town, we started getting all types of requests for charitable work. Each season we would discuss among all of us which of these requests we would take on. These were often our favorite nights of the season.
By our final season, in the middle of the economic downturn, we were turning down as many gigs as we were booking, which indicated to me that the market could easily bear another group in town. That last year, we even got asked to sing at five church services on Christmas Eve—all at the same mega-church.
I would encourage anyone to try this idea as a business opportunity. In our era of digitalized entertainment, a group of costumed, good singers is a novelty in a community of any size. You can easily make a profit your first year (that can’t be said of many businesses) if you start looking for bookings in the fall and have some promo materials such as photos, a Web presence, and sound clips for potential clients to review. Requiring a nonrefundable deposit to reserve a date is a must.
Of all the work I have gotten or chased down in this business of singing, caroling was the easiest to find, the most consistently profitable, and the most fun! After all, you have known “Silent Night” and “Jingle Bells” since you were four years old. Why not finally make it pay?
