Orchestras Canada

The Canada Revenue Agency has released updated, written guidelines for fundraising by registered charities – something of equal interest to fundraisers, chief financial officers and board treasurers. Among other things, the new guidance includes a substantially simplified suggested method of allocation, gives less prominence to the ratio of fundraising expenses to overall revenue, discusses the [...]

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We’ve got two recommendations this week (one of which is actually MULTIPLE recommendations) – and they’re all about audiences. Last Saturday’s Globe and Mail included an interesting article by Kate Taylor that contrasted the expectations of contemporary audiences with the formal rituals associated with attendance at a traditional performing arts event. You can read it [...]

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A couple of recommendations this week. Musical America has just published a useful and easily digested set of resources on digital media marketing in the arts – including a number of case studies on orchestras’ and classical music organizations’ use of digital media to better promote their messages. You can find all the goodness at [...]

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Last week, Statistics Canada released the results of its 2010 Canadian Survey on Giving, Volunteering and Participating (the CSGVP) – a triennial tally of Canadians’ engagement with the voluntary and charitable sector. To help make sense of the reams of data, Imagine Canada has published a research note and tables, summarizing such key points as: [...]

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The US-based Future of Music Coalition has just published a ground-breaking study on just how musicians earn a living. According to the study, musicians (working in all genres) access 42 different revenue streams to make up their annual incomes, with classical musicians typically tapping into 3 revenue streams, and singer-songwriters tapping into as many as [...]

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We’ve got a pair of recommendations this week, both devoted to the evergreen topic of audience development. March 2-4, Orchestras Canada and CCI, the Ontario Presenters Network co-presented an audience development workshop for small budget orchestras with master teachers Lendre Kearns, Cheryl Ewing and Judy Harquail and guest presenters Jennifer Green (late of Soundstreams), Allison [...]

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The HR Council for the Voluntary Sector has just published a fascinating executive summary of their research on Canadian not for profit executives. Key findings? On the up side: Despite many challenges, executive directors report high levels of satisfaction with their job. The support provided by the board is an important driver of executive director [...]

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The Wallace Foundation, in partnership with Big Thought (a Dallas TX-based organization dedicated to quality arts education) have teamed up to create a resource-packed website that houses resources to engage stakeholders, define quality teaching and learning, assess the quality of programming and improve education for all children. Educators, artists, civic and community leaders, and policymakers [...]

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Hill Strategies Research has just released the latest in its invaluable series of reports, largely drawn from Statistics Canada research, and this one – devoted to cultural participation by Canadians in 2010 – advises that Canadians’ participation in arts, culture and heritage activities reached record levels in 2010. Among the highlights: • All Canadians participated [...]

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As Orchestras Canada’s own nominating committee for the 2012-13 year swings into action, we’ve been thinking a lot about boards of directors – and we’d like both to recommend a few of our favourite resources on boards to you, and ask for your top picks, too. Here’s our list: The resources section of Orchestras Canada’s [...]

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