Early stages of concert planning

With about two and a half months to go to my concert (7 Oct), I have thus far secured my sound engineer, and contacted the three main musicians I want to work with. So far, only one has confirmed that he's both available and interested, and I'm waiting to hear from the other two. Once I've established the line-up, I'll proceed with my concept, because this event will showcase my original material using different sounds, different instruments, different energies combining on stage - quite a different approach to my previous concerts, which featured either a duo or trio for the whole show.

There's a lot that goes into putting on a concert, and I decided to opt for an October date, rather than September (my initial plan), so that I could do it as thoroughly as possible. Once I've confirmed all the important details, (especially the musicians), I'll start advertising. I have a timeline for all my steps, and definitely want the tickets to go on sale as from the beginning of September. My goal is to pre-sell all the tickets. The Nassau seats about 130, which is not an impossible number.

All my expenses have to be carried by me, personally, and earned back in ticket sales, but I would like to explore sponsorship of some kind. I'll need to get that ball rolling soon, as I want the ticket specs to be handed to the printers by the 24th of August, and I want the sponsors' names to be included.

It's funny - long before I even get to the drawing up of the programme, decide which songs to do and with which musician, I have to do so much else! Getting the charts finalised and copied also has to happen before we get to the rehearsal stage.

Right now I have a cold. It was looming for a while, and I thought I could escape it, but here it is - as debilitating as hell. Can't breathe through my nose, starting to look like Rudolph, and feeling lousy. Head hurts, throat hurts, chest hurts like mad, and I suspect my sense of humour will want to elude me for a while.

I'm actually going to a concert at the Nassau Hall tonight, to the monthly jazz concert put on by Cliff Wallis. Tonight it's pop-jazz singer-guitarist Richard Caesar in the first half and a more mainstream jazz band in the second. Should be quite a treat. Of course, I agreed to go before I caught this cold.

Sniff, sniff, sniff.