This top picture is at the Newell K. Whitney Store in Kirtland, OH.Barry was in charge of all the venue sales for the tour(on his vacation time). He set a lofty goal of 100,000 in sales. At the first stop in Toronto, he and his team (all volunteers- a lot of choir spouses) sold 22,000! They were working like crazy. The funny thing is, the theater only held about 1500 people! We did two concerts there though. Barry had shared his goal with everyone and before long the whole choir knew about it! He would be asked by several people every day how the sales were going. By the second venue sales were already up to 44,000. Yes... by the end he made his goal and even went over by 9,000. Choir Pres. promised him a steak dinner if he made the goal...we'll see. We performed in four outdoor venues-The Blossom ampitheater in Cleveland, Riverbend in Cincinatti, Ravinia in Chicago and Chautauqua in NY. The hottest was in Cleveland. It must have been 90 degrees and 90% humidity. We were informed there that a broadcast was going to be taped for future a showing. I on
ly hope there were not too many closeups because most of us were dripping with sweat, especially me! When the bright lights were turned on it must have gotten to 110 degrees easy(add a hot flash to that! I about died). In Cincinatti we were the opening concert for the summer season with the Cincinatti Pops. Conductor ,was a lot of fun. He did something weird though...he made us all bow together! He was so thrilled with our sound and ability that he said a number of times that we had to move to Cincinatti. He never had anything to say to us but praise. There were over 10,000 there at Riverbend. All of the crowds were so enthusiastic and warm. It was a pleasure to perform for them. This picture was taken at Chautauqua during "Ah El Novio" Boy was I glad to get to the last two venues that were indoors. We performed in Nashville and Memphis. The latter for the very first time in the choir's history. At this point, KSL's and her cameraman joined our tour. We had a general authority travelling with us as well. We also had church security and travel department people with us. The tour was extremely well organized as you can imagine it would have to be with 574 people. We stayed in the nicest hotels, mostly Marriots and ate very delicious food...too much I'm afraid. I learned something though... food cannot energize you alone, you have to have enough rest as well. We lacked the rest portion a lot. I rested on the bus rides but you know how that is...I never really slept. Check out the list on the top left for some of our great newspaper reviews! Copy and paste the address .
