Olivia PowellGALA Festival 2020 Mineappolis, regarded as the ‘largest’ festival of its kind, has signed a new deal with Integra Planner to use its event technology platform for its 10th edition.
Launched by former event organisers Martin Brophy MBE and Chris Denning, the comprehensive solution takes the stress out of planning, organising and delivering events.
GALA Festival 2020 Minneapolis takes place from 4-8 July at the Minnesota Convention Centre in Minneapolis, United States and is live streamed throughout the world. The event is an international celebration of the LGBTQI choral movement and features five days of singing, community-building, dancing, workshops and parties. The event attracts over 10,000 delegates from more than 150 LGBTQI and allied choruses from North America, China, Mexico, Cuba and Europe.
The festival is organised by a core team of four people at GALA Choruses with the help and support of Integra Planner. With thousands of delegates and over 200 different groups and organisations, Integra allows GALA Choruses to keep all the festival data in one system which can be shared with participants, staff and the venue with everyone viewing the same, up-to-date information.
Integra sales director, Martin Brophy MBE, said: “It’s been great working in collaboration with GALA Choruses for 10 years. Six months before the last festival in 2016 in Denver, Integra heard the disturbing news that a music copyright compliance company had warned GALA Choruses that they will have enforcers at the festival with copyright violations receiving fines of tens of thousands. Integra worked with GALA Choruses and enhanced the system so performers can upload song copyright details with proof and documents and after four weeks of intensive development we rolled out the copyright compliance module to be used at the event.”
The Integra Schedule App allows all participants to view each event they are involved in or connected with, arrival times and locations. Everyone can view event details in addition to the details of each song, including composer details. Each person can view the range of 40-50 events on offer each day, favourite them, make notes and share them on social media. Data is live so all those on the app are informed about adjustments as soon as they are connected.
Executive director of GALA Choruses, Robin Godfrey, added: “Integra Planner works for GALA Choruses because it was designed from the ground up to manage a festival which is our most significant information management challenge. The team has been most helpful about adapting the system to accomplish other tasks for us such as committee meeting management and chorus data updating. As an international organisation usability and access are vital factors in choosing Integra Planner.”