'Almost Heaven Aliquippa'
St. Elijah Serbian Orthodox Church Choir
Hosts of the 2008 SSF choral festival
Greeting from your friends in Aliquippa! The St. Elijah
Serbian Orthodox Church
Choir wants to extend a heartfelt "Thank-you" to all who came and
supported this
year's festival. We hope you enjoyed the weekend and took home many fond
memories and new found friendships. We certainly enjoyed being your hosts
and
still have our heads in the clouds remembering all the fun times and
beautiful
performances. We hope everyone made it home safely. If you have any
comments to
share please sign our guest book on the home page of our website at www.ssffestival.com
We have already received many kind words from those in attendance and that
makes
all the hard work worthwhile. As the pictures trickle in it seems there
was much
laughter and singing from the welcome dance on Friday all the way through
to the
after party at the hotel on Sunday night!
We would like to say a special thanks to Bob Susnjer for his dedication to
making the website a success and to Media Quest who took care of the
sound,
stage and video recording. The DVDs are in the final edit stage and Media
Quest
did an excellent job. They even met our request to broadcast the Stanley
Cup
finals on the big screen Saturday night so that amidst all the singing and
dancing, the hockey fans could watch the playoffs on the big screen.
For those of you who have asked about purchasing the DVD for your choir
archives
and perrsonal use here are the details: They are being
professionally produced and edited and will show each choir
up close and personal just as they appeared on the big
screen during the concerts.
Over 20 choirs- including those talented junior choir singers -are
represented
on this DVD and the performances were exceptional. For details and order
forms
go to our website at: www.ssffestival.com. The price for the 3 disc set
will be
$25.00 (U.S.) plus shipping and handling and we encourage choirs to order
as a
group if they are interested in reducing shipping charges.
Please submit your completed order forms and payment by July 31rst and we
will
ship by mid-August. This is a onetime only offer no orders will be taken
after
this deadline.
Since some of you may not be able to access the
online order forms we will also
follow up with each choir by letter and email to give you the details.
If you watch our performance closely you will notice we had a smoke
machine for
our entrance while singing "Almost Heaven Aliquippa" and at the end of
that song
we turned it off and unplugged the machine but still minutes later at the
end of
our first song one last puff comes out! We think it is our beloved members
from
years past telling us they are still with us in spirit and supporting us
in all
we do. We say "Memory Eternal" to those talented and courageous pioneers
who
worked so diligently to make these types of events possible.
As hosts we can't thank you enough for coming to "Almost
Heaven Aliquippa" and
making it a special weekend that we will never forget .We hope the
fellowship
you experienced will inspire future attendance at festivals and continued
support of the SSF so that generations to come will experience the rich
and
rewarding traditions that we have enjoyed for so many years!