## **Dorchester Choral Society Annual Report**
## **2024/25**
## **Chair’s Report to the AGM: 2024/2025**
I always start composing these reports by looking back at last year’s. Some things have changed dramatically – Colin (Howard)’s departure from the post of Director of Music and welcoming Duncan (Emerson) to the podium. Other issues seem to remain a worry year on year: our need for financial prudence, our search for volunteers to come on the committee and/or fill some vacant posts.
However, since Colin is not here to give a music director’s report on last year (and Duncan has only held the reins since the summer), I do need to start by reminding you of our busy programme and the performances we achieved.
## **Autumn Term 2024**
The first part of the Autumn Term largely revolved around our major twinning event with the choirs from Bayeux and Lübbecke where we hosted an unexpectedly large number of guests who we then had to shoe-horn into Wimborne Minster to sing _Messiah_ with all the sight-line problems we then faced in trying to follow Colin’s direction. Thank you for all those who participated, who helped to provide accommodation, food and activities etc for our visitors who were very appreciative.
We then moved into a December concert with Beethoven’s _Mass in C_ , Haydn _St Nicholas Mas_ s and Mozart’s _Ave Verum Corpus._ This was a great sing and proved to be a popular concert. And with organ rather than orchestral accompaniment we broke even – a really difficult feat these days so thank you for your ticket-selling efforts.
## **Spring Term 2025**
Colin had chosen the work he wanted to conduct as his farewell concert: Bach’s magnificent and magisterial _B Minor Mass._ Musically I think this was one of the highlights of my time with the choir; we all wanted to sing our hearts out to make this a memorable farewell and I think we produced a performance at the top of our game. Colin loved his farewell party and the several carefully chosen gifts. A big thank you for the generous way you supported this whole endeavour – your various financial contributions made a big difference to our bottom line as Susan has already explained.
## **Summer Term 2025**
This is the point at which we welcomed Duncan as our new director of music; he has taken up the reins with enthusiasm and I think we all believe he is a worthy successor to Colin and will take the choir on to even greater things. I won’t repeat what he has already said about the direction he is taking us in musically but I am very excited by it and I hope you are also.
## **Looking Ahead**
The choir is in good heart, our numbers are stable – although we are always on the lookout particularly for younger singers – and we have an exciting programme to look forward to, including an outing to Bayeux in 2027.
Last year was very expensive but we knew it would be and your committee has made sure that we have employed modest forces for our Christmas 24 and Summer and Christmas 25
programmes to bring our finances back into balance, helped enormously by your generosity in the Spring. But, unless we can find other sources of patron/sponsor income, we remain heavily reliant on your subs (and the Gift Aid that brings) and, crucially, on ticket sales. Please continue to do your utmost to attract audiences and, by the way, tickets for 6[th] December will go on sale on 1[st] October.
## **Final Thanks**
To Heather who continues to astonish us with her accompanying skills. Thank you too, Brenda, for stepping in when needed.
My personal thanks to the committee who work so hard behind the scenes. I was delighted to hear that the team in place last year have all agreed to stay on the committee for another year and we are grateful to Jerry Brady for putting his name forward. But we could still do with new committee folk – why not come along as a trial to one of our future meetings and see if you feel you could contribute. See me!
Last, but very much not least, thank you all for your continued support for the choir, for your hard work singing, moving chairs, making teas/coffees, erecting staging and myriad other tasks without which we could not continue.
## **Trustees and officers**
I am pleased to announce that, as a result of our voting tonight, your committee for the next year will be:
Chair: Jane Howard
Treasurer: Susan Adams
Secretary: Emily James
Liz Adams
Jerry Brady
Carolyn Hattersley
Christine Pfaff
Jane Pryce
Kevin Rogers
Jane Howard
29[th] September 2025
## **Treasurer’s Report for FY 2024/25**
## **Account Balance**
At 31 July 2025 the balance in the CAF current account was £21,578.51. This compares with £23,328.33 at the start of the financial year and 21,907.65 in mid-May. The net loss for the
year was £1,750, largely explained by the ambitious programme for the year - Messiahs, the Twinning and the Bach concerts; it is a much smaller loss than would otherwise have been the case thanks to some very generous donations, mainly from the choir.
## **Year End Commentary**
The budget for the year was for a loss of a little under £5,000. And thanks to donations from the choir we managed to limit the losses on the March concert, and thanks to two lots of Gift Aid, we ended the year with just £1,750 less in the bank than at the start.
Compared with the budget the major variations were:
- Gift Aid income was £2,100 higher than budget
- Ticket income was £1,764 lower than predicted
- Sponsorship and friends/patrons income was £4,284 greater than budgeted.
- Rehearsal Conductor and Accompanist costs were £892 higher – a result of more rehearsals.
- Concert Conductor and Accompanist costs were £1,674 higher than budget
- Sundries costs including drinks were £1,352 less than budgeted
- Twinning expenses, not specifically budgeted for, came in at £3,400
## **Budget for 2025-26**
The proposed budget for 2025/26 has been proposed and approved.
The accounts have been inspected by an Independent Examiner and have been signed off with no further action required.
Susan Adams
29 September 2025
||
**Charity Name**
**Dorchester Choral Society**|
**Charity Name**
**Dorchester Choral Society**|
**Charity Name**
**Dorchester Choral Society**|**No (if any)**|**No (if any)**|**CC16a**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||**For the period from**|Period start date
01-Aug-24|**To**|Period end date
31-Jul-25|||
||||||||
|**Section A Receipts and payments**|||||||
|**A1 Receipts**|**Unrestricted funds**
**to the nearest £**
**12,808**
**11,394**
**4,284**
**700**
**4,855**
**41**
**114**
**-**
**34,196**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**34,196**
**9,412**
**673**
**412**
**24,142**
**467**
**840**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**35,946**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**35,946**
**- 1,750**
**-**
**-**
**- 1,750**|**Restricted**
**funds**
**to the nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**|**Endowment**
**funds**
**to the nearest £**|**Total funds**
**to the nearest £**
**12,808**
**11,394**
**4,284**
**700**
**4,855**
**41**
**114**
**-**
**34,196**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**34,196**
**9,412**
**673**
**412**
**24,142**
**467**
**840**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**35,946**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**35,946**
**- 1,750**||**Last year**
**to the nearest £**|
|Subscription|**12,808**||**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**|**12,808**||**11,443**|
|Concert Income|**11,394**|||**11,394**||**6,420**|
|Concert Donors|**4,284**|||**4,284**||**-**|
|Friends and Patrons|**700**|||**700**||**400**|
|Gift Aid|**4,855**|||**4,855**||**-**|
|Bank Interest|**41**|||**41**||**19**|
|Miscellaneous|**114**|||**114**||**1,060**|
|Corporate Sponsors|**-**|||**-**||**500**|
|**_Sub total_**_(Gross income for AR)_|**34,196**|||**34,196**||**19,842**|
||||||||
|**A2 Asset and investment sales, (see**
**table).**|||||||
||**-**||**-**
**-**
**-**|**-**|||
||**-**|||**-**||**-**|
|**_Sub total_**|**-**|||**-**||**-**|
|**_Total receipts_**
**A3 Payments**|||||||
||||**-**|**34,196**||**19,842**|
||||||||
|
Rehearsal Costs|**9,412**||**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**|**9,412**||**7,463**|
|Insurance and PRS|**673**|||**673**||**727**|
|Other RunningCosts|**412**|||**412**||**834**|
|Concert Costs|**24,142**|||**24,142**||**9,182**|
|Scores/Music Hire|**467**|||**467**||**1,532**|
|Publicityand Printing|**840**|||**840**||**498**|
|Other Costs|**-**|||**-**||**1,168**|
||**-**|||**-**||**-**|
||**-**|||**-**||**-**|
|**_Sub total_ **|**35,946**|||**35,946**||**21,404**|
||||||||
|**A4 Asset and investment purchases,**
**(see table)**|||||||
||**-**||**-**
**-**
**-**|**-**|||
||**-**|||**-**|||
|**_Sub total_ **|**-**|||**-**||**-**|
|**_Total payments_**
**_Net of receipts/(payments)_**
**A5 Transfers between funds**
**A6 Cash funds last year end**
**_Cash funds this year end_**|||||||
||||**-**|**35,946**||**21,404**|
||||||||
||**- 1,750**|**-**|**-**|**- 1,750**||**- 1,562**|
||**-**|**-**|**-**
**-**|**-**||**-**|
||**-**|**-**||**-**||**-**|
||**- 1,750**|**-**|**-**|**- 1,750**||**- 1,562**|
CCXX R1 accounts (SS)
27/10/2025
1
|**Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period**|**Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period**|**Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period**||
|---|---|---|---|
|**Categories**
Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all
the trustees
**B5 Liabilities**
**B3 Investment assets**
**B2 Other monetary assets**
**B4 Assets retained for the charity’s**
**own use**
**B1 Cash funds**|
**Details**
**Details**
**_Total cash funds_**
(agree balances with receipts and payments
account(s))
Cash at Bank
Floats
Petty Cash
**Details**
**Details**
**Details**
Signature|**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**Restricted**
**funds**
**to nearest £**
**to nearest £**
**160**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**160**
**-**
Agreement Error
OK
**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**Restricted**
**funds**
**to nearest £**
**to nearest £**
**21,579**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Fund to which**
**asset belongs**
**Cost (optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Fund to which**
**asset belongs**
**Cost (optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Fund to which**
**liability relates**
**Amount due**
**(optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
Print Name
Susan Adams
Jane Howard|**Endowment**
**funds**
**to nearest £**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||OK|
||||**Endowment**
**funds**
**to nearest £**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**Current value**
**(optional)**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**Current value**
**(optional)**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**-**|
||||**When due**
**(optional)**|
|||||
|||||
|||||
|||||
|||||
|||||
||||Date of
approval|
|||Susan Adams|21-Oct-25|
|||Jane Howard|**23-Oct-25**|
CCXX R2 accounts (SS)
27/10/2025
2
## **Independent examiner's report on the accounts**
**Section A Independent Examiner’s Report**
## **Report to the trustees/** Dorchester Choral Society **members of**
**On accounts for the year** 31 July 2025 **Charity no** 285911 **ended (if any) Set out on pages** 3 (remember to include the page numbers of additional sheets)
I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of the above charity (“the Trust”) for the year ended 31/07/2025.
- **Responsibilities and** As the charity trustees of the Trust, you are responsible for the preparation **basis of report** of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (“the Act”).
I report in respect of my examination of the Trust’s accounts carried out under section 145 of the 2011 Act and in carrying out my examination, I have followed the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.
## **Independent examiner's statement**
I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination which gives me cause to believe that in, any material respect:
- accounting records were not kept in accordance with section 130 of the Act or
- the accounts do not accord with the accounting records
I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.
* _Please delete the words in the brackets if they do not apply._
**Date:** 15 September 2025
**Signed: Name:** Stephen Rex Priddy **Relevant professional** Fellow Chartered Certified Accountants (FCCA) **qualification(s) or body (if any): Address:** Jestys Spetisbury, Blandford Forum, Dorset
**October 2018**
**IER**
1
DT11 9DF
## **Section B Disclosure**
Only complete if the examiner needs to highlight matters of concern (see CC32, Independent examination of charity accounts: directions and guidance for examiners).
**Give here brief details of any items that the examiner wishes to disclose** .
**October 2018**
**IER**
2