This should put you all in a festive holiday mood! Thanks to our Ed Curran for providing us with the footage!
Posted by CBS Chicago on Saturday, November 28, 2015
Home for the Holidays Opens at Elgin Art Showcase December 4

(ELGIN, IL; November 12, 2015) Home for the Holidays, A Musical Revue, opens its 19th season in a four performance engagement at the Elgin Art Showcase, 164 Division Street, 8th Floor, Elgin, IL 60120, December 4 – 6; presented by With A Voice Like This and FAME – Flora Ann McIntyre Entertainment and sponsored in part by an Individual Artist Grant from the Elgin Cultural Arts Commission.
Inspired by the classic films, Holiday Inn and White Christmas, this spectacular holiday concert will take you on a musical journey of classic songs from the ’40’s & ’50’s: Beginning with a WWII performance for the troops, we’ll move on to a Florida nightclub and finally settle in to a New England town. Christmas Eve In My Hometown, Home For The Holidays, Baby It’s Cold Outside & White Christmas are just a few of the classic songs performed in this magical revue. Complete with lavish costumes, original arrangements, comedy and plenty of sentiment, this show proves that the holidays will warm the heart and enrich the soul because everyone longs to be, “Home for the Holidays”!
“In the summer of 1995 I had an idea: Why not create a holiday concert that includes songs from some of my favorite childhood movies, like Holiday Inn & the classic 1954 film, White Christmas? Those old movies had everything I loved in a film; comedy, sentiment, song & dance plus a love story all in one.” said Flora Ann McIntyre, owner of FAME and co-producer. “From the beginning I wanted this to be a show that the entire family could enjoy and I consider this group of artists to be a part of my family.”

Home for the Holidays runs 70 minutes with no intermission and features 30 classic songs performed by four singer/dancers and one keyboardist. For the last eighteen seasons Home for the Holidays has performed in multiple locations in Chicago and the surrounding area, including Kankakee, Joliet, and Door County. It’s also frequently performed at private venues. By performing this engagement at the Elgin Art Showcase people who have wanted to see the show for years will now have an opportunity.
“Every year people ask us where they can see the show and we’re usually either too far away from them or we’re performing at a private event and just can’t invite them” said Jim Goodrich, owner of With A Voice Like This and co-producer. “So this year we’re self-producing the show and I am fortunate to have received an Individual Artist Grant from the Elgin Cultural Arts Commission to help do just that.”
Add to that the Romance Premium Cafe has partnered with Home for the Holidays to provide a “Dinner and a Show” package for the Friday and Saturday evening performances and anyone can make it a wonderful kickoff for the holiday season.

The four performances will be Friday and Saturday, December 4 & 5 at 8:00 PM and two performances on Sunday, December 6 at 2:00 PM and 6:00 PM. Tickets are $20 in advance, $25 Day of performance and Dinner and a show packages are $32 advance sale only. For more information on the show and to purchase tickets, visit http://HomefortheHolidays.show/tickets.
Come to the Elgin Art Showcase December 4 – 6 and be “Home for the Holidays”!
What: Home for the Holidays – A Musical Revue
Where: Elgin Art Showcase 164 Division Street, 8th floor, Elgin, IL 60120
When: December 4 & 5 at 8:00 PM, December 6 at 2:00 PM and 6:00 PM
How much: $20 in advance, $25 Day of Performance, Dinner and a Show package Dec. 4 & 5, $32 advance sales only
Ticket info: http://HomefortheHolidays.show/tickets
Jim & Tim on Hiatus until 2016
Jim & Tim take a hiatus every year around the holidays. This year, we’re just starting a bit earlier. But we’ll be back in 2016, so keep a eye out for our dates coming up. In the meantime, we’d like to thank Double J Sports Bar, Salt Creek Pizza and Pub, Church Street Brewing and the Moran Athletic Club and the private functions that we played during 2015.
Jim will be out and about during the holiday season, in fact, you may even trip over him if you’re not watching closely as you bustle along during the busy season. We’ll have more information on where you can see him in the coming weeks.
Everyday basics for Posts using Yoast SEO
One of the biggest internet buzzwords is SEO (an acronym Search Engine Optimization). I use Yoast SEO Plugin for WordPress and I tell everyone I work with to do so as well. There are a few excellent plugins to help, but what puts Yoast SEO way out in front is its ease of use and it guides you to good SEO practices.
This guide is not comprehensive. It focuses on the process to set up good SEO on a post or page, the everyday stuff. It deals with the General and Page Analysis tabs of the free Yoast SEO plugin for WordPress and includes some SEO best practices. This guide is built so you can run through the steps on your own at any time. Here we go!
Accessing the SEO Interface
When you create a new post, the Add New Post window opens. In the Publish box on the right side of the page you will see SEO: N/A Check with a gray dot next to it.
Click or Tap the Check link
– This will take you to the bottom of the Add New Post and the Page Analysis tab of the Yoast SEO section with a “No focus keyword…” error message.
To set a focus keyword, click or tap the General tab in the upper left corner of the Yoast SEO box
– This will open the General tab of the Yoast SEO section
NOTE: When you view the General section for the first time, the Snippet Preview will show what the search results would be based what is in the title, URL and text area of the post/page. The Focus Keyword will be blank, the SEO Title will show what is in the title area of the post/page and the site title and the Meta description is blank.
The four areas of the General Section are:
Snippet Preview
This sections shows you what displays as the search results of a Google search. The example above is blank, but if you have information in the event itself, it will display what would be pulled by Google by default.
Focus Keyword
This is a word or phrase about the event and is the basis for the scoring of the SEO on the event itself. It should be a combination of:
- Specific to your post/page (longtail)
- Audience targeted (Who are you most trying to reach with this post or page?
- Audience friendly language (What words would they use to search for this conference?)
As you begin to type, a drop box with possible keywords will appear, these are results from Google Suggest and will change real time. Once the focus keyword is filled out, the event will be ranked based on its usage and additional factors.
SEO Title
This is the Title that will show in the search results. It defaults to the title of the event. Recommended length of a title is 40 – 70 characters. If the title is too long, it is cut off and an ellipsis (the three dots “…”) is added to the end. For good SEO it’s not recommended to have a title that is too long. By default, WordPress adds the site name to the end of every title.
Meta description
This is a brief description about the post or page. The section is limited to 156 characters and by default pulls from the beginning of the event, so it is best to have a short, descriptive paragraph about the event ready to place here for anyone searching the web to help them know what the event is about immediately.
The following is an example of a completed General section with a good ranking:
To start (or update) the SEO scoring, enter a focus keyword in the Focus Keyword field, then go to the top of the post/page and click or tap one of the following buttons in the Publish section in the upper right of the page:
- Save Draft – recommended if you haven’t already published the post/page
- Publish – least recommended as the first step
- Update – Use when the event is already published, the Update button replaces the Publish button
NOTE: Clicking or tapping to Save, Publish or Update to show the scoring will not be necessary starting late October or November of 2015. The upcoming upgrade will change to real time updating once you enter a focus keyword.
-Once you have entered a focus keyword and saved it, you will see one of the following 4 SEO scoring indicators:
To improve your score, click or tap the Check link to the right of your indicator
– The screen will return to the Page Analysis tab of the Yoast SEO plugin.
NOTE: The circled phrase “focus keyword” in the example below is replaced with the actual keyword you use.
IMPORTANT: Don’t forget to save your revisions/changes or they will be lost and you will have to start over!
Some SEO targets:
- 300 word minimum in the event/article
- Use of focus keyword (target is 2.5 – 5% for entire post/page) in these areas:
- Title
- URL
- Content
- Meta description
- Use of subheading tags (H2, H3, H4, H5 or H6) Think outline headings!
- Outbound links
- 40 – 70 character Page title length
- Uniqueness of focus keyword
- Use of images (photos, graphics)
- Readability of content based on the Flesch reading ease scale
NOTE: these targets are not hard and fast rules, different combinations will still score the good SEO ranking! The biggest factor in good SEO is to start with good content!
Conclusion
SEO works best when it is a habit, whether it’s a page, article or post. Yoast SEO gives you an easy to use, logical framework to help develop SEO at every level.
Download
If you want to print out a copy of this guide, you can download the pdf guide. You can just have it, No e-mail signup, no joining anything, it’s yours.
Welcome to With A Voice Like This
Happy Holidays and welcome to my site! If you want to see my calendar of upcoming shows, simply click the link below
Jim’s Upcoming Shows
Also, if you’d like a little more Christmas music, buy my Christmas EP With A Voice Like This Christmas directly through me.
Thank you for stopping by, I’m glad you did and I hope to see you back soon!
Jim
Is it too early for Christmas?
Not if you’re Arthur Christmas!
For the Holiday season, 4-AM returns to our roots with The Merry Maskers Carolers singing holiday carols and having a great time getting into the spirit.
Well, last Saturday, November 12th, at Woodfield Mall was the earliest I’ve ever caroled. But it was all a part of the 12 Days of Arthur Christmas, a new holiday film from Sony Pictures and we were caroling and having pictures taken with anyone who asked. There were Arthur Christmas activity books for the first 100 kids to visit Santa in the Ice Palace, a speed wrapping contest and prize wheel in the Grand Court of the mall. Oh, I almost forgot the cookie decorating there as well. I think they may have been tipped off ahead of time, because I didn’t get to decorate any cookies…Which is probably better for everyone all around, now that I think about it.
It was a great time. There were lots of smiles and wide eyed kids, replete with cookie frosting all over their faces, pictures taken, flying wrapping paper and people singing along. I guess it’s never too early for Christmas.
But here’s a not so secret ‘Secret’.
If you go to the 12 Days of Arthur Christmas Calendar and choose Chicago, IL from the drop down list and you look at the 11th Day of Arthur Christmas, you’ll see this:
O COME ALL YE CAROLERS
Trump International Hotel and Tower Chicago | River Walk
401 N. Wabash Ave. | Chicago, IL 60611 | 2:00PM-4:00PM
Spot the ARTHUR CHRISTMAS Carolers for your chance to learn a Christmas carol and receive a prize
…And I bet that if you look hard enough and long enough on the internet (are you done looking yet?), you just might be able to find a picture of the Carolers you’ll be looking for Tuesday.
Happy Holidays and Good Hunting from 4-AM!
Is it too early for Christmas? originally appeared on 4-AM on 15 November 2011.
The post Is it too early for Christmas? appeared first on 4-AM.
It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas
At least from the perspective of our busy time of year. Last Saturday, November 21st was our first Holiday gig. It was for the grand opening of the Elysian Hotel in accordance with the Magnificent Mile Lights Festival. We were one block over from the staging area for the parade on E. Walton and were singing outside from 1 – 4 pm. Here’s a picture of us that day:
L-R Jim, Jenny, Flora & Gary (click to enlarge)
The first gig out of the gate is always fun in a lot of ways. You get to see what you remember and what you don’t, and by this point of singing together for almost 15 years, there’s very little we don’t remember, except the occasional lyric (why did I forget that one anyway? Oh…Rudolph, that’s right).
It’s a busy time of year, but one I wouldn’t want to do without. I get to see old friends and catch up with them and enjoy the time of year and help people celebrate it. What more can you ask for?
It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas originally appeared on 4-AM on 25 November 2009.
The post It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas appeared first on 4-AM.