For the last few years I’ve been running our village choir. They’re a lovely bunch of people, but as there are only about 10 of us, we’re on the borderline of not being able to keep going.

So every now and then I put a notice in the village magazine asking for new choir members. One or two people mutter they might be interested but no one ever comes.

The last few weeks, though, something remarkable has happened. We’re in an area that still has a fair number of farms, and some local people decided it would be good to make more of the harvest festival, turning it into a week-long celebration. As part of this I was asked if would open the choir to anyone to come along for two or three practices, then sing at a couple of special events.

As a result, for the last few weeks, the choir has more than doubled in size. What’s more, some of our festival members are going to join us regularly, and others will be back for future special events.

It strikes me there’s a huge psychology lesson here for charities. I’m sure I’m not alone in being really irritated when charities push and push to get regularly giving. There are at least two charities that I have stopped giving to because they kept writing, emailing and phoning me to give regularly. I made it very clear that if they kept doing this I would stop giving, but they kept on.

Surely charities could benefit too from a half way house approach. The thing that seems to have made a difference to my festival choir members was not having an open commitment. It was a fixed term, no strings activity. I suspect charities might get a lot more regular givers if they provided the option of a short sequence of regular donations towards a specific appeal, rather than always pressing for a long-term commitment.

(Oh, and if you live in the North East corner of Wiltshire (UK), more singers are always welcome – no commitment required!)