Elegant Evening lives up to its name
STATELINE – With $55,000 in donations, the sold-out crowd at Saturday night’s Elegant Evening had plenty of choices when it came to items to bid on.
Most offerings came in the form of silent auction items, though a few pricy things – like trips to the Caribbean and a full set of braces – went for thousands of dollars in the live auction.
Nearly 500 tickets were sold for Soroptimist's April 21 Elegant Evening at Harrah's. Photo/LTN
This annual event put on by Soroptimist International Tahoe Sierra raises money that is then given back to the community. Issues affecting women and girls are the emphasis of this service club.
People were decked out in sorts of attire – none of which could be called mountain-wear or Tahoe casual.
This sit-down dinner was followed by a lively dance floor in the convention center of Harrah’s Lake Tahoe.
— Kathryn Reed
Great evening…well, mostly. My wife and I started the dancing, being the first couple on the dance floor (long before dinner). UNfortunately we felt it necessary to leave not long after dinner; and having made only one early bid at the silent auction….if we had stayed I would have bid on other items.
Why did we leave early?……the MC doing the live auctions had his sound system turned up to very high and uncomfortable levels. It was not just so loud as to preclude talking, it was ‘ringing in my ears loud’. My wife had to use bits of paper from drink napkins in her ears…and others at our table, and other tables, were very annoyed. We were not the only ones to leave. I did notice that most that left early were senior citizens just like us. My wife wanted me to unplug the sound system! She settled with a few choice words directly to the MC as we left.
We’ve gone most years to this event, next time, …if there IS a next time… we are bringing solid rubber earplugs, and will converse by sign language!
On the other hand, the band was very good, the food was good, and we enjoyed seeing friends again.
BTW, I DID see a few people in casual ‘mountain attire’.
We’re sorry we lost you early. I’m sure you understand that trying to provide sound through the entire room is difficult. We will look at solutions for this. It could be that we limit the size of our event in order to not have tables so close to the stage. If you have other ideas to help us out-please share at sitahoesierra@gmail.com. We hope you’ll continue to join us. Bettering the lives of women and children make our community stronger. Thank you for supporting our club.
My Wife and I went and had a great time. It was well organized, food was great and the music was great. We are looking forward to next year. Great job Soroptimist’s!!
Love love love the band! Carlee is a song bird and Trey Stone plays an amazing guitar. The food was good and it was sooooooo fun to hookup with people, that sometimes I only have the opportunity of seeing at events like this because we all have such busy lives. As well as helping the community it gave us all a much needed break to sit back and enjoy each other. Very well done!
I enjoyed the event but have to agree with the complaints about the sound system. It may be high time to upgrade the room to state of the art acoustics especially for such well attended events. Thank you for the high bidder who purchased my artwork! For a certificate of authenticity and documentation contact me directly or through Soroptimist.
Mr. Darvas, your donation was amazing and we thank you for it. In fact, we thank the 310 businesses and individuals who donated items for our auctions. Each and every dollar raised will go into projects to improve the lives of women and children beginning July 1, 2012. We appreciate you working with us to carry on much needed work in our community. Thank you again to the over 470 folks who spent their evening with us. Look for us again next year!!!
We were NOT close to the stage. I did walk over to glance at the amplifier, located against the wall in the silent auction area (northwest end of it) and every time the MC spoke into his microphone the amplifier power indicators went into the red overdrive-distortion area. The same loud sound was heard from from both ends of the long room, as well as the bar(s) which were against the shorter width, rear.
The plain fact SEEMS to be that the sound system was just turned up way too loud. I had only a problem with the loud speech of the auction. Shouting into a mic is not OK… with us.
I think I know a wee bit about public address systems and background sound, etc. My business at S. Shore, for last 39 years, is repairing electronics, and I’ve worked with a lot of public address systems in quite a few businesses, etc., here in town over the years. While the system could be upgraded, I don’t see the need for the expense. The problem was not that of the wrong type of amp equipment and speakers…they would have been fine and plenty adequate, if the volume was turned down.
I doubt anyone had a problem, at least as long as we were there, with excessive sound from the Band. AND, YES, Rocky, Trey, and Carlee are great.
NOTE that the above was our only complaint of the evening (well, my wife’s lettuce piece had no dressing and wasn’t adequately cleaned in the kitchen, if one needs to do some nitpicking).
Anyway, the tuxedo is put away for the next outing, whenever and wherever.
Robert Fleischer installed the insane sound system in Rojo’s basement in the late 70’s… because he could. If he says the sound was wrong then it was.
Me again. If we could get back to the point of the evening and the hard working efforts of many women. Thank you LTN for highlighting our event. The article was simply about our fundraiser that will help to improve the lives of women and children in our community. Thank you Dreu for all of your fantastic efforts and for helping to loosen the wallets of many caring people. You did a great job for us!!!
Congratulations on another fabulous evening Lisa! You did a great job. Thank you!
Exactly right, Lisa
What a fun night it was! I was volunteering with some members from the s club at the highschool. We helped with the auctions and selling items. The soroptimist women work so hard, and I hope someday I can be apart of this group.