Something unusual happened in New Zealand in mid-July. The All Blacks beat South Africa by a record score - but it wasn't the main news on TV.
The nation's rugby heroes were upstaged by the National Youth Choir when the 41 young singers were named Choir of the World at the
International Music Eisteddfod in Wales.
"When they learned they had been on the news before the All Blacks there was an even bigger cheer than when they won the title," choir manager Jacqui Simpson says.
Only a few days later they won another major competition, the Grand Prix Slovakia.
Back home, Simpson must deal with the realities of running the choir - and coping with the deficit.
Corporate sponsorship managers had talked about wanting to associate their companies with "excellence." But this choir - not for the want of trying - cannot find a sponsor.
"We said, 'Here we are, we are the choir that most of you are aware of,'" Simpson says. "We have just achieved virtually the highest accolade we can achieve and we still can't find a sponsor.
"One problem is our profile in terms of regular meetings. We don't meet weekly, we don't get weekly television coverage, although obviously we've had more lately, which has been fantastic."
Perhaps the choir is handicapped by its own recent success. People learn it was on a five-week tour of Europe, and assume money is no object.
But unlike the All Blacks, the choristers don't have everything taken care of for them. The young singers must pay most of their costs themselves. For the latest tour they contributed $4500 each.
On top of that, singers from the various regions had to meet regional fundraising targets. Luckily, a lot of them get support from their families and some were helped by local trusts.
A further $50,000 was raised from concerts, busking, carol-singing, garage sales, Christmas functions, weddings and garden parties.
The choir was formed in 1979, and Simpson has been with it for eight years. Running the choir has always been a difficult balancing act.
It is a regular client of the state arts funding agency Creative New Zealand, and next year will get $100,000, which Simpson says is a "pretty good" core grant.
The choir's one major sponsor, Chaucer Print, enables it to produce the sort of glossy brochures and programmes which are so important in terms of enhancing the choir's image. There are also grants from trusts and foundations.
The choir tries to travel abroad once every three years and because of its reputation there are several invitations every year to perform overseas.
For its recent tour the choir decided on a slightly different strategy.
Though musical director Karen Grylls isn't fond of preparing choirs for competitions, for this tour the National Youth Choir targeted competitions in which it thought it could perform well.
The theory was that competitive success would lead to corporate sponsorship.
"We had to go and win something, or at least get a placing, and be able to say we had achieved something," says Simpson.
"It's all very well to go away and do fantastic concerts and say, 'Yes, we got standing ovations.'
"But at the end of the day it's something tangible and something people here can look at.
"Week after week you see sports being able to say that and then it's analysed and all the rest of it, so at least we could have something quite specific."
For many of the choristers, the overseas tour marked the end of their time in the choir, and others decided to remain overseas.
Rather than see such choral talent disperse the choir has formed a graduate choir, called Voices, which gained places last year in two sections at the Tolosa International Choral Contest in Spain.
"We're now trying to support two choirs rather than one," Simpson says.
"Creative New Zealand has given us a little bit extra money for next year, which is great, but it certainly puts the pressure on.
"I guess that's how we work. There always has to be another challenge."
- NZPA