Old and Stuffy? I Don’t Think So!

Anyone who’s known me over the past 7 or 8 years knows that other than photography and yarn crafts, my other major hobby is barbershop.

“Isn’t that just a bunch a old guys dressed up in striped vests and straw hats singing old songs really badly?”

Uhm, no – not even close…

Barbershop harmony – for those who don’t know (and a good deal of my Facebook contacts do know – a big “hello” to them via the RSS feed from this blog to Facebook!) consists of 4 parts sung a cappella (without instrumental accompaniment): the melody is sung by lead, with the tenor harmonizing above, the bass below, and the baritone filling the remaining fourth notes of each chord.  The resulting sound is quite amazing, I assure you; if the tuning is just right (I won’t go into the physics of this), one or more overtones can be produced, creating what is often called “lock and ring”.  If you have heard this before, you know that it’s really awesome.

Barbershop isn’t just quartets, either.  There are many, many choruses out there singing in this musical style as well.  Better than explaining this though, would be to offer a demonstration.  Here, for your viewing and listening pleasure, is the 2009 Barbershop Harmony Society International champions (yes – there is an annual convention/competition) – the Ambassadors of Harmony from St. Charles, MO.

This is so NOT old and stuffy!  In fact, it’s freaking cool!

The News Pitch

MasterKey PitchPipe, originally uploaded by CraftyGuy.

I had said in a previous blog post that I had a wee bit of news to share, and now I'm finally getting off my duff to do so.

I used to sing with the Sounds of Concord, a men's barbershop chorus. What's barbershop you ask? Simply put, it's a style of 4-part close harmony a cappella singing wherein the melody is usually sung in the second highest part (the "lead"), with the tenor harmonizing above the melody and the baritone and bass harmonizing below. Anyhow, I used to sing baritone in the Sounds of Concord for a number of years, as well as in a quartet (no, we did not wear those silly vests and straw hats - though the hats might be fun), but had to stop a couple of years ago due to scheduling constraints.

The news is this - I, along with my friend Paul (who still is with SoC, and was in that quartet I sang with), are forming a new chorus in the local (Fitchburg/Leominster/Westminster, MA) area. The working name for the chorus is the "Montachusett Harmonizers" (Montachusett is a regional name, comprised of the name of the three mountains in the area: Monadnock, Watatick, and Wachusett). Eventually, we'd like this chorus to become part of the Barbershop Harmony Society.

We have the date, time and location for our first get-together/meet-and-greet/mini-rehearsal all set, as well as the first few prospective members. Still trying to nail down a location for the weekly rehearsals, but I think we're close to having that nailed down as well. I need to confirm, but I think I will be able to obtain use of a room at my church for that purpose.

Anyhow, that's the news. I will be keeping you updated as things progress.