Four Part Harmony

Your vision of a barbershop quartet may be four dapper gents wearing striped vests, armbands, and straw hats, harmonizing on My Wild Irish Rose. Indeed, this nostalgic image is preserved in some circles, but barbershop singers today are just as likely to be female, dressed in tuxedoes, or crooning the hits of the Beatles.

“Barbershop is family entertainment,” says Reed Sampson of the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America Inc. “The lyrics are easily understood and touch on a lot of values that people hold true. There’s patriotism, there’s Mom, and home, and apple pie. There’s June and spoon, and love, and the girl next door.”

“You can take yourself out of the everyday world and get a different perspective,” notes Paul Bowman of the quartet Give & Take of Twin Falls, Idaho (pop. 34,469). “For the most part, these words and the songs bring back things that you enjoyed. They evoke an emotion that you can’t get without music.”

A love for these harmonies is perhaps the only unifying trait you’ll find among barbershoppers. The music draws participants from every profession imaginable and from quartets based in the smallest towns to the largest metropolitan areas. “Age makes no difference,” notes Bowman, whose quartet ranges from 21 to 64 years old.

The barbershop singing society has 32,000 members in the United States and Canada. Female counterparts Sweet Adelines International and Harmony Inc. boast 30,000 and 2,500 members respectively in North America.

‘Most perfect form of harmony’

If there’s any question that the groups enjoy what they do, consider a few of their names: 2 Young ’N’ 2 Old, 4 Crying Out Loud, 4 Warning, Achy Breaky Parts, Chordiac Arrest, Den of Antiquity, and Fourgetaboutit.

Musical selections range from staples such as Heart of My Heart and Let Me Call You Sweetheart to patriotic tunes, Christmas carols, and gospel songs. These days, many barbershop quartets might appeal to younger folks with songs by Billy Joel, James Taylor, and even Dr. Seuss.

“Barbershopping is about pleasing the audience. As long as your audience is enjoying it and appreciating, that’s all we’re out there to do,” says J.R. Muth, whose quartet, Catfish Bend, was named 2002 International Collegiate Quartet Champions.

Muth, 25, and his vocal partners illustrate the infusion of young blood in barbershop quartets. “I love the purity of it,” says Muth, a middle school choir teacher from Lakewood, Ohio. “Without a doubt, it’s my favorite kind of music.”

Historians trace barbershop singing to the minstrel shows of the mid-18th century. The music itself is a blend of African-American improvisational devices and the four-part harmonies frequently used in European songs such as psalms, hymns, and folk songs.

The tenor harmonizes above the lead singer (the second-lowest voice who provides the melody), the bass sings the lowest harmonizing notes, and the baritone provides in-between notes to form consonant, ringing chords. By barbershop singing’s strictest definition, singers should strike a different chord on every note of the melody.

“It’s the most perfect form of harmony that you can possibly get,” explains Kristi Conner of the all-female quartet Voice Activated, based in Lincolnton, N.C. (pop. 9,965). “If you get them exactly right, you can get an overtone.”

Overtones are tones not directly produced by the singers but that result from the combination of their voices. So, besides the four notes being sung, a fifth and sometimes a sixth note can be heard—usually above the highest voice.

But creating such perfection takes some effort, says Karen Maney, Voice Activated’s founder. “(Barbershop singing) is seen by the public as something that anybody can do,” she says. “In fact, the words and the notes are fairly easy. What’s difficult is getting the right blend and the right balance and the vocal skills required to do it.”

Freddie King, who began quartet singing as a teenager in 1950, knows the work required to become an accomplished barbershop singer. “The more you know about it, the more proficient you can be,” says King, who has performed in international competition for five decades. “I can remember the day that I rejoiced in hitting a chord and then I remember the day that I used to get angry for missing one.”

The singer, arranger, and vocal coach with 2,000 stage shows to his credit describes barbershop singing as “a door to my entire musical life.” Working as a foreman in a steel mill, the barbershop enthusiast of Parkville, Md., (pop. 31,118) was hired to teach music in a Baltimore County, Md., school although he had no college credits.

“(While teaching) I earned my bachelor’s degree and my master’s degree and taught for 31 years in the county,” King continues. “There are a lot of classically trained musicians who become barbershoppers. I was a barbershopper who became a classically trained musician.”

Competitors and hobbyists

Most people encounter barbershop quartets at fairs, festivals, and churches, but another realm of barbershopping exists in the competitions. The barbershop singing society’s annual international competition routinely draws 10,000 people to the hosting city. It’s a lively event of non-stop performances made more interesting by the tradition that strangers often gather in lobbies, restaurants, and public transit stations to form spontaneous quartets.

“Competition is very clinical,” King says. “No one is allowed to speak. You just sing two songs. You’re on and you’re off. But in a show, you have a half-hour to make a musical point and you can speak with the audience as well. In my quartet, we go back to a vaudevillian-type presentation.”

Paul Bowman of Give & Take divides barbershop quartets into two categories. “There’s the competing kind and the hobby kind,” he says. “In the competing group, the focus is more on improvement, ‘What can I do better?’ In the hobby part, it’s the same concept without the pressure.”

Although all four members of his group have been individually honored as Barbershopper of the Year in their district, they consider themselves hobbyists. They perform at weddings, meetings, and other social functions with attire ranging from traditional to formal. “If they’re doing a Hawaiian theme, we’ll dress in shorts and sandals,” he adds.

As with many quartets, Give & Take does a lot of giving of its talent. “We sing at the hospital in the dialysis unit each year and for people who are doing chemotherapy,” Bowman explains. “That’s real meaningful for us because one of the guys in the group had lung cancer and had a lung removed.”

The undisputed busiest day in the life of a barbershop quartet is Valentine’s Day. The boys in Twin Falls turn it into a marathon singing spree. “Last year we did 54 separate singing Valentines in one day,” Bowman says. “We go in, present a bud vase, and sing a couple of songs to whoever we’re singing for—guys, girls, adults, children, whoever people ask us to sing for.”

They’ve performed to a hygienist while she worked on a patient and a sugar plant foreman surrounded by his 40 co-workers. The responses sometimes are emotional. When they sang for an employee of an auto parts store, “there were tears welling up in his eyes a little bit by the time we finished,” he recalls.

Taking the past to the future

“I was one of the lucky ones that was able to start in it at a young age,” says Conner, whose mother’s barbershop chorus practiced in their home as early as she can remember. “I couldn’t wait ’til I was old enough to do it.”

Because not everyone has such a front-row seat, quartets and their organizations make it a priority to introduce their music to the world.

“Of all the kinds of music I’ve done, barbershop seems to have the most resources for music education for the community,” Maney says. “There are vocal education programs, music camps, conventions, and education seminars. I don’t know of any other organization in the world that does that much in training their singers.”

“We love promoting the hobby,” says Muth, whose quartet makes a special effort to improvise with young attendees after their concerts. “We want it to live on.”

King harkens back to his introduction to the style. “The thing that hooked me in 1950 was ringing those chords. And in 2050, I want some young 16-year-old boy to get the same feeling.”

Frequent contributor Michael Nolan remembers singing harmony once at age 15—but hasn’t been able to replicate that moment since.

Related Stories

If you enjoyed reading this story, Four Part Harmony, then you might enjoy these other stories.

• Singing the Language of Love
• Singing Without Limits
• The Big Sing
• Donna Fargo: Singing a New Song
• The Music of the Folks

Share This Story With Others:


 

Discuss this Article

  related categories

• Nostalgia
• Indiana
• Maryland
• North Carolina

  related articles

• Singing the Language of Love
• Singing Without Limits
• The Big Sing
• Donna Fargo: Singing a New Song
• The Music of the Folks

  additional links

• Current Happenings
• State Trivia & Tidbits
• Where to read American Profile
• Buy Our Cookbooks