No, for our purposes, we need to skip to of Google’s search results.īarbershop is an approximately hundred-year-old American a cappella style sung by four voices, with all parts singing the same words at the same time (mostly) on four-part chords (mostly) with the melody predominantly in the second-highest part. That, too, is a good thing, but it, too, is not the subject of this series. A barbershop is also a local establishment that provides hair-styling services (when there isn’t a pandemic ravaging society). It is a good movie, but it is not the subject of this series. My hope is that all who read it walk away with a new appreciation for why harmony moves us and, perhaps, how we can harness it to contribute music into a world that, as always, needs it now more than ever.Īs a point of basic calibration, let’s define what we mean by “barbershop.”īarbershop is a 2002 American comedy film featuring Ice Cube and Cedric the Entertainer. This series expanded far beyond the single-article scope I originally intended, but I believe this content will be engaging for barbershop singers, choral musicians, and casual readers alike. I’ll take this newfound synthesis of barbershop and its scientific underpinnings, and show you how to arrange properly for the barbershop style by analyzing iconic arrangements-from the 1950s all the way through the 2019 International Chorus Contest. I’ll demonstrate how this science motivates barbershop as a style, and I’ll explain how and why chords in barbershop are spelled the way they are and move the way they do. I’ll review the science of acoustics and the singing voice, as a framework for how and why harmony comes to be. I’d like to finally crystalize my learnings in a series of posts here on Medium. It demands bravery as much as it demands restraint. It’s a logic puzzle as much as it is a vehicle for emotional connection (to listeners as well as to the music being sung). Turns out - it’s a fascinating balance between the right brain and the left. Eventually, I broke out of my holding pattern of confusion and started to understand how barbershop harmony actually works. Becoming a barbershop arranger today requires stubborn persistence: persistence to study existing arrangements and devise one’s own framework to explain them, persistence to arrange new works oneself and convince groups of singers to try them, and persistence to seek constructive feedback from veterans of the craft.Īs a result, I developed my own sense of the style through some combination of trial, error, derivation, and play. Barbershop has evolved since the Arranging Manual was published, but the materials largely have not. The few materials that do exist are disappointingly outmoded and difficult to access. Learning barbershop’s rules and constraints takes focused study, but there’s an unfortunate dearth of literature that can truly guide you to proficiency. Yet for all this time investment, I’ve found barbershop arranging an extremely difficult discipline in which to gain any kind of competence, let alone confidence or mastery. And more recently, I’ve scheduled video chats with generous agents of the art form who are as happy to help the next generation as they are thrilled to continue forging ahead on their own. I’ve sent rogue emails to the preeminent barbershop arrangers of the modern era, asking for their guidance on tricky phrases. I’ve read the antiquated 1.1-pound Barbershop Arranging Manual compiled and published by barbershop legends of the day in 1980. The “Barbershop Arranging Manual,” first published by the Barbershop Harmony Society (then the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America, Inc.) in 1980.ĭuring that time, I’ve also dabbled in barbershop arranging as a doubly peripheral, hobby-adjacent side hustle.
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