Ready for a lot of youtube videos you have to watch? “But Lev I have so much work to do” haha too bad watch them anyway

Barbershop quartet music fascinates me. Here’s a quick lesson on how barbershop quartets work, as presented by Main Street, 2017 International Quartet Champions. That video will introduce you to the role of each of the four different voices in a barbershop quartet (it’s never as simple as it appears).

A lot of what makes barbershop great to listen to is the barbershop seventh, a particular kind of close harmony chord that makes up a lot of barbershop music. It tends to produce these spectacular ringing overtones that you don’t find in a lot of other choral music. I’m going to link here a video of the 2018 International Quartet Champions After Hours performing at what is essentially the world championship of barbershop music. The whole video is probably worth a watch, but I’m linking to the timestamp that I think is the most impressive. When you watch the video, listen for that overtone at the end. Here it is; watch ‘til the end of the video.

After Hours (from that last video) got the highest ever total score for a series of Barbershop performances. To understand how scoring works, here’s a video from a fan-favorite quartet, the Newfangled Four.

This is a performance by Signature, 2019 International Quartet Champions. I have considerable difficulty getting through this video without crying. Shut up.

Anyway here’s FRED. FRED were the 1999 International Quartet Champions, the first comedy quartet to win.

Finally, here’s a video of what is sometimes considered the greatest barbershop performance of all time, as performed by Ringmasters, the 2012 International Quartet Champions. If you don’t wanna watch the whole thing and would rather just watch the tag (the ending chord), skip to 5:07 and watch to the end (they go through a false tag first that is equally impressive).

If you want to learn a barbershop tune, here’s some sheet music and here’s what it sounds like.

See you all at practice,

Lev “Fred” Bernstein

Secretary, Quiz Bowl at SPEBSQSA, 1938-2021