Harmonizing on the street is an old tradition. A New Orleans researcher, Lynn Abbott, has found many sources dating back to the 1880s and 1890s that refer to the pervasiveness of close-harmony recreational singing by African American quartets in school yards, lodge halls, barrooms, shoeshine stands, railroad stations and street corners, as well as in barbershops (which gave the form its original name).

Although barbershop and doo-wop groups grew out of the same tradition, the history of each genre is very different. Throughout the twentieth century barbershop singing has been a predominantly white leisure hobby, whereas doo-wop singing was a more professional genre performed primarily by African Americans. Despite historic and musical differences, the current collegiate a cappella community shares commonalties with both.

Barbershop

"According to Val Hicks, the Golden Age of Barbershop got under way during the Gay Nineties and continued through the Roaring Twenties, a period that included the ‘peak years’ between approximately 1920 and 1925." In 1938, the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America (SPEBSQSA) formed in response to the declining public interest in barbershop. Although the organization had no set agenda when it began, founding member O.C. Cash did file for incorporation and trademark protection. In the years following, SPEBSQSA developed a strong identity as a national support organization for male barbershoppers. It is important to note that the Sweet Adelines International, SPEBSQSA’s sister organization, started in 1945. Today it has 29,000 members. SPEBSQSA currently has about 34,000 members in the United States and Canada. As a national support organization, it publishes music, operates a museum and library and engages in a number of charitable activities. It also serves to unify the 800 or so SPEBSQSA chapters whose activities include providing training in music and barbershop craft to each member, planning and organizing barbershop events, maintaining ties with local music teachers and choral groups, and encouraging good fellowship among chapter members.

The Contemporary A Cappella Society of America (CASA) is a non-profit support organization that began in 1991. Contrary to SPEBSQSA, CASA was created by Deke Sharon because he saw how many groups existed and wanted to unify those groups, encourage cross fertilization, and share information with a cappella singers and fans all over the world. Currently CASA has 10,000 members. Before 1991, a cappella groups other than barbershop groups did not have a support organization. CASA functions in several capacities. It carries out a role equivalent to a barbershop chapter in the sense that it provides general information about how to start a group, how to manage a group, how to compete and how to arrange. And in the larger context of the a cappella community, it promotes and organizes events such as Sunday Sing, The A Cappella Academy, the Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards, maintains extensive databases such as the Recording Resource Database, and sponsors major programs like the Urban Harmony Movement, which is a program designed to bring a cappella to inner city high schools.

When O.C. Cash and Rupert Hall started SPEBSQSA, they and other founding members decided that they needed to create a context in which to draw barbershoppers into the society. In June of 1939, they announced that they would hold the World’s Championship Quartet Contest. 150 barbershoppers from seventeen cities and seven states showed up, and in addition to the contest, SPEBSQSA founders used that opportunity to hold a meeting to elect a national president and officers. In 1940, the contest brought even more people from new parts of the country, and in effect it became a primary method to expand membership in SPEBSQSA, and also generated new interest and excitement within the barbershop community.

CASA does not hold annual competitions. However, it closely supports producer Adam Farb whose National Championship of College A Cappella (NCCA), generates great interest and excitement in the college a cappella community. The NCCA started in 1995. Each year, the number of groups competing has increased. In fact the exponential growth of collegiate a cappella groups has caused Farb to seek corporate sponsorship and employ a staff because the event has gotten too big for him to handle. In addition to quantitative data, the barbershoppers interviewed by researcher Robert Stebbins in 1996 and some of the college a cappella singers I interviewed for this paper cited competition opportunities as important to them. People in leadership roles particularly expressed favorable thoughts on competition because it fosters group momentum.

In Stebbins’ survey, winning a competition was most frequently cited as a career high point for the barbershopper. Although many of the students I interviewed spoke very enthusiastically about competitions, there are many other things that they find equally important. Part of the reason the barbershoppers and college students may not agree on the degree of importance of competition probably has to do with performance frequency and social differences between the two genres.

The performance opportunities for a barbershop group and a collegiate a cappella group are not the same. If a barbershop group wants to sing in events other than competitions, it has to create a context in which to do it. This requires a lot of administrative work and months of musical preparation. That, coupled with the fact there is no market for amateur a cappella, assures that performance frequency is not high. College groups, however, perform at least once a month and in many cases every week, and although some administrative work is necessary, the collegiate context affords the groups a lot of flexibility. For example, if a group does not publicize until four days before a show, the audience will still come. Such is not the case in the post-collegiate a cappella world. With or without competition, a college group will still perform many times in a year whereas, for a barbershop group or a nonprofessional post-college a cappella group, competition is a climactic moment because it is one of a few major performance opportunities that come up in a year.

Despite the discontinuity regarding career high points, the low points of the barbershopper’s and college a cappella singer’s career are very similar. Barbershoppers cited poor leadership, disagreement with musical choices, low commitment, unpreparedness for rehearsals, tardiness, and politics as reasons for disappointment and discontent. While I did not ask directly about those issues, each student I interviewed mentioned at least one of the above as a point of contention. As a former president of one group and current president of another it is certainly true that no group escapes any of the aforementioned. However, if the administrative and musical leadership of the group is strong, conflicts and problems are relatively easy to resolve. Unfortunately, such a combination is rare, for often those in positions of power lack the experience, the expertise, or the maturity to lead effectively. Fortunately, each school year has two semesters or three terms. Usually after the first part of the year, those in leadership positions grow into their various roles.

"Concern about membership abounds all three (Barbershop) societies." Since young people seem uninterested in barbershop, Stebbins suggests that,

A singout or two each year at different high schools, by quartets and choruses of both sexes would give barbershop exposure in an area of the community where recruitment is weakest. Chapters might also perform at nearby colleges and universities and try to gain a spot on local or even regional television, a medium that confers considerable prestige..
. . One of the oft-heard arguments in barbershop circles goes like this: young adults are generally not attracted to barbershop because it is so dramatically different from the popular music that they and their peers are so fond of.

Stebbins disputes that argument and states that with the right exposure young people may become more involved. Obviously Stebbins is unaware of the large a cappella movement happening within high schools, colleges, and universities. His ignorance is understandable since the collegiate a cappella movement is very grassroots and largely contained in cyberspace. However, if he looked at the websites of college a cappella singers, he would quickly realize that the reason recruitment of young people is weak is not because they do not want to sing a cappella, but that young people prefer to sing rock and roll rather than barbershop. Also, since most people involved in barbershop are older than most students, a barbershop group could not possibly offer a social experience comparable to a student a cappella group.

Doo-wop

In the early years of SPEBSQSA, African Americans were discouraged from joining the organization. That factor alone did not cause the inception of doo-wop however, perhaps we can speculate that such discrimination certainly caused African Americans to develop their own style of vocal music. In the 1950s, doo-wop emerged as an African American alternative to barbershop. According to Johnny Keyes, former lead singer for The Magnificents,

All of the doo-wop groups had one thing in common. We started singing on the street corners, in the hallways and vestibules, in the boys bathrooms at schools, and at the end of the elevated platforms. Making music was very basic. The one who knew the words to the song was the lead singer. The remaining three or four singers imitated the sound that the horns make in the background, in harmony. The bass singer started the songs, setting the tempo and giving the pitch.

Similarly, a number of the older collegiate a cappella groups began by making music in the same way, they were college ‘street’ singers. While college a cappella groups have more members than doo-wop groups, the harmony Keyes describes is what background singers in college groups do. The bass is clearly the most important member of the doo-wop group and the same is true of the college a cappella group. Because a college group has a music director, and the bass is not a person but a section of a group, the responsibility of the bass in a doo-wop group is not overtly the same in a college a cappella group. However, the bass section is the anchor of the group and as such has more control over pitch and tempo than any other section in the group.

Initially, doo-wop singers sang without any musical accompaniment. However, as groups turned more professional and got record deals and gigs, that changed. Suddenly doo-wop groups had to sing with a band, not an easy adjustment for people who were used to singing under street lamps and who could not read music much less write out the chord changes for bands to play. Many groups dreamed of getting a record deal but what they did not realize was singing with a band not only cost them money but also meant that they would lose credit for their songs. The way it worked was that the bandleader transcribed the songs for the band and charged a fee which came out of the group’s royalties, and then his name appeared on the label as the arranger. Although those circumstances were tough to accept, many groups did so in the hopes of making it.

Despite the doo-wop groups’ use of instruments, Keyes’ first hand account of the doo-wop fan base and the amount of "creative borrowing" groups engaged in is extremely similar to college a cappella culture.

Screaming girls motivated Du-Wop groups at this stage of the game, because money hasn’t entered into it yet. If they liked what you were doing, they would scream and pull on your clothes, organize fan clubs, invite you to dinners (at their homes), buy your record when and if you record one and pay to see you perform if your record is hot enough to get you booked. These girls made a guy pay for the ticket to see you, bought your autographed souvenir programs at the big concerts and would occasionally visit your hotel room to inspire you to put on a better show the next time you step on stage. Yes they were in the front paying attention. And that was enough to keep some serious adrenaline flowing.

Speaking from my own experience, the college a cappella fans are very similar, especially toward the all male groups whose raw energy and sexuality drives performances. Coed and female groups also have a fan base but it is often geared toward individuals rather than the group itself. Even so, whatever kind of group is performing, the enthusiasm of a college crowd is unparalleled.

Creative borrowing is more or less plagiarism of other groups’ material.

Everyone in the group went to see the show the first day. The show would last a week. The member of the group having the best memory would attend every show from then on, accompanied by another member, who could remember everything that the first one would forget. They would then ‘borrow’ the routines, medleys, the walk-ons, ad-libs and smiles. In other words, everything that got a good response from the audience would be borrowed, brought to rehearsal, and combined with whatever you already had.

College groups do more or less the same kind of thing. However, the creative borrowing occurs more with songs and skits then choreography and stage presence. Many groups have their repertoire listed on the web pages. Often, when a group needs a new song to sing and cannot think of one, an arranger will look at what other groups are doing for inspiration. Groups on the same campus do not steal each others skits, but with the amount of interaction groups have with one another, it is not unusual for a group’s members to borrow a skit from a group they sang with at another school.

The most compelling comparison between barbershop, doo-wop, and college a cappella groups is the experience of the singers themselves. Obviously the musical styles of each vary but the connection between the voice, the brain, and the heart is articulated by all kinds of singers in the following:

When you’re singing, the sound around you is incredible. You feel like you’re being carried away with it. It’s absolutely inspiring. But, you know, it seems to take a contest or the annual show to bring out the best in us, to get to that level of perfection where the chords ring and you feel like you’re being swallowed up by the music itself.

Doo-Wop, she-bops in tight staccato bursts of harmony over and over until one of us brought it to a stop with a choir-director type hand gesture. Then, much laughter and yelling. What a feeling all inside our body. What a rush of energy. What a good positive feeling.

It feels so right. Its really hard to describe, but all of a sudden you feel like a big smile and your soul comes pouring out of your mouth and eyes as you look at other people in your group and almost fall in love. I’m going to get a little biological on you so please just go with my analogy. When any animal (including humans) copulate, and they achieve orgasm (in humans) a neuro-chemical called oxitosin is released. This chemical has been called "liquid love". It is what forms the emotional bond between two people after they copulate. In my opinion, I think this chemical is released during magical moments on stage, causes a bond to form between everyone involved. This would make the experience, almost by definition, orgasmic.