Barber Shop Quartets and Amazing Acappella

Call it procrastination but it was worth it for the fun and laughter.  I was editing the last chapter of my next novel, Running With the Enemy, when I added two words to a paragraph—”Barbershop Quartet”, and was curious to see what there was on YouTube.

Any excuse to escape the drudgery of editing and revisions.

“The ‘barbershop’ style of music is first associated with black southern quartets of the 1870s, such as The American Four and The Hamtown Students. The African influence is particularly notable in the improvisational nature of the harmonization, and the flexing of melody to produce harmonies in “swipes” and “snakes.” … The first written use of the word “barbershop” when referring to harmonizing came in 1910, with the publication of the song, “Play That Barbershop Chord”‹evidence that the term was in common parlance by that time.” Source: Acappella Foundation.org

Then of course, I was tempted to procrastinate longer and ended up discovering this incredible acappella group.

Wow! What else can I say? Amazing! This group is known as the Voca People if you have not seen them perform before. This was my first time so it might be yours too.

The Voca People are an Israel-based ensemble, and they claim to be aliens from another planet where the main method of communication is sounds. Their motto is “Life is music and music is life.”

ps – Even with the BSQ and Acappella procrastination, I still completed my writing goals for the day.  It just took me a few more hours to do it. Heck, as long as one is going to procrastinate, he might as well have fun doing it instead of feeling guilty because he isn’t writing, editing or revising.  In fact, I was writing–I wrote this post.

For more music, discover What do Dolly Parton, Whitney Houston and Jessica Sanchez have in common?

_______________________

Lloyd Lofthouse, a former U.S. Marine and Vietnam Veteran, is the award winning author of The Concubine Saga.

His latest novel is Running with the Enemy. Blamed for a crime he did not commit while serving in Vietnam, his country considers him a traitor. Ethan Card is a loyal U.S. Marine desperate to prove his innocence or he will never go home again.

And the woman he loves and wants to save was trained to hate and kill Americans.

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12 responses to “Barber Shop Quartets and Amazing Acappella”

  1. I watched Pitch Perfect last night. It was a little cheesy, but the music and dancing were very enjoyable.

    1. I have to be careful. If I start to watch one of these shows, I tend to get sucked in and don’t get anything else done. But it is a great way to procrastinate. :o)

      1. It’s a movie, so you would blow 2 hours. 🙂

      2. That works. I got to a lot of films. It gets me out of the house and walking. We live 1.5 miles from the local theater.

  2. Our children were obsessed with a cappella groups for awhile, and listened to them so much that my husband and I started twitching at the least hint of beat boxing. However, kids have moved out, and we’re a little lonely for them — and suddenly you pull out these a cappella masters and mistresses. Yikes. What were we thinking? Thanks. Visiting from Sunday Blog Share.

    1. We are now empty nesters—have been for going on 5 years. We saw very little of our daughter while she was in college but now that she’s graduated and has a job, she drops by late at night after work to sleep two or three days a week in her old bedroom and then she’s gone by 6:30 am. But seldom if ever visits on the weekends.

      Is that your situation too?

  3. Love it! You might want to check out The Sing Off series on YouTube. A couple of my personal favorites are Pentatonix, Home Free and The Dartmouth Aires. Check out the Aires doing a Queen medley: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPW5LspKq0k and Pentatonix doing Born To Be Wild: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZMgUxPGiqQ

    Hope this helps you procrastinate 🙂

    1. Thanks. I’ll check them out. Procrastination is always on the horizon tempting me. Today, for instance, I went walking for 4.5 miles and avoided hours of writing. Now my feet are sore. :o)

      1. Im just getting started and sadly I understand completely!

      2. When I get serious, to avoid procrastination, I start out the day with a list of goals that I want to finish by the end of the day. I write them down and put them in sight where I can’t ignore them. Works every time. But, to write the goals, I have to avoid procrastinating.

      3. Thanks for the tip!

      4. You’re welcome.

        Maybe this poem will help as it has helped me.

        https://lloydlofthouse.org/2012/05/19/the-face-in-the-glass-by-dale-wimbrow/

        After you read the poem, you will probably understand why I write the goals down—if I don’t achieve what I wrote, then I have lied to myself. And sometimes I don’t finish them all in one day. Sometimes it takes a day or two. Then I write my next set of achievable goals.

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