I was introduced to barbershop singing in grammar school, when my Scoutmaster was a member of the Dairymen Barbershop Chorus in Racine, Wisconsin. The headquarters of the SPEBSQSA is in Kenosha, ten miles south. The typical unit for barbershop singing is a quartet, but the units of the SPEBSQSA also usually have larger choruses that sing in typical barbershop four-part harmony.

I've noticed in recent years that many barbershop quartets sing what I think of as doo-wop songs, as opposed to the old-fashioned humorous or sentimental songs that were the usual fare for earlier quartets.

-Joe Offer-

*SPEBSQSA
(Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America.