Looking Back on the May 20, 2025 Alexandria A Cappella Collective Chapter Meeting
The Collective met Tuesday, May 20, in Old Town Alexandria – starting at Market Square to warm up the voices and to gather all the singers as they arrived from all over the Metro DC area.
After the gathering and warm up conducted by artistic director, Joe Cerutti, the singers embarked on a stroll down King Street for stops to entertain the crowds outside during a lovely spring evening. The first stop was on the corner of Market Square, a couple stops down King Street, and a mini concert on the steps of the Torpedo Factory. Many members did wear their new AACC t-shirt but carried a jacket for later in the evening.
The Harmonizers sang a brand new song, “Africa,” that they had just worked on for the first time on May 16. It went so well that night that Joe suggested the song be used this week in Old Town. It was well received and the many folks along the path enjoyed singing along. Samantha Tramack directed Metro Voices when they sang “Happy Together” and the combined ensembles sang “I’m Still Standing.” At the Torpedo Factory, the AACC chorus added “Defying Gravity” with Samantha Tramack and Joe as soloists. Also they added “Hey Jude” with Matt Ambler as soloist at some stops in the area along the Potomac River at the end of King Street.
There were guests at the event – Devin Turner, Carl Parkin, and Brigit Gilvary – who joined the good number of singers present for the fun evening for both ensembles. Plus there was a number of family members who walked with the singers – some to pass out business cards to folks in the audiences and some to hold signs announcing the hashtag addresses for the three ensembles.
When the singers finished their walk in Old Town, a good crown of them adjourned the short distance to Chadwick’s for an afterglow which included more singing.
During announcements last week, Joe stressed that all singers of The Collective should mark their calendars and plan to attend the annual retreat scheduled for July 18-20 at McDaniel College in Westminster, MD. The annual event is a great opportunity for serious work on the music, plus a chance for members to meet and socialize with each other and get to know more names to go with the faces we see each week. The two coaches for the weekend will be Darin Drown from Denver, CO, and Cy Wood, our frequent performance coach from Ohio. There will also be a ceremony to present the 2024 distinguished service awards for the chapter. Great food, relaxing housing on campus close to the meeting space, casual dress, a modest drive up into MD, and always fun. Stay tuned for signing up – talk up car pools and plans for that weekend. Plus expect a few team building surprises from the music team and chapter leadership.
The rehearsals on May 27 and June 3 (with Cy Wood to coach) will be at AlexRenew. The Harmonizers will sing for arriving Honors Flights of Veterans on Saturday, May 31. Flights will arrive at DCA at 8, 9, 10 and 11 am. Dress will be AACC t-shirts and jeans. Songs will be “Armed Forces Medley” and “God Bless America.”
Here is a repeat reminder that registration for Harmony College East 2025 is still open! And the weekend is closer than you think!! Get your calendars out and reserve June 12-15, 2025, for the best District barbershop school ANYWHERE! Briefly, here are the particulars: WHAT: Harmony College East 2025; WHERE: The beautiful campus of McDaniel College, Westminster, MD; WHEN: Thursday, June 12 through Sunday, June 15, 2025.
The AACC black t-shirts are available for pick up if you ordered one, or for purchase if you still need one. Just $10 each. Get your shirt soon for the Harmony College East event or the chapter retreat in July.
The DC Barbershop Chapter, Singing Capital Chorus, has invited other barbershoppers to join them for a gig at Nationals Park on June 8 (Nats vs Texas Rangers). Uniform will be red polo shirt and tan slacks (note this color change from last week’s message) and black shoes. Songs will be “Star Spangled Banner” and “God Bless America.” Rehearsal – attend just one Monday night rehearsal before June 8 (except Memorial Day). See http://singingcapitalchorus.org/sing-at-nationals-park/ for details.
Congratulations to Steve White, Rick Taylor, Jay Butterfield and Robbie Seay and their quartet INSTAGRAMPS that has officially qualified for the Barbershop Harmony Society (BHS) senior quartet contest at the Midwinter contest in January in Pasadena, CA.
In recent days, chapter musical leaders released a video report via Slack to summarize inputs received from the interviews of members conducted between Feb. 3 and March 6. Director Samantha interviewed 27 members of Metro Voices with Joe’s help interviewing first-year-members. Joe interviewed 65 Harmonizers. Here are the top ten topics collected during the process as reported by Joe and Samantha.
1. Onboarding new members - a plan has started to be more efficient and effective in auditioning and helping new members become active singing members of AACC and its ensembles. One major change will be conducting auditions four times per year or so – forming a group of new members going through the process at the same time, given the same info and assistance.
2. Improve Inconsistent Rehearsal Venues – versus going between AlexRenew and Beth El Synagogue. Leadership agrees and is willing to consider and investigate any new venue. All members are asked to do some searching for venues in their part of the Metro Area with metro access, plenty of parking and room(s) for the ensembles and breakouts.
3. Repertoire Selection – Brad Jones is repertoire committee chair. Our goal is a cappella pops in the barbershop style. Work in this area will concentrate on how best to introduce a song to the singers and choosing songs for our audiences – with work beginning for the 2025 holiday music.
4. Celebrating Volunteers – a big issue shared by members. Our chapter depends heavily on volunteerism. An increased effort will be coming to recognize our volunteers.
5. Patriotic Repertoire Needed – part of chapter’s major goals is to support and make contact with the local demographic of veterans, military members and federal workers. For sure we will be heavily involved during the 250thanniversary of the USA and the 25th anniversary of 9/11. Dana Richardson and EJ Herold have already organized chapter support to sing for a variety of those audiences. Plus there will be a major event when the famed Vocal Majority barbershop chorus from Dallas comes to sing with us and we are part of local 9/11 events.
6. Communicating in Advance to Members – there were strong suggestions about the need to give members more advance information for things like uniforms, locations and times, details of what to expect, repertoire.
7. Plan in Advance for Future Travel Opportunities – communication again – well ahead so members can plan financial outlays for International convention and international travel, etc.
8. Project Planning Staffing – space out work load for volunteers who manage major chapter projects – involve new/more leaders, spread out the work.
9. Create Small Group Repertoire – basically AACC Polecats songs (short songs familiar to all singers and to audiences and easy to sing in a small ensemble). There could be 8-12 songs on the list and that list will stay in place for a while.
10. We Are A Happy Bunch! It was good for leadership to hear and get feedback that members enjoying the singing experience in AACC. Samantha encouraged members to plan gatherings and fun events – continue the “hanging out” fun of the chapter that exists.
Terry Reynolds released a video with statistics based on answers to the survey each member took. There were no surprises and lots of positive results in the numerical responses from members.
Until next time – editorjack!
(This message is prepared for your review if you were there, for your information if you had to miss, and as a historical record for the great things going on each week during the 76th year of the Alexandria
Chapter. - YeEd)
The Chapter Mission Statement: Enriching lives through vocal harmony in the greater DC area.
