�������� A Cappella

By Gabrielle Bibus

Legend has it that if you walk through the halls of ��������’s main academic building around 10:00 PM, you might hear an echoing symphony of disembodied voices coming from the I Wing stairwell. A similar phenomenon has also been witnessed in the staircase near the Campus Center Bookstore, particularly on mornings right before an event is about to commence in the Event Room. If you have ever heard this unexplained stair-singing, don’t worry, you haven’t experienced a poltergeist, nor are you a sailor being lured in by a siren out at sea: chances are, you simply overheard one of ��������’s three a Cappella groups wrapping up a rehearsal or warming up for an event with the aid of some stairwell acoustics.

To sing a Cappella means to sing without an instrumental accompaniment. In other words, a Cappella singers produce music using only their voices, which can include vocal percussion (better known as beatboxing) and reproducing the sounds of instruments by using syllables such as “den,” da,” “doh,” etc. A Cappella music came into the limelight when the movie Pitch Perfect was released in 2012. However, this style of singing existed far before Anna Kendrick’s big screen performance, and in ��������’s case a Cappella has been on campus since 2007. In this year, a group of eight ambitious singers put on their very first concert as the group cleverly named Stockapella. The following year, �������� hired Dr. Neil Aaronson as a Physics professor. In 2009, Aaronson, a musician with expertise in acoustics and psychoacoustics, stepped into the position of director and took the tiny singing group, formerly advised by Dr. Beverly Vaughn of the Music department, under his wing. Their numbers slowly increased from eight to about a dozen members. Little did they know that over the next ten years, hundreds of students would audition for a slot in �������� a Cappella. 

With a Cappella music rising in popularity and talent flooding into ��������, it was inevitable that another a Cappella group would eventually spring up on campus. That left Stockapella with two options: they could either be in competition with whatever new group appeared, or start another group themselves within the same organization. Preferring cooperation over competition, Dr. Aaronson chose the latter, and in Spring 2010 the group ��������es was born. One year later, �������� a Cappella welcomed a little sister to the family: an all-female group called Stockata. Although �������� a Cappella is an umbrella organization, the three groups are all unique. First and foremost, all three groups are NOT called Stockapella. That’s only one of us! There are so many ways in which the different groups are individuals! For starters, each group wears different colors for concerts and competitions. Pella wears yellow (though in the past they wore blue then briefly pink), Tones wears blue, and Tata wears purple (after an embarrassing phase of wearing multi colored scarves). Then, of course, there are the adorable nicknames given to each group, as written just now. Each group also sings its own set of songs, with two songs performed by all three groups, one of which is always Happy Ending by MIKA, performed each semester at every concert. �������� a Cappella alumni are also invited onstage to sing this song. 

 

 

Over the years, �������� a Cappella has performed over 200 different songs of varying genres, by artists including Sara Bareilles, Adele, Panic! At The Disco, Gavin DeGraw, Fall Out Boy, Evanescence, and Imagine Dragons. Songs are selected based off of suggestions made by group members, which are then narrowed down by Dr. Aaronson and the executive board (which consists of a President and Vice President for each group as well as one overarching Secretary). �������� a Cappella only performs original arrangements composed by Dr. Aaronson or one of its members or alumni; we even have our own arrangement of The Star-Spangled Banner! Each group usually performs a set of between three and six songs each semester. Rehearsals are held twice a week for two-and-a-half hours in room H116 where there is access to a piano. In the past rehearsals used to be held in H102, but competition for the room from Music Union and Highest Praise Gospel Choir led a Cappella to reroot in the next hall over. Pella has held rehearsals on Tuesdays and Thursdays from the