Members of the Toronto Northern Lights belt
out a song after winning silver for the third year
in a row at the Barbershop Harmony Society's
international
championship.
United in song, Song, SONG... Barbershoppers find begging puts soul into
music 50-voice group second to 'best chorus in
history'
BILL
TAYLOR FEATURE WRITER
"Y'ever stood on the street and begged for money?"
Bruce Marchant demands. "It's an eye-opener."
Marchant owns a sporting-goods company. He's not a poor
man. Nor are any of the guys enjoying a barbecue at his home
in Rouge Hill. But they know what it's like to panhandle.
Not so much method acting as method singing.
These are the Toronto Northern Lights, though they
could just as well call themselves the Vocal Snowbirds, an
air-obatic team flying on the wings of song, their voices
soaring, swooping, diving and intertwining, always in close
formation.
Who knew that barbershop four-part harmony could be
such spine-tingling stuff?
Most of the 50-strong choir are at Marchant's house to
celebrate their runner-up spot at the Barbershop Harmony
Society's recent international championship in Montreal. It's
the Northern Lights' third silver medal in a row.
"Not bad, considering we've only been together six
years," says co-director Steve Armstrong. "We were beaten by
just 57 points by a group three times our size, the biggest
and best barbershop chorus in history."
The Dallas-based Vocal Majority, with 146 singers,
topped 20 other choirs to win an unprecedented 10th gold
medal.
But what does this have to do with begging?
One of Northern Lights' songs in the 2001 championship
in Nashville was the classic Great Depression song, "Brother,
Can You Spare a Dime?" It's also the title track of their
second CD.
"One of the guys started thinking he knew nothing about
what it really meant," says Armstrong, 40, a computer
consultant. "So he went out and begged for spare change. When
he told me, I thought, `Gee, now I've got to do it.' A
lot of the choir wound up panhandling, just for the
experience. It was a huge emotional investment and it made for
quite a performance of the song. There was a lot going on."
"Barbershopping" became popular in the United States at
the turn of the 19th century.
"The stereotype is a quartet of older gentlemen singing
old songs," says Northern Lights president Perry Wildfong.
He's 46 and works in computer sales. "But it's not just `Down
By The Old Mill Stream.' We do contemporary stuff, jazz. ...
We've done the Celine Dion and Andrea Bocelli song `The
Prayer.'"
While most barbershoppers also form individual
quartets, there's no limit to the number who can sing in the
choir. It's still four-part harmony.
"The lead sings the melody and then there's baritone,
bass and tenor," says Armstrong, who sings baritone. "Vocal
Majority had 56 guys singing lead. A big chorus might have 45
basses."
Northern Lights had only 46 men on stage in Montreal.
"We don't try to out-sing a 150-man chorus with
volume," Armstrong continues. "But we can do things with
fidelity, the clearness and precision of the sound, and
intonation that they can't."
The group holds regular auditions — see http://www.northernlightschorus.com/ — but,
says Wildfong, "we expect a lot. You have to be driven to
achieve."
Armstrong and co-director Chris Arnold have music
degrees. Many singers can't even read music. Arnold,
32, has turned this into a business.
"I make learning tapes and CDs for quartets and
choruses," he says. "They send me their sheet music and I
record it and send it back to them so they can learn the songs
without needing to read music. Until I started doing this, I
worked in customer service for an insurance company. That's
not my style."
Arnold is a rare bird. He has the range to sing all
four parts.
The Barbershop Harmony Society — that's the widely used
form of its full name: Society for the Preservation and
Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America — was
formed in 1938 in Tulsa, Okla., and has about 33,000 members
across North America. But individual teams are invited to
compete in championships from all over the world.
Barbershopping is popular in Britain, Australia, New Zealand,
Sweden, Holland, Germany, even Japan.
"And there were those four young guys who came over
once from Russia," says Wildfong.
Northern Lights rehearses in Toronto but draws its
members from as far away as North Bay and Buffalo.
There are two organizations, the Sweet Adelines and
Harmony Inc., for the female equivalent of barbershopping.
"The reigning Sweet Adelines champions, North Metro,
are from Toronto," says Marchant.
All over his backyard, snatches of close-harmony keep
breaking out. One quartet, Mirage, does a creamy rendition of
"I Can't Give You Anything But Love."
Marchant, 59, has been singing barbershop for 30 years
and has 13 international medals. His son Darryl, 31, is in
Northern Lights as is Arnold's dad, Ed. Northern Lights
members range in age from 19 to mid-60s.
"I'd still be a young buck in a lot of choruses," says
Marchant. "The average age tends to be older than I am.
"Perry Como was a barbershopper. And Dick Van Dyke put
together a quartet. He sings lead or bass. They do a great
`Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.' Gordon Lightfoot started his career
barbershopping in Orillia. We did a show with him a couple of
years ago. And he used to sing with the guy who did my
basement ..."
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