May 2, 2019
Reason #200: The Evolution of ICCA Since its founding in 1996, the ICCA tournament has undergone changes. There have been changes in scope. Even when I hopped…
April 18, 2019
Reason #199: Professional Groups Performing at Colleges Now more than ever, professional a cappella groups are plying their trade on stages across the United…
April 11, 2019
Reason #198: The Return to Finals Scholastic a cappella, not unlike scholastic sports, and other competitive mediums, face the interesting dynamic that at least
April 5, 2019
Reason #197: When The Home Group Wins In an age when more and more groups are competing, more and more groups also have cheering sections with them at their…
April 4, 2019
Reason #196: Making a Life in A Cappella Conventional wisdom would suggest that you don’t sing a cappella to make a living. Traditionally speaking, I would…
March 28, 2019
Reason #195: Coming To A Cappella From Unexpected Places Increasingly, there are stories of successful practitioners of the a cappella form who first heard a…
March 22, 2019
Reason #194: When Everyone’s Got Something Interesting To Do We’ve all heard and seen those a cappella performances in which not everyone on stage is…
March 21, 2019
Reason #193: When It All Comes Together Too often, performances don’t come across the way we would hope they would. Someone has a bad case of nerves. The…
March 14, 2019
Reason #192: When Gender Flips Work There are those times when a group covering a song across gender lines does not do the group or the song any favors. It’s…
March 8, 2019
Reason #191: High School Groups Going Old School High school groups represent the future of a cappella—youngsters learning the fundamentals of the form, in…
March 7, 2019
Reason #190: “Dream On” as performed by Casual Harmony Forgive me, because I’ve recounted this anecdote before on this blog and in the pages of The A…
February 28, 2019
Reason #189: When A Show Starts On Time We live in an era of convenience. Rather than waiting for the next episode of a favorite TV show, we binge watch. Rather
February 22, 2019
Reason #188: Soloists Who Don’t Look Like They’re Performing Some of the very best soloists in a cappella are those with stage presence—the ones who work…
February 21, 2019
Reason #187: Complementary Soloists Sometimes, an individual soloist captivates the crowd, draws them into a story, and walks away as the single most memorable…
February 14, 2019
Reason #186: “If You’re Out There” as Performed by The Stereotypes The Washington University Stereotypes are a unique a cappella group with a unique…
February 8, 2019
Reason #185: Fluid Transitions Over the last five years or so, the seamless set has become a staple in high level scholastic competition. One song bleeds into…
February 7, 2019
Reason #184: Throwbacks One of the great treats of hearing a student-run a cappella group (or even a post-collegiate group run by creative minds) is the degree…
January 31, 2019
Reason #183: A Balanced Competition Often as not, when there’s an a cappella competition, we get caught up in questions of which group was better than…
January 25, 2019
Reason #182: Such Great Heights In the mid-2000s, “Such Great Heights” arrived as one of the coolest songs in indie rock, made all the cooler for the two…
January 24, 2019
Reason #181: Skinny Love In 2014, The University of Michigan G-Men kicked off ICCA Finals. They didn’t lead off with a barn burner or a big dance number, but…
January 17, 2019
Reason #180: Crimson The past seven years have seen an explosion in the number and quality of a cappella groups—professional, amateur, college, and high…
January 10, 2019
Reason #179: Men of Note Before enterprises like The Sing-Off and Pitch Perfect launched a full-fledged explosion of a cappella at every level, there were Men…
January 3, 2019
Reason #178: Enormous High School Groups In recent years, high school a cappella groups have inched closer and closer to their college counterparts in terms of…
December 27, 2018
Reason #177: Aca-Couples Don’t get me wrong—intra- or inter-group aca-dating can be problematic. The theatrics of relationship spilling over into any work…
December 21, 2018
Reason #176: Groups With Unique Identities I’ll always remember my first trip to ICCA Finals, back in 2007. It’s a show that Noteworthy rightfully won
December 20, 2018
Reason #175: Stages The year was 2015, when then-Ithacappella-member Dan Purcell married his love a cappella to his passion for film making. The result was…
December 13, 2018
Reason #174: Pocketappella Some friends and I started casually using the term “pocketappella” in the mid-2000s in reference to the bevy of a cappella…
December 7, 2018
Reason #173: Off-Beat Openings Though more and more a cappella groups have started performing and recording original music, covers remain a staple of the form.…
December 6, 2018
Reason #172: The One Person Rocking Out the Hardest We’ve all seen it. At the dance club. In the children’s choir. On stage for the community theater…
November 29, 2018
Reason #171: The End to Controversy on the Internet In the preceding edition of 200 Reasons to Love A Cappella, I discussed the benefits of Internet…
November 23, 2018
Reason #170: Controversy on the Internet This selection for the reasons I love a cappella may seem counterintuitive. After all, who likes controversy on the…
November 22, 2018
Reason #169: Improvisation In an a cappella world that can seem increasingly planned--in which more and more groups choose to choreograph at length, and in…
November 16, 2018
Reason #168: Start-Up Groups We hear a lot about groups with long traditions, the likes of The Whiffenpoofs, Smiffenpoofs, and The Nassoons. Groups that have…
November 15, 2018
Reason #167: The Diversity of Acts In a Competition Watching an a cappella group perform a show can be entertaining and enriching for the opportunity to see…
November 8, 2018
b>Reason #166: Rediscovering an Album You’re flipping through radio stations in the car, and you come upon a song you used to love. One you haven’t thought…
November 2, 2018
Reason #165: Bringing Alumni on Stage Hands down, one of my favorite aspects of a live a cappella show is the incorporation of former group members on stage.…
November 1, 2018
Reason #164: Big Crescendos When I review a cappella shows, it’s not unusual for me to highlight groups that show care in planning and precision in executing…
October 25, 2018
Reason #163: Fun Encores For every Varsity Vocals competition, the night wraps up with the winning group retaking the stage for one more song—an encore. After
October 19, 2018
Reason #162: Soloists Who Sound Like the Original Artist There are those a cappella soloists who flounder for trying to hard to imitate the original artist on a
October 18, 2018
Reason #161: The Wall of Sound Particularly at the scholastic level, most a cappella groups feature ten or more singers. While a big group can lead to all sorts
October 11, 2018
Reason #160: When Someone Nails a Stevie Wonder Solo Whoever you are, wherever you’re from, whether you’re even old enough to know who he is, there is one…
October 5, 2018
Reason #159: Building a Personal Connection to a Song Each a cappella group has it repertoire. Most of these song lists include a few contemporary favorites
October 4, 2018
Reason #158: Dedications Despite being a performance art, music is also a profoundly personal thing. Our tastes, the songs that resonate with us, the way in…
September 27, 2018
Reason #157: Subtle Movement In the mid-2000s, as a cappella groups really proliferated and competitions grew stiffer, we also observed a steep increase in the…
September 21, 2018
Reason #156: Adapting to the Audience Be it in the a cappella world or other walks of life, we’ve all had the experience of seeing a performer miss the mark…
September 20, 2018
Reason #155: Adapting To The Environment It’s a reality for any artist who travels to perform live: you will encounter different stages, different…
September 13, 2018
Reason #154: Embedded Solos Offering individual singers short solos within a larger piece is nothing new to the world of choral music, but in the contemporary a
September 7, 2018
Reason #153: Personal Style With thousands of a cappella groups plying their trade today, it can be tough to stand out. Being good, being innovative, and being
September 6, 2018
Reason #152: The Robot When it comes to over-the-top, cheesy dance moves, we’ve all seen The Sprinkler, The Shopping Cart, or The Running Man. All these moves
May 10, 2018
Reason #151: Front Row Seats In the preceding edition of 200 Reasons To Love A Cappella, I referenced the pleasure of sitting in balcony seats to take in a the…
May 3, 2018
Reason #150: Balcony Seats Conventional wisdom suggests that front row seats to a show are the best seats in the house. Others may seek out the acoustic sweet…
April 19, 2018
Reason #149: Transitions on Your Playlist My first true love in music is not so much any individual artist or genre, nor the act singing or playing an…
April 12, 2018
Reason #148: Law School Groups While there are certainly people who make it work, let’s be honest—between financial concerns, professional and academic…
April 5, 2018
Reason #147: Incorporating Foreign Languages A cappella is all about the sounds the human body can generate, and principally from a vocal perspective. You can…
March 15, 2018
Reason #146: Raw Solos When I think of premier soloists in the a cappella world, I’m often drawn to folks with silky smooth vocals, impressive range, or…
March 8, 2018
Reason #145: Connecting With a Song A cappella groups cover songs for any number of reasons—whether they happen to be popular at the time, sit well with the…
March 1, 2018
Reason #144: BOSS In 2012, The Contemporary A Cappella Society (CASA) started a new a cappella festival, Boston Sings, more commonly referred to as BOSS. It…
February 22, 2018
Reason #143: A Well-Executed Choral Arrangement Bringing a choral piece to a contemporary a cappella show may seem counter-intuitive. After all, the form has…
February 1, 2018
Reason #142: When a Group Defies What You’d Expect By Looking at Them Many of us grow up hearing that we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover—and yet how…
January 11, 2018
Reason #141: Breath as a Sound Effect If a cappella is rooted in making the most of the human voice, one of the greatest gifts of the contemporary style over…
January 4, 2018
Reason #140: Seniors’ Last Show One of the sad inevitabilities of scholastic a cappella group is that the group will, in time, separate. Graduation happens…
December 7, 2017
Reason #139: Small Groups In reason number 138, we took a look at super-sized groups. This time we turn to the opposite extreme. Small groups have cemented…
November 16, 2017
Reason #138: Super-Sized Groups While a cappella groups with a small number of members can certainly command an audience’s attention and feature distinctive…
November 9, 2017
Reason #137: Singing in a Round Who among us doesn’t reflect fondly upon childhood sing-alongs of “Row, Row, Row Your Boa?.” It’s a simple, feel-good…
November 2, 2017
Reason #136: A Radical Arrangement The last decade has seen the a cappella palate multiply several times over. While industrial rock and hip-hop performances…
October 19, 2017
Reason #135: When the Staging Emulates the Music Video One of the biggest difference between a cappella now and a cappella fifteen to twenty years ago is that…
October 5, 2017
Reason #134: Remembering How You Know a Song One of the most powerful effects of music is its capacity to trigger memories. Because most a cappella groups focus
September 28, 2017
Reason #133: Seeing a Group Transform On Stage and Off When I was an undergrad, I spent a couple years working tech crew, which included setting up and taking…
September 21, 2017
Reason #132: When a Group Squeezes an Extra Song Into Its Competition Set Conventional wisdom dictates that a ten-to-twelve-minute competition set will consist…
September 14, 2017
Reason #131: The First Time You Hear a Song After You’ve Heard It A Cappella It’s no secret that one of the coolest parts of attending an a cappella…
September 7, 2017
Reason #130: Watching the Crowd Grow at a Public Show One of the a cappella’s most unique and most appealing qualities is how few requirements it has. A…
May 25, 2017
Reason #129: Hearing a Song That Just Came Out on the Radio I consider myself pretty open minded about music from different time periods. On a given day, I’m…
May 18, 2017
Reason #128: A Sold-Out Crowd We’ve all heard the expression, “bigger is better.” The words certainly hold true in the case of the audience at an a…
May 4, 2017
Reason #127: Simulating Sounds In a genre defined by the human voice and body, one of the most fascinating elements of a cappella to watch evolve over time is…
April 6, 2017
Reason #126: Clean Sound Here at The A Cappella Blog, we spend a great deal of time talking about a cappella accoutrements like staging, song selection, and…
March 30, 2017
Reason #125: Hearing the Story Behind a Song Starting in the late nineties, VH1 struck a chord with American music fans through the show Storytellers, a concert
March 23, 2017
Reason #124: Intro Videos As cameras, video editing software, and the A/V capabilities of a wide range of performance venues have improved, so has the use of…
March 16, 2017
Reason #123: Wild Transitions Between Songs Contemporary a cappella groups rarely entrench themselves in single, solitary genres. Particularly at the scholastic
March 9, 2017
Reason #122: Buying a Group’s CD After the Show While plenty of people who sing a cappella will tell you they do so for the love of the art form and the joy…
December 1, 2016
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