Interviews

ACB Interview: Jerry and Julie Lawson, on the Jerry Lawson & Talk of the Town CD

By Mike Chin on April 19, 2012 in Interviews

As a follow up to our previous interview with Jerry and Julie Lawson, and our review of the Jerry Lawson and Talk of the Town CD, Jerry and Julie were kind enough to partake in a follow up interview with The A Cappella Blog.

Jerry Lawson and Talk of the Town, the eponymous CD from the former Persuasions front man and the foursome that brought him back into the a cappella fold, sounds fundamentally different from just about any other major a cappella CD you’re likely to hear nowadays.

“It was recorded analog (an art in itself), thanks to Paul Stubblestine,” Julie Lawson, Jerry’s wife and co-producer explained. She indicated that contrary to recording digitally, it “produced a richer sound … We wanted to keep it as organic as possible [and] it’s a richer sound when played on a real stereo, as opposed to digitally compressed and heard through earbuds or computer speakers.”

ACB Interview: The Organizers of the Montreacappella Festival

By Mike Chin on April 5, 2012 in Interviews

April is a big month for a cappella. The Contemporary A Cappella Society (CASA) faithful will descend upon Massachusetts April 15 for Boston Sings (BOSS), while others will make the pilgrimage to New York the weekend of April 29 for the biggest weekend on the scholastic a cappella calendar—the 2012 International Championship of High School and Collegiate A Cappella Championship (ICHSA and ICCA) Finals.

In addition to these a cappella Goliaths, a third force is rising north of the border. On Sunday, April 22, all eyes will focus on Montreacappella.

Michael Dyck and Glynn Rankin conceived of the Canadian a cappella festival after their group, Effusion, had competed in ICCAs years back. Rankin recalled, “getting to meet so many other groups” and cited the way in which the experience enriched his group’s own view of a cappella and the community around it.

ACB Interview: Jerry Lawson

By Mike Chin on March 8, 2012 in Interviews

When today’s a cappella stars talk about how they started with the genre it’s not uncommon to hear tales of growing up in a cappella choirs, and being inspired by the sounds of an act like Rockapella or The Nylons or Boyz II Men, or perhaps even a local college group. Over the course of the next decade we’ll start to hear stories of new voices initiated via The Sing-Off, or an On the Rocks video on YouTube, or a Straight No Chaser appearance in their hometowns.

But what about the voices from long ago? The ones that came about before a cappella had a network TV show, and before the Internet, and two decades before Rockapella sang Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

Would you believe that such an act toured across the country alongside names like Liza Minnelli, Ray Charles, and Stevie Wonder or that they recorded with Frank Zappa? That a sold out crowd gave this a cappella group a standing ovation after they sang The Lord’s prayer?

This is the story of Jerry Lawson and his first a cappella group, The Persuasions. Jerry and his wife Julie were kind enough to speak with me in February 2012.

Lawson was born and raised in Apopka, Florida, in the shadow of what would become the Disney World resort. He moved to New York City and was dazzled with the opportunity to visit the Apollo Theater and pay $2 to hear artists like Sam Cooke perform live--acts he had hitherto only experienced via his uncle’s jukebox. And so, it was little wonder that Lawson sought to share his own voice with the Big Apple, and he soon found himself playing bars alongside other pilgrims to New York, who had followed the bright lights from Michigan, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia. The fledgling band featured five vocalists and one guitar player. There was one problem in regards to that guitar player, as Jerry recalled, “every time we had a gig in a bar, he got drunk.”

At first, the group apologized for their guitar player’s behavior and inability to perform, but once patrons had heard the guys sing, unaccompanied, the cry was consistent: “You don’t need no band!”

ACB Interview: The Makers of American Harmony, Aengus James, Allan Webb, and Colin King Miller

By Mike Chin on February 10, 2012 in Interviews

American Harmony is a documentary that spans a year-long journey to the International Championships of Barbershop Singing. The film will air on The Documentary Channel on February 12, 2012 at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET (5 p.m. and 8 p.m. PT). You can read my review of the film here.

I spoke with director, Aengus James, executive producer, Allan Webb, and producer, Colin King Miller this week to discuss the film.

American Harmony’s greatest strength is no doubt its sincerity and commitment to the form it portrays. It may, therefore, come as a surprise that just a few years ago the director had very little experience with barbershop. James was shooting a film in Kansas about the social-political climate when he stumbled upon a barbershop quartet. “I thought they were a riot!” James said, recalling a group of farmers who had developed a routine over a period of years. After about four years of following the group on his days off, they suggested that James check out The International Championships of Barbershop Singing.

James introduced Miller to the barbershop world and idea of a film about it at a time when a number of documentaries centered on competition were coming out (e.g., Spellbound, Murderball). “I thought this would blow all of those movies away,” Miller said. “It was like anything you would see on American Idol times 100, plus the comedy and the showmanship.”

ACB Interview: Alumni of The Sing-Off’s Men of Note Prepare for ICCA Competition

By Mike Chin on February 9, 2012 in Interviews

Season two of The Sing-Off saw the rise of a unique a cappella supergroup—a collection of talent culled from alumni of Cherry Hill High School West’s Men of Note. The high school group had racked up three consecutive International Championship of High School A Cappella crowns in the late 2000s. But how would the cream of that crop do on national TV?

The good news was that the guys delivered. Their performance of Billy Joel’s “The Longest Time” used old school charm to win over a national audience. The bad news was, in a show steeped with sensational talent, Men of Note had to make an early exit from the season.

“The experience was a very exciting one,” Men of Note member Jason Nop recalled. “It was almost as if you were a celebrity.”

“We went from throwing together new arrangements the week before the audition to boarding a plane to Los Angeles, California,” another member, Rajeer Alford said. “Aside from performing on live television, the most exciting part for me was probably listening to the other groups rehearse when we weren't filming. I recall listening to Street Corner Symphony practice parts of Train's “Hey, Soul Sister” and I was in complete shock at how in sync they were with each other. I've never seen a rehearsal be so productive and run so smoothly at the same time. It's a little ridiculous how talented all the groups were. To this day it still surprises me how much of a family that season of The Sing-Off grew to be. You would have never guessed it was a competition by watching the groups interact.”

Members of the Men of Note super group persevered in the a cappella world. Alford and Richard Crandle carried their a cappella dream into the collegiate ranks, forming a brand new group at Rider University known as Vocalmotion. After just three months together, the co-ed group placed second in its International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella (ICCA) quarterfinal. With two months to hone their sound and revise their set, the group came to play at the Mid-Atlantic Semifinals, and finished just one place shy of going all the way to the ICCA Finals.

ACB Interview: Scott Henderson of The EarthTONES and Canada Sings

By Mike Chin on February 3, 2012 in Interviews

In the wake of the collegiate a cappella explosion of the early 2000s and three seasons of The Sing-Off, it’s not unusual to hear to hear about a group of friends trying to cut it as a professional a cappella group. It’s less ordinary, though, to find someone who’s invested in not only his own group, but a cappella as a medium for moving music and society forward. When I spoke with Scott Henderson in late January, this is exactly what he suggested.

“The Idol shows set people up to judge individual people’s singing abilities,” Henderson said, “and people thought you should only sing if you’re outstanding. That mentality crept into pop culture. Now, with Glee and The Sing-Off and Canada Sings, the whole premise is people who are not professionals performing. That’s a real healthy way of people getting interested in making music.” He went on to explain his view that a cappella has music “becoming what it always should have been—people walking down the street singing; everybody should sing, just like everybody walks and talks.” Henderson went on to discuss the way in which a cappella “inspires any fan of music, inspires people to put their own spin on songs they love, and think about how music can be done in different ways. A cappella [musicians have] known for a long time they can’t just imitate, they need to innovate without instruments—that affects musicians in general and how they look at how they can make music and do covers.”

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