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A cappella picks up tempo: Changes on the a cappella scene include new members and a new group

BY ALLI GREENBERG & AMY HENNING

"Desperate, With High Standards," reads the top of the Plans page of a cappella group Vox. At the beginning of this year, this tagline exemplified the situation of the all-female group, whose membership was significantly diminished after nine founding members graduated last spring.

"We only had five [members] left this year," said Sarah Berghardt '07. After three rounds of auditions, though, Berghardt has confidence that Vox will be as strong as ever. "I think [the group] will be wonderful, because the girls we admitted were incredibly talented," she said.

The new Vox will benefit from the diversity in class years of the members. "We had no diversity whatsoever in [previous] years, which led to this crisis this year," said Jessica Rhoades '07. "We have the tools to make a fantastic group," she said, "but we shouldn't expect it right off the bat."

Vox's rebound signals a shifting, but still thriving, a cappella scene on campus. A cappella options now include not only Vox, all-male group G-Tones and mixed group Con Brio, but a newly formed vocal jazz group as well. Members of the groups are confident about the year and not concerned about competition for members.

The new vocal jazz group, founded by Elizabeth Greenberg '07 and Alisha Saville '09, includes both women and men.

"Since my freshman year here I've wanted to start this group," said Greenberg. "There is really no venue on campus for vocal jazz at all, and there aren't enough a cappella groups for everyone who wants to be in one."

Saville said that there is enough student interest to round out the new group. "I have quite a few friends in the other a cappella groups, and they've all expressed interest, or at least support, for starting this vocal jazz a cappella group," said Saville.

Adam Lorton '07 of Con Brio said that a cappella groups are not overly concerned about competition for members. "A lot of the crowd that turns out for Con Brio is also associated with Grinnell Singers, and so as far as I've seen, in the kids that auditioned for us, we didn't seem to have any crossovers," he said.

Membership in Con Brio and the G-Tones has been relatively stable this year. While both groups admit that important members graduated last spring, neither group feels they have lost any ground. "We don't like having to replace them, because they were really great singers and fun people," said Lorton, "but it's going to be nice to have some new faces in the group." And despite losing one of its founding members, Derrick Mitchell '06, the G-Tones auditioned 20 singers for three spots in the group this fall.

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