Our Reboot Story
Pushing a Rock!
Ever try to push a rock? COVID hit our chorus hard! Getting things started again was like pushing a rock. Our chorus of 25 singers had stopped meeting, our director moved on to new horizons, the terms of our board of directors had all expired, many of our singers moved into new chapters of life, and our rehearsal location had closed its doors during the pandemic.
Other than that, things were going great! Then a few curious singers wondered, “When might the Wine Valley Harmonizers start singing again?”
With some able assistance from Craig Hughes (former president of the Far Western District and longtime friend of WVH) those curious singers set a course to form a new board, find a new director, and secure a new rehearsal space in order to once again return barbershop harmony to the Temecula Valley.
One September evening in 2021, in five different locations all connected by Zoom, four hungry harmony singers formed a new board of directors for the Wine Valley Harmonizers; and as their first order of business they accepted Mr. Sam Irvin as the new director of music for the chorus. What started with 8 singers in October has grown to 15 singers in July. We are back rehearsing at Atria Senior Living (Thank You, Atria) at the foot of wine country and we have a new tradition of having our afterglow rehearsals at Old Town Barbers barbershop on Winchester - so once a month, at least - we get to sing barbershop in a barbershop! Thank you Casper and Old Town Barbers!
Who sings with us?
We are now a mixed chorus - all genders, welcome! As we rebooted, we considered the Everybody in Harmony option supported by the Barbershop Harmony Society, and have opened our membership to all genders. We have kept our barbershop traditions of chapter meetings for rehearsals, tag singing, quartet singing, performing in our community and singing 4-part acapella harmony. We have visited with other mixed choruses to learn how best to support our singers to succeed and enjoy barbershop harmony as we make this transition. We currently sing TTBB arrangements and work with each new singer to find the best part-match for their voice as we adjust and enhance our new - yet traditional - barbershop, acapella sound.
What do we sing?
We are committed to preserving our barbershop acapella harmony legacy. We mostly sing songs arranged in the barbershop style. We open our chapter meeting rehearsals with polecats and we close with Keep the Whole World Singing, the official closing song of the Barbershop Harmony Society. And in between we build our performance-ready repertoire, grounded in barbershop tunes, with forays into chorale music, Celtic songs, sea shanties, a song or two by D. Flattigan and Stephen Sondheim, and songs that keep you tapping your toe and humming the melody. Our current performance song set can be found on our Members Resources page. Come sing with us!