The a capella group Extreme Measures performs at the Student Union Theatre.

In the winter of 1998, Amity Wahl ’99 (BUS), Bonnie Panda ’01 (CLAS) and Liz Conklin ’00 (CLAS) found one another as creative people so often do, attracted to the “vibe” of kindred spirits.

They enjoyed singing as members of the UConn Chorus but also were drawn to the sound of a cappella vocal groups — tight harmony and voices approximating the sounds of musical instruments.

The Chordials

With no a cappella groups on campus at the time, the three young women decided to start one. They blanketed the campus with bright yellow flyers inviting students to audition.

A handful of vocalists showed up to sing in a small classroom in Arjona Hall on a cold winter night, enough to form a group, and they named themselves The Chordials.

The group began “scrounging music from many different sources,” recalls Wahl, and in the spring of 1999, The Chordials did their first “official” concert.

Nothing could have prepared them for what happened at auditions the following September, when so many people showed up that they had to schedule a second night of tryouts.

Since most of the hopefuls were women, they decided to make The Chordials an all-female ensemble.

Before the year was over two other a cappella groups had formed. The women of Rubyfruit distinguished themselves from The Chordials with a repertoire that included songs with a feminist theme.

And A Completely Different Note — known by the acronym CDN — would become the University’s first male group.

Today the three groups that were the vanguard at UConn are still in existence and stronger than ever. And they have been joined by the Conn-Men; A Minor—the University’s first co-ed group, Extreme Measures, often called Ex-M; and Shir Modulation, the newest.

A Minor

“Music is a passion for all of us,” says Laura Weismantel ’09 (ENG), a mechanical engineering major in A Minor, whose members include no music majors.

“It’s something we simply love, and the a cappella groups provide us with an opportunity to express that.”

Steven Bourque ’09 (SFA), a music education major in the Conn-Men and vice president of the A Cappella Association, agrees.

“We get a lot of positive feedback from the audiences,” he says.

“People are impressed that singers can make music like this with only their voices. Besides that, I’ve made some great friendships. A cappella has been a really positive college experience for me.”

While many academic majors are represented in vocal groups, the work of organizing, rehearsing and performing offers music majors opportunities to arrange music, lead an ensemble and hone their teaching and directing skills.

Ehren Brown ’03 (SFA), ’03 (ED), ’06 M.M., a co-founder of CDN, says a cappella “really was the most pivotal experience in my college career.”

Arranging and directing the group helped him to land his first job, as assistant conductor of the Vernon (Conn.) Chorale.

Today he conducts that group, serves as assistant conductor of the Hartford Chorale and sings with two professional choirs.

But the groups, as well as the UConn A Cappella Association, also require business managers and other leaders, and those roles provide valuable experience for non-music majors.

“Most collegiate a cappella is completely student driven,” says Collin MacDonald, a graduate student who is planning a career in secondary education and who sings in and serves as business manager of CDN.

“Commitment is big. You absolutely have to show up for rehearsals and the gigs. It’s not a hobby.”

A Completely Different Note

That work ethic, says Brown, is central to a code of responsibility all the groups adopted early. And, he adds, it has helped them to remain vital.

Though participation is fun, it is made clear to new members that it is also hard work. Yet former members inevitably say that discipline pays off in their post-university careers.

The a cappella form of vocal singing has a collegiate tradition stretching back nearly a century, to the founding of Yale’s Whiffenpoofs in 1909. But it has probably never been more popular on college campuses than it is today.

According to the Web site College-Acappella, there are more than 2,000 a cappella groups at some 400 colleges and universities nationwide.

Collegiate a cappella is “a growing trend of increasing strength,” says Jonathan Minkoff president of the Contemporary A Cappella Society (CASA), a nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion and encouragement of contemporary a cappella music.

He attributes that popularity to the flexibility of the a cappella format and to the Internet. The popular YouTube Web site offers dozens of clips of a cappella groups performances, primarily college students.

“The popularity of these groups speaks to the power of music in people’s lives,” says Robert Miller, UConn professor of music in the School of Fine Arts and advisor to both the UConn A Cappella Association and one of the University’s groups, The Conn-Men.

“We hope music instruction in schools encourages lifelong interest in music, and the students who participate in the a cappella groups certainly exemplify that. For these students, music and singing become enduring parts of their personal identity.”

Though some colleges and universities have many more groups, Minkoff calls UConn a “top tier a cappella hotbed.” Scarcely a week goes by when one of the University’s groups isn’t performing somewhere on or near campus.

UConn’s vocal groups also undertake public service projects and regularly perform for many local events in the communities surrounding the UConn campus.

At the request of the Department of Music in the School of Fine Arts, they enliven trustee dinners, donor presentations and other University functions.

The Conn-Men

In return, the department provides them with rehearsal space.

A cappella is so venerable that its umbrella covers a host of musical idioms — madrigals to Gregorian chanting, doo-wop to barbershop.

Most contemporary collegiate groups mix it up, performing music reflecting a few generations of shifting tastes.

And since they often spice their performances with humor and choreography, the audience reception usually ranges from warm to frenetic.

When five groups performed a joint concert in the first-floor lounge of the Student Union one Saturday night last November, they attracted an enthusiastic crowd of students and parents that soon outstripped seating capacity, even on a night with the remnants of Hurricane Noel blowing through the state as the Huskies football team played Rutgers at Rentschler Field.

The songs performed that night included hip-hop and contemporary hits like Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” as well as tunes students’ parents might have enjoyed during their collegiate years, such as Crosby, Stills & Nash’s “Helplessly Hoping,” Bill Withers’s “Ain’t No Sunshine,” and Fleetwood Mac’s “Go Your Own Way.”

That egalitarian blend is a by-product of the democratic way most groups’ members listen to and adopt new music each year.

And they will tell you that it is one of their greatest strengths as performing artists because they usually have something in their bag of tricks to appeal to everyone.

The vocalists’ involvement with music often continues beyond UConn. As an alumna, Amity Wahl joined several Rubyfruit alumnae — Kate (Edgerly) Diaz ’01 (CANR), Beth (Gambin) D’Amato ’97 (ED) and Andrea Barnes ’00 (CLAS) in Harmonious Soul, a Connecticut women’s group who performed for the Indigo Girls, Noel Paul Stookey (of Peter, Paul and Mary) and, in 2006, as entertainment at an a cappella competition judged by the godfathers of contemporary a cappella, Rockapella, at UConn.

Wahl has since moved on to work with Singing Bridge, an indie rock band, and Panda, one of the original Chordials, has launched a solo career, recently making it to the regional finals of the Nashville Star Competition.

To mark 10 years of a cappella at UConn, Wahl and many former members returned to UConn in March 2008 for an anniversary concert.

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