This Friday will be the first time we have Linda Barnes playing in the shop. She has already done a great job at some of the open mic nights around town. She learned to play the harmonica at eleven years old, then learned guitar at age twelve, and now plays a range of instruments as well as singing and writing her own songs. She played for several years in a group called “The Good News Singers”, and she also plays at fund raisers, and weddings. As well as her original material she performs covers from musicians such as Crosby Stills Nash & Young, and The Judds.
In the second half of the evening we have another visit from a group that is always popular – Stuart McMartin and his harmonizing friends from the Northern Stars Chorus. These guys (or at least some combination of them – they guarantee a minimum of four!!) have sung in the shop several times before, and the response to their clever harmonies and stage presence was very positive, so we are delighted that Stuart is bringing them in again! They are based in Nepean, but come from all around the region, and present a great mix of happy, sad, comedic, and musically interesting songs that explore the barbershop genre.
You may have noticed there are more than four of them, so they are not technically a barbershop quartet, although for many of their songs they ascribe to the four-part harmony rules of SPEBSQSA. (SPEBSQSA used to be the name of the barbershop society founded in 1938, but suddenly in 2004 they realised that it is tricky to pronounce with your mouth full of cappuccino, so they changed the name to The Barbershop Harmony Society.) Did you know that Handel’s father was a barber? This could explain George Frederick’s gift for 4-part harmonies in famous works like ‘Messiah’, but I doubt that the Northern Stars Chorus will be attacking that repertoire!
The Northern Stars Chorus have a webpage at: http://www.harmonize.com/northernstars/
Linda Barnes, & Northern Stars Chorus play on Friday, June 17 at 7:00pm at Gaia Java on Stittsville Main Street.
-Paul Jay