August 2003                                                        InCider Press                                                            Page 5

Have you ever seen a Barbershopper wearing a little lapel pin that has a smiling cat's head on top of a short barberpole?  Have you wondered what that little pin meant and why that Barbershopper was so proud of wearing it?  I can't help you with the first question, but here is the answer to the second one:

In 1971, International SPEBSQSA President Ralph Ribble launched a new Society activity known as the "Barberpole Cat Program":

    * To encourage quartet activity at chapter meetings;

    * To provide Barbershoppers with a common repertoire of songs they can sing with any three other Society members at inter-chapter activities, conventions, other barber-  shopping events, and even in airports and waiting rooms;

    * To enable Barbershoppers to gain confidence in performing in a quartet in an informal, supportive atmosphere; and

  * To teach Barbershoppers a repertoire of easy arrangements that a beginning quartet can perform.
The Barberpole Cat song list was slightly different when our Chapter was chartered, but the current list

The Barberpole Cat Program
By Myron Calhoun, Assistant Music Director and Barberpole Cat Recorder

of 12 songs, selected by a vote of Society members in 1987, includes:

      Bb  Shine on Me

      Bb  Down Our Way

      Ab  You Tell Me Your Dream

      Bb  Honey-Little 'Lize Medley

      Bb  Sweet, Sweet Roses of Morn

      Bb  Let Me Call You Sweetheart

      Bb  My Wild Irish Rose (short version)

      Ab  Down by the Old Mill Stream

      Ab  Heart of My Heart

      Bb  You're the Flower of my Heart, Sweet Adeline

      Ab  Wait 'Til the Sun Shines, Nellie

        F   Sweet and Lovely"

Becoming a Barberpole Cat is simple:

  * Learn the 12 songs -- in any order and in your normal voice part.  You should probably start with copies of the printed arrangements:  all twelve are in THE BARBERPOLE CAT PROGRAM AND SONG BOOK, or you can find the first eight in JUST PLAIN BARBERSHOP, the next two and a half ("Nellie" is missing the verse) in STRICTLY BARBERSHOP, and "Sweet and Lovely" is available in sheet-music form.  If you want to practice while driving, four cassette learning tapes are available through the Barbershopper's Emporium catalog; each tape features one voice part, with that part predominant on one side of the tape and subdued on the other side.

(Continued on page 6)

Bob Ridley, Wayne Bailie, Myron Carpenter and Myron Calhoun singing "Down by the Old Mill Stream" to help Wayne earn his Barberpole Cat pin

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