Spreadin’ the barbershop bug

We had the coolest day today!!! We spent the morning hosting an educational singing workshop for sixth graders in the Northern Virginia region. The “Saturday School for the Arts” program, organized by George Mason University’s Potomac Arts Academy, was organized for students from Hunter Woods Elementary School, a magnet school for the arts and science in Reston, Va.

Epic was brought on board as a special treat for the sixth graders, the students who have been in the multi-year program the longest. We kicked off the day with a couple of song for the entire group (fourth through sixth graders) and then quickly retreated to our classroom to start our lesson with our sixth graders. We taught them about the history of barbershop music, the structure of the type of music we sing and we sang a few more tunes (the favorite, by far, was “One More Minute”… somehow this crazy tune resonates with sixth graders. Shocking, we know!).

These young singers were sooooooooo talented. We moved into our favorite part of the day–tag singing!! (check back soon… we recorded a couple of these and we’ll post them here ASAP). So many of them are HOOKED! A few young men even asked where and when Richard’s chorus rehearses so they can join them. The teachers and organizers shared with us that they were stunned at the students’ reactions–especially a few of the ones on the more shy side who stood up in front of the class to sing tags in put-together quartets.

We could not be more proud of our young tenors, leads, baritones and basses. We offered them an open invitation to join us at our March 18th benefit concert for free, and we’re hoping they’ll bring their families to see them in action once again. If we get a handful there, we’ll pull them up for a quick tag on stage!!!

We have to extend a great big thanks to Libby and the folks at the Potomac Arts Academy for inviting Epic to participate in this program. It was the most rewarding experience we’ve had in the life of our quartet… we were just as excited as the kids to spend the day with them!