While other young men pick out flowers and candy for Valentine’s Day, the members of The Highland Harmonic will be gearing up for work. The barbershop quartet plans to raise funds with singing telegrams for Valentine’s Day.
The Highland Harmonic is a barbershop quartet of four LSU students. Brandon Blaylock sings as tenor, Brandon Loveday as bass, Lane Johnson as lead and Jimmy Kritikos as baritone.
The group formed about seven months ago when Blaylock, Johnson and Kritikos approached Loveday about filling the vacant spot in their quartet.
“I’ve been into barbershop for about seven or eight years, so when I came to LSU, I wanted a group that was pretty serious about it,” Kritikos said.
The group is preparing to compete in the MBNA American Collegiate Quartet Contest. It takes place April 11 through 14 in Columbus, Ohio. If they win, they will move to the final competition in Montreal, Canada.
The group estimates it will cost about $2000 to compete in Columbus and even more if they make it to the finals, Kritikos said.
To raise money for its trip to the competition, The Highland Harmonic is selling its services as a singing telegram for Valentine’s Day. The quartet will arrive at the recipient’s place of work or home dressed in tuxedoes, sing two songs and present them with a single rose and card. The price varies depending on travel time, but on average about $40, Kritikos said.
Many people associate barbershop quartets with the four singing men with matching striped vests and hats they see in movies. However, today groups generally wear tuxedoes when they compete, and there is a lot of training involved, Johnson said.
“There’s a lot of controversy about where barbershop got started,” Kritikos said. “They originally said it was brought over by the English, but now they are beginning to say that it might have been brought over by the slaves in some of their music,”
The Highland Harmonic recently performed on KLSU’s “Classical Show.” It also will perform a singing telegram early Friday morning on WVLA during “Morning Baton Rouge,” Kritikos said.
The Highland Harmonic could face stiff opposition from last year’s bronze medalist in the competition, The Nile Manski Trio. The trio is from Loyola and in the same division as The Highland Harmonic.
For more information, to hear some samples or to order a singing telegram from Highland Harmonic, check out their Web site at www.highlandharmonic.com.