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PrintTulsa Founders Chorus sings in perfect harmony
Tulsa Founders Chorus keeps a traditional music form alive.
It was late October, but the holiday season had already arrived at John Knox Presbyterian Church.
Upon entering the church’s gym at 7 p.m. on a Tuesday, the perfectly harmonized voices of 15 men rang through the halls. Preparing for their Dec. 5 holiday concert, they sang “It’s Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas,” “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” and “We Three Kings,” among other classic tunes. They represented an array of voice types, but they melded beautifully, accompanied by no more than an initial tone from an electronic tuner.
Tulsa Founders Chorus has flown quietly under the radar since 1938, when a group of 26 Tulsans, led by local attorney Owen C. Cash and banker Rupert Hall, gathered at the roof garden of the Tulsa Club to sing some four-part harmony and preserve an American art form.
“It was just a lark, but it grew by leaps and bounds in ‘38, ’39 and ’40 and spread across the country, almost like wildfire,” says Bob McCullough, a current member of the Founders Chorus whose father joined the group in 1939.
The group’s initial name was the SPEBSQSA (Society of the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America Inc.), a riff on federal government programs of the time, but the name was later shortened to the Barbershop Harmony Society. Now, the society is the largest all-male singing organization in the world, with more than 33,000 members in 800 chapters in North America alone. Tulsa Founders Chorus was the first chapter.
Although Nashville is now the national headquarters of the Barbershop Harmony Society, the female component, Sweet Adelines International, is headquartered in Tulsa.
With ages ranging from 14 to 80, and professions ranging from physicians, accountants and engineers to county investigators, computer techs and contractors, Tulsa Founders Chorus is a diverse group. They have made a name for themselves through their annual holiday and spring concerts, as well as their singing Valentine performances in February. Several of the group’s spinoff quartets have also earned national and international honors.
Jan Skinner, president of Tulsa Founders Chorus, began singing barbershop 35 years ago. While making a pharmaceutical sales call to a doctor in Wichita, Kan., the doctor said he would only see Skinner if he joined his singing group. So Skinner visited Wichita Air Capital Chorus and joined three weeks later. He also became a member of the Sounds of Aloha chorus in Hawaii before moving to Tulsa to sing with the Founders Chorus.
“It’s a lifestyle for all of us,” Skinner says. “That and a passion to come together.”
Tulsa Founders Chorus and the Tulsa Tones and Final Note quartets will perform at 7 p.m., Dec. 5, at John Knox Presbyterian Church, 2929 E. 31st St. Tickets are $10. For more information, call 622-5392 or visit www.tulsafounders.org.
