Origins and Founding

The "barbershop" style of music is first associated with black southern quartets of the 1870s, such as The American Four and The Hamtown Students. The African influence is particularly notable in the improvisational nature of the harmonization, and the flexing of melody to produce harmonies in "swipes" and "snakes." Quartets "cracking a chord" were commonplace at places like Joe Sarpy's Cut Rate Shaving Parlor in St. Louis, or in Jacksonville, Florida, where, historian James Weldon Johnson writes, "every barbershop seemed to have its own quartet." The first written use of the word "barbershop," when referring to harmonizing, came in 1910 with the publication of the song, "Play That Barbershop Chord,”  evidence that the term was in common parlance by that time.

Although many people think barbershop music is strictly stuck in time with old, familiar melodies like “Sweet Adeline,” through the years the music developed into many musical genres.  These genres ranged from Tin Pan Alley and Vaudeville in the 1890’s to gospel and spiritual hymns, love songs of the 1940’s and 1950’s to rock music of the 1960’s and 1970’s, and of course, jazz.  Many men who originated this unique musical style went on to become pioneers of jazz. Today, most contemporary music can be arranged and sung in the close harmony style of barbershop.