The Cayuga Chimes: "The Official Voices of Ithaca"

A performance in various harmonies

“Hello! Hell-O! HELLO!” That’s what you’d hear on a Tuesday night in Boynton Middle School at the Cayuga Chimes’ weekly rehearsal. Dubbed “The Official Voices of Ithaca,” the Chimes is a multi-generational a capella-style barbershop chorus.

Barbershop is a style of music where the songs are performed in various harmonies. Typically, the highest notes in the harmony are sung by either male tenors or female soprano, who can also take the lead part. In male groups, the leads are the singers of the melodies. Both male and female baritones usually sing the middle harmony. The lowest harmony, however, is sung by male basses and female mezzo-altos.

The Chimes was formed in 1977 by some women who wanted to sing barbershop harmony, a singing style typically dominated by male voices. While the average barbershop group is a quartet, comprised of four men, the Chimes is made up of about 30 women with a passion for singing and community service.

“We do a lot for the community,” said Daisy Sweet, president of the Cayuga Chimes and member since 1980. The Chimes sing at many local events, such as festivals, parades, and weddings, but they also do a lot of sing-outs at places like hospitals, nursing homes, and other senior citizen facilities.

When the Chimes are not singing for charity, they are preparing for their annual show. This past February 13 marked their 2004 show, the Sweetheart Invitational, a free two-and-a-half hour concert held in Ithaca’s State Theatre.

The next day, the Chimes held four innovative workshops for singers and attendees. Costume Design and Woodshedding were the two strictly-singer workshops, while Yoga, which taught participants some yoga and breathing techniques, and Humor, which taught participants comedic delivery and how to incorporate humor into singing and presentations, were open to singers as well as the public.

Flag Day Celebrations 2002

This year’s Sweetheart Invitational also marked the first of what will be an annual barbershop competition, partially funded by the Tompkins County Tourism Development Grant. The competition, which was hosted by the Cayuga Chimes, judged by a local record store owner and a singer from the area named Peggy Haines, featured three barbershop groups. Competing were The Ithachords and Alakazam, both hailing from Ithaca, and Sounds of Celebration of nearby Vestal, a suburb of Binghamton. While all three groups did their best, the Ithachords “won by a landslide,” admitted Sweet.

According to Don Lebow, the Ithachords’ music director, winning was “a good feeling. We had worked really hard.” Lebow found it especially rewarding to win the competition because of the group’s small size. There are only 12 Ithachords, and as Lebow said, “Each voice is important in a group and the fewer voices there are, the more impact each one has.”

The Cayuga Chimes are always looking for new members. Experience is not necessary and there is no audition process. As it says on the Chimes web site,“if you are a woman who loves to sing and enjoys good company and community, we would love to have you join us.”

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