Site Navigator

About The Singing Shed

Where does barbershop come from?

All About Barbershop The style in its modern form began in the USA. It is believed the precursor came from Europe and cross fertlsed with black music of the US South. Why Barbershop The Barbershop was the pool hall and video Gaming centre of its day. Men would hang out there and some experimented with free close harmony, nowadays called Woodshedding.

In Australia

The first organised barbershop started up in the middle 1980's. There had been barbershop quartest performing in Tasmania in the early 1960's. At least one of those quartets was registered with SPEBSQSA, the rather long winded name for the movement in the US. The show The Music Man of the early 1960's started up many a quartet. Dream World on Australia's Gold Coast featured a quartet in much the same way as Disney Wold.

The greater Hobart Area

The Eltones in Launceston and the Devon Barbershop Quartet were early adopters of the style. In the late 1980's Close Shave quartet, well known around Hobart helped the Wellingtones Chorus get started in the early 1990's. The Wellingtones joined the Australian organisationin about 1993 and has since spun off many quartets and the present Club with its two choruses and a varying number of quartets.