Aca-Beginnings

by katiekelleher9506

Acapella was brought to Purdue by the Acabellas. The group was started by three Purdue students, Brittany, Mariko and Jihan. Brittany was the brains behind this operation. She was the one that came up with the idea and recruited Mariko and Jihan to help her create this aca-awsome group of all female singers. When Brittany came to Purdue’s campus she felt like she could not fit into any other group that was already established so figured it would just be better for her to make her own.

Brittany then chose Mariko to help and become the teacher of the group. Mariko is the person that creates all of the arrangement for the group and mashes up different songs for the best piece for the Acabellas. Once her master piece is created she then teaches the rest of the group the proper way to sing it. She will make us sing it 300 hundred times over until we get it right. But it is worth it because when we all sing together we sound like angels. (Take my word for it I promise.)

Then Brittany chose Jihan to be the treasure and in charge of the Acabella’s social media. It always important to make sure you have someone that is in charge of the money that way you know how much each person has to give to get cute matching t shirts. Besides what’s a group with out their matching attire. Jihan also makes sure that we actually have people know about our group through the Acabella’s Facebook page. That way we could get people other than our parents to come to performances and enjoy our music.

There was 15 original members of the Acabellas. Most were freshman with 4 sophomores and 1 junior all still trying to figure out this whole college thing while trying to make new friends that like to sing just like the girl next to her. It really was a match made in heaven for all of us. Instead of trying to sing in our dorm rooms after our roommates left we finally had a place we could go and sing with others that wanted to sing as well. We did a lot of silly ice breaker games in the beginning just so we were comfortable enough to sing in front of each other. Turns out the better you know the person you are singing with the better you blend and sound together. Which is a good thing because we all had just met and our first performance was coming up fast.

The first performance we had was a “flash mob” in Ford dining hall. It did not go as well as we had hoped for. Fun fact, if you are going to preform someplace make sure you have microphones or that it is quiet enough for people to hear you sing. It was hard to hear in the dinning hall but we made it work. The people in the 20 tables in front of us clapped so, I count it as a win for our first performance. After that we made sure we always had mics at every performance. Every performance we get better and every season we get new Acapella singers to join to make our family a little bit bigger.

Original members of the Acabellas

Acapella meets Acabellas

by katiekelleher9506

Hey everybody! Through out my blog I’m going to be writing about the acapella group, the Acabellas, that are on the campus of Purdue University. The Acabellas is an all girls group with singers of all voice ranges and beat boxers. Everything that is sung is with just their voices. They have absolutely no instruments that accompany them. Which is aca-amazing!

I was one of the original members of the Acabellas and have watched it grow from 12 girls into to group that it is today. Full of strong women that love music and want to show the world what they can do.

If you like acapella music you’re going to want to stick with me on this journey. You might just find a new group that you love.

Always remember, just keep singing!