Buffalo Bills - If You Were the Only Girl in the World (feat. Perry Como) 

I think Como was not only having fun, he was thrilled at being in the epicenter of the Bill amazing tone and control.

LlewelynReswald watching it right now which brought me here.

LlewelynReswald Hahaha yeah

Would love to hear your take on the Suntones and the Boston Common!! My favorites

@@snirkyd both have equally solid harmonic basses that blend so well with the others. The middle voices also fit so well together. The one thing I do notice is that sometimes the tenor on top tends to get pitchy in his upper range, and it causes a few chords to not lock in fully, but I love both groups as a whole

I have synesthesia, too! Do you "see" certain pieces of music in color? My kids have it too, but our colors are all different. The key of D is yellow because the letter D is yellow to me, B flat is blue, etc. How about you?

@@rangerette58 D major is yellow for me but D minor is almost always pink for some reason

​@@demonative9945 see I think D is this really warm broad color like a cherry red. Bb is such a blue for me as well very cool color. Db is purply. And I feel like that's the most consistent color that gets assigned to Db very purple tone

This was sweet! I did The Music Man when I was a kid in the sixties and the harmonizing stuck with me over the years. Then who popped up a year or two later but the Beach Boys. In junior high, we would sing bass in the boys' room cause the ceilings were 12 feet high and the massive antique urinals resonated. We were learning physics and didn't know it.

Yes, marvelous is the word!

As a young child they came to our local high school for a preforming. And from that point I was hooked to not only barbershop but harmony in general! A lost art to some point!

Spot on.

And they always made it look so effortless. If you've even been in a quartet, you know it requires a great deal of practice, skill and talent.

Tom Jones : It helps greatly to have both perfect pitch ( which I do ), AND a thorough grasp of the style of harmony that gave rise to the tradition (which I pretty much also do). The ideal must always be heard in the heart and mind before it is sung! Perry was the bravest crooner to try this stunt.

I cannot disagree, Mike. It's a bit sad that the recording capabilities back then were nothing compared to today. Up there, close, I would place the Suntones, Dealer's Choice, and Acoustix. Just my favorites. Plus, a tip of the cap to the Western Continentals and wonderful Teddy Bradshaw!

@@scottski51 The Mark IV and the late Mike Senter's Golden Staters also took it to the next level. Fair to say that the "absolute, utter perfection" distinction also extends to all of those fine groups!

But more importantly, years of dedication and determination behind the scenes.

I hope you're feeling better.

Tom Barrister buffal bills

I think it probably refers to the fact that Perry Como started out as an actual barber; see his Wikipedia article, where there's plenty about barbering (and singing while doing it) but nothing about barbershop-style singing

He wasn't a barbershop singer, just an actual barber. He was a crooner though, and then did TV stuff.

Tom Barrister, can you help me? Scotty Ward, second from right, looks like an entirely different man than the baritone who appeared with the Bills in the 1962 film version of "The Music Man." Or am I just easily confused by the black mustache he wore in the film? I checked imdb, and it lists Scotty Ward in the film's cast list, but I've always thought the baritone in the film looks very different from every other picture I've ever seen of Ward, (all w/o the mustache).

@@MayorMcCheeseStalker It would have to be Scotty Ward or Dick Grapes. They were the only two baritones the Bills had in the 1950's. Grapes is said to have left the group in 1957, when the Bills moved to NYC. Grapes had lighter-colored hair.

I think it's the motivation in these times. So much emphasis on being "cool" and over the years, Barbershop became a not-so-cool art form.

Exactly.

That's why, in barbershop, they call this kind of tune....a "tear jerker":-)

Perfectly said. The Bills were the most powerful sounding quartet ever. There is no other that came even close, but could you imagine having Al Shea and Vern Reed in one ear and Scotty Ward and Bill Spangenberg in the other?! It's not fathomable. I bet his ears rang after that one for a couple minutes. Again, it's what's missing in today's barbershop circles. The training won't allow this type of raw natural singing.

ToyotaGuy1971 remark was because Perry was a barber before before he got famous!

I think you missed the Beach boys, of the '60s, and the boy bands of the 90's, otherwise...you're right. It's more about hype than it is about talent, and is only getting worse, with an occasional gifted artist once in a blue moon. I grew up with my father, and grandfather singing barbershop, so I am lucky enough to appreciate this, but at the same time cursed, because I didn't appreciate when the music took a turn, in my opinion in the '90s, with a lot of the rap crap, and so on. But at least I can come on here, and even see and hear my father sing with his quartet. He passed away in June this year.

That's a lovely Db from Bill Spangenberg.

@@WBensburg Very impressive! I keep coming back to this.

i found it!!

ale laera where did you find it? Can you drop a link?

could you please please please share it? :)

@@quieego ops sorry i did not see the comment

@@reinhardvonhoengramm7842 Ima look for it today

These 4 were all in the Music Man. A couple of them just look clean shaven here, particularly Wayne Ward & Bill Spangenberg on the right of Perry. Bill only lived until one year after Music Man, sadly, having to leave the group after the film due to being ill.

Try tapping on the middle of it, or on the bottom right hand corner, and it should expand it.

At first I thought the same thing, about blowing the pitch pipe, but then thought, if they hadn't kicked the song back up to where it needed to be, The bass wouldn't have been able to hit that d flat, So knowing that they were all friends, and great singers, I'd like to think, it was more about resetting the song where it needed to be, and Perry, Being a singer, and realizing that acapella to that degree isn't easy, was probably fine with it, and understood why. Just my two cents.

No! They changed the key.

In my opinion, the showoff-iness is what makes these old quartets.

I mean they're clearly having fun with it, it's part of the whole gag. Perry getting shown up and laughing about it.

I sang in a barbershop quartet at Miami University that won the fraternity quartet contest. Saw the Dallas Vocal Majority win in Vegas 6 years ago. Nothing better than barbershop harmony.

The Bills kicking it up a notch and "showing off" is exactly why Perry Como booked them on his show.

Well since you've sung that much you might want to think about the bass trying to hit that d flat, if he hadn't have blown the pitch pipe, and reset the song to where it needed to be. (Otherwise that d flat would have been a C, or a B, and the bass was at his limit with the d flat already! I'm just going by what someone else said as far as it being a d flat, but I know I have all I can do to hit an e on a good day, so I can appreciate this!) It wasn't to show Perry in the wrong. It was just to reset the song, and Perry being the singer he was, appreciated how hard this level of acapella is, so I don't think he had a problem with it. He even joked about it, pretending to blow the pitch pipe a little towards the end of the song.