Sweet Adelines International
| Sweet Adelines International | |
|---|---|
"Real Women, Real Harmony, Real Fun"
|
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| Background information | |
| Origin | Tulsa, Oklahoma |
| Genres |
A Cappella Barbershop music |
| Years active | 1945–present |
| Website | sweetadelineintl.org |
| Members | nearly 24,000 |
Sweet Adelines International is a worldwide organization of women singers, established in 1945, committed to advancing the musical art form of barbershop harmony through education and performances. This independent, nonprofit music education association is one of the world's largest singing organizations for women. "Harmonize the World" is the organization's motto. It has a current membership of 24,000 and holds a yearly international singing competition.
Sweet Adelines International was established in 1945 by Edna Mae Anderson of Tulsa, Oklahoma. The aim was to teach and train its members in music and to create and promote barbershop quartets and other musical groups. She gathered a group of women who wanted to participate in the "chord-ringing, fun-filled harmony" that their husbands, members of the men’s Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America (SPEBSQSA), were singing. SPEBSQSA has since changed its name to the Barbershop Harmony Society.
By year's end, the first chapter incorporated in Oklahoma with Anderson as its president. It had 85 members and a chapter name, Atomaton (for "an atom of an idea and a ton of energy") that recognized the Atomic Age.
Sweet Adelines went international on March 23, 1953 when the first chapter outside the U.S. was chartered in Brandon, Manitoba, Canada. Even though there were international chapters, it wasn’t until May 1991 that the name officially changed to Sweet Adelines International.
In 1957, Harmony, Incorporated split from Sweet Adelines over a dispute regarding admission of black members. SPEBSQSA and Sweet Adelines at that time restricted their membership to whites, but both opened membership to all races a few years later.
Today, Sweet Adelines International has a very diverse membership that spans the globe. The organization includes women from a wide range of backgrounds who love to sing.
In 2012 Sweet Adelines International claimed a membership of 24,000 women, all singing in English, includes choruses in most of the fifty United States as well as in Australia, Canada, England, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Scotland, Sweden, Wales and the Netherlands. Headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the organization encompasses more than 1,200 registered quartets and 600 choruses.
For organizational purposes, all choruses and quartets affiliate to SAI as members of a geographic "region", each region being approximately the same size in terms of total SAI members. The number and boundaries of the regions are adjusted periodically and as of 2015 there are 28 active regions numbered 1–35. (Region numbers 7, 18, 20, 24, 27–29, and 33 no longer exist, and were merged into neighboring regions.) Corresponding to its popularity and origin in the USA, the vast majority of regions are allocated to geographic areas of the USA. This is followed by five regions allocated to Canada, one each to Australia and New Zealand, one each to Great Britain and the Netherlands, and Finland and Sweden. A final "satellite" region is reserved for anywhere else in the world.
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