Texas A&M Singing Cadets

The Texas A&M Singing Cadets are a male choral group at Texas A&M University. Nicknamed "The Voice of Aggieland", the Singing Cadets have been touring for 109 seasons, with their roots in a glee club founded on the A&M campus in 1893. The Singing Cadets are one of the oldest collegiate singing organizations in the world. They have toured both in America and abroad and have earned recognition by doing so, including invitations to sing for American presidents. Contrary to their name, the Singing Cadets are not all members of the Corps of Cadets and have not been since 1965, when the university as a whole ceased mandating Corps membership. Between 1996 and 2006, the Singing Cadets traveled over 35,000 miles and performed more than 450 concerts worldwide.

The first record of a singing organization at Texas A&M (then known as the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas) was in 1893. The nine member glee club was composed of both students and faculty. The group grew to around twenty members through the turn of the century. Their first recorded field trip in 1905, was to Houston, Texas, where they participated in a four hundred member chorus. Other tours in this period included a trip to Fort Worth in 1907, where they met noted violinist Fritz Kreisler. One year later, the director of the group, Professor T.P. Junkin, left the A&M Glee Club.

The next paradigm shift came in 1910 when it was reorganized by F.D. Steger, and subsequently performed for a number of audiences throughout Texas. After several restructuring efforts and directors, the organization laid down an official constitution during the 1937-1938 school year. The Cadets entered the national spotlight when they performed at the 1939 Sugar Bowl game. After A&M professor J. J. Woolket became director in 1940, the chorus was renamed the "Singing Cadets" following a naming contest. The Singing Cadets first full-time director, Richard Jenkins, raised the organization's profile though a series of tours throughout the American South. Under his aegis in 1942, the group provided choral music for the propaganda film We've Never Been Licked.

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