Serendipity Quartet

Taking advantage of the carousel during our lunchbreak from coaching with Lori Lyford and Jana Gutenson today! We got to ride twice!!!

For those wondering what exactly we've been up to these past months, the three of us were at the Sweet Adelines International Harmony Classic competition, in Phoenix, AZ with our amazing chorus!

We are so proud to be able to sing with our Alamo Metro Chorus sisters under the direction of the incomparable Ryan Heller and we are OVER the moon to have brought home not only the silver medal in mid sized chorus, but the coveted Audience Choice Award for most entertaining chorus overall (in the world!)!

Now that we're back to real life for a bit, we are seriously in search of a Tenor... who's game!?

https://youtu.be/FcVWzA__R5w

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Alamo Metro Chorus, 2022 Harmony Classic Division AA Coming off their popular IES performance in July, Alamo Metro Chorus started off Harmony Classic Division AA with a dynamic (and funny!) tribute to the piano...

Happiest of birthdays to our amazing tenor, now lead, Juli Brinkley!!

Help us wish our amazing Baritone, Lisa Pitcher, a very Happy Birthday! 🎁🎂🎉 💜 Lisa Eversden Pitcher

🔈 Calling all you Tenors out there! 🔈

Serendipity is looking for a Tenor to round out our Quartet.

Reach out to Lisa Deiser, Lisa Pitcher or Juli Brinkley if you or someone you know might be interested in seeing how we blend.

Let’s ring some chords 🎶💜

Us with the Lone Star Cowgirls at the Wimberley Rodeo ❤️🇺🇸💙

Y’all , we were invited to sing the National Anthem to open the rodeo festivities on Saturday night at 8.

If you’re looking for some good, old fashioned, down home fun tomorrow night, head out to the Wimberley Rodeo Arena for the 76th Annual 4th of July Rodeo.

Hope to see y’all there! Yee haw! 💜 JB

🔈 Calling all you Tenors out there! 🔈

Serendipity is looking for a Tenor to round out our Quartet. Juli has decided to take on the Lead role leaving a vacancy in the Tenor role.

Reach out to Lisa Deiser, Lisa Pitcher or Juli Brinkley if you or someone you know might be interested in seeing how we blend.

Let’s ring some chords 🎶💜

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Help us out… follow the instructions on the meme (as long as you select Tenor or Bass 😜). 💜 JB

Welcome to DAY 1 of the Multi-Region Social Media Challenge. Follow the instruction in this image to help Region 10 earn points for the challenge! Please complete the task ON THIS POST. Actions taken on shares or copies do not count toward Region 10's participation or award!

Today’s challenge runs for 24 hours. After that time no more points will be counted and a new challenge will start. Thank you!

We - Lisa D., Lisa P., and Juli D. - would like to wish our amazingly talented friend and lead, Daphne V., the very best as she departs from quartetting with us in Serendipity. We know that big things are just around the corner and cannot wait to see what the future holds. 💜

Stay tuned for more about Serendipity and what’s in store for us! 💜

We are blessed beyond measure (pun intended) to have such a nurturing, caring, supportive and talented director who also serves as coach to us.

Though we did not place in the top
5, we walk away from our first contest with so much more knowledge from this experience.

Congratulations to all the competing quartets for persevering through the “dark times” to fine tune this incredible art form.

A special congratulations to Vitality SAI Quartet from Alamo Metro Chorus for earning third place in the quartet competition. 💜💈💜

(Pic of Ryan giving us some final coaching on the day of competition.)

Ugh! You’d think she was a lead or something 🙄

Starts at 3! You can watch not only all the competitors, but the individual interviews, too!

We sing just after 6pm.

Choruses are tomorrow! Our Alamo Metro Chorus will sing tomorrow at around 1:15 pm.

Region 10Contest Webcast! - https://mailchi.mp/region10sai/r10-webcast22-6049033

Region 10Contest Webcast!

Below is the webcast for todays contest if you care to watch!! It starts at 3 central time, but we don’t come on until after 6!

It’s contest day!!! 💜

The bookends half of Serendipit…. On the road to our first Quartet Regional Competition AND, due to the pandemic, the first Chorus Competition since 2019!!! 💜

The entire completion will be live-streamed beginning Thursday.

Region 10Contest Webcast! - https://mailchi.mp/region10sai/r10-webcast22-6049033

Leading up to regional competition THIS WEEK (and since we've added a lot of new followers), we want to reintroduce you to our Quartet Bass!

📣 Introducing Serendipity’s Bass 📣

Lisa Deiser, our bass singer has been a member of Sweet Adelines since 1982 when she joined her Mom’s chorus, the Mission Belles three weeks before their Regional competition! But barbershop has been in her life since birth. Her parents met through barbershop singing and it has always been a part of her world. As a child, she and her four siblings frequently fell asleep listening to either her Mom’s or Dad’s quartet rehearsals! Her Mother is a two time International top 10 Quartet finalist with “The Gem Dandies”, and her Dad was the baritone of the 1969 International Quartet Champions “The Mark IV”. Pretty good music to dream by and great role models to boot!

Lisa is a charter member of the Alamo Metro Chorus. She has served as choreographer, bass section leader, front row dancer and Image Manager among many other duties over the years. She has sung in numerous quartets, many with her Mother on baritone, including the 2008 Region 10 Champions “Prelude”.

In “real life”, Lisa is a Claims Processor for CRFS, LLC Inc. In her spare time, this “barbershop brat” enjoys working jigsaw puzzles, trivia, crafts and playing games with her family. Although she has no children of her own, she loves spending time with her nieces and nephews (7 total) and great nieces and nephews (7 also!). They are the little loves of her life! 💜

Leading up to regional competition THIS WEEK (and since we've added a lot of new followers), we want to reintroduce you to our Quartet Baritone!

📣 Introducing Serendipity’s Baritone 📣

Lisa Pitcher, our baritone, didn’t really start her singing career until her late 20’s. She sang in church choirs, but that was about it.

Back in 1994, while living in Tampa with her husband, she had heard about the local barbershop (Sweet Adelines) chorus, Toast of Tampa, who had just won International; she HAD to check them out. She watched her Dad compete with The Pride of Polk chorus, directed by Tony DeRosa, and was already in love with barbershop music. After the first visit she was hooked and KNEW she had to sing that crazy baritone part!

Lisa spent 4 years with the Toast of Tampa before moving to Dallas and joining the Rich-Tones Chorus for a short stint. The next stop on Lisa’s journey was Austin where she took a hiatus from Sweet Adelines and started performing with The River City Pops show chorus. It was there where she discovered her love of choreography.

Lisa moved to Wimberley in 2005 and decided to try something totally new and different; she got involved in performing, choreographing, and directing musicals in the local community theaters! She enjoyed that for about 13 years until her youngest son graduated from high school in 2018. It was then that she realized she really missed her first love, Sweet Adelines.

After some research, Lisa decided to check out Alamo Metro Chorus. Immediately, all of those warm, fuzzy feelings she had after her first visit with Toast of Tampa came flooding back and she joined right away! She doesn’t even mind the hour plus drive to rehearsal! As soon as she could, she got on the front row and offered up her choreographing skills. Lisa later became co-choreographer with Lisa D. (our bass) and they had so much fun working together that they decided to start a quartet! The rest is history!!

As for her personal life, she is a retired nurse of 27 years, and now owns a flag store in Wimberley, Texas along with her husband of 28 years. Lisa also has two grown kids: Danielle (25) who works as a Civil Engineer outside of Seattle WA, and Jarod (21) who is a Nursing Student and in the Army ROTC in Corpus Christi. They have always been so supportive throughout her singing “career” and she knows she would never have been able to do all that she has done without them by her side!

We are ecstatic to have Lisa P as our Bari. She expertly adds that rich tone that makes barbershop, barbershop! 💜

Leading up to regional competition THIS WEEK (and since we've added a lot of new followers), we want to reintroduce you to our Quartet Lead!

📣 Introducing Serendipity’s Lead 📣

“Serendipity” marks Daphne Vasquez’s very first quartetting experience, debuting as our Lead. Daphne has been a Sweet Adeline since 2018. She is an Alamo Metro Chorus (AMC) Lead, the Lead Section Leader for AMC and part of the Diversity, Education, and Inclusion (DEI) committee. Daphne has a Master’s in Education and has been a private piano instructor since 2007. Her most recent hurdle was conquering how to teach piano in a virtual environment due to COVID… but as with all things, she conquered it!

When not engaged in music activities, Daphne enjoys cooking and sharing meals with friends and family. Our outgoing and vivacious Lead also enjoys dancing, hiking, going to jazz clubs and hanging out with family and friends. You might run into Daphne at one of her happy places like Dollar Tree, Michael’s, 5Below, Hobby Lobby, or any number of food markets. Daphne has been married for 29 years to Andy, is a wonderful mom to both her son, Matthew who just turned 21, as well as Cody, the family’s adorable senior fur-pup. She is the happiest when creating. Everything from creating a meal to share, a game for piano lessons or creating a musical composition or presentation… these are the things that make Daphne the happiest.

In her own words, she describes herself as “a total goofball” and she “absolutely loves to laugh!” “Serendipity” cannot wait for you to hear her sing… she sings from her heart. 💜

Watch as Daphne dazzles you with her piano performance! https://youtu.be/Z4uk2a82aiQ📣

Sending a huge thank you to Radiance Quartet (Bebe Caldwell, Bonnie Garcia, Janet McNeil Moe, and Ethel Melton Lowther) for hosting the traditional Quartet Champagne Toast as we head off next week to Great Gulf Coast Region 10 Sweet Adelines regional competition in Houston!

Also, a heartfelt thank you to all the quartets for their special gifts. And, last but not least, an extra special shout-out to Mary Ann Wydra for her delectable Strawberries Romanoff.

💜💎 Break legs and shine like the diamonds you are, ladies! 💎💜

📣 Meet Serendipity’s Tenor, Juli Brinkley Dearrington 📣

Juli, Serendipity's Tenor, began her musical career at the ripe old age of 2. Her elder siblings often held their “garage band” practices in the family formal living/dining room. I guess you could say Juli was rockin’ to The Beatles, The Beach Boys and The Monkees since she was, literally, being rocked on the other side of the room. Juli likes to credit her finely tuned ear for harmony to the fact that, as the youngest in a performing family, she had to find a part that wasn’t being sung, which was typically the 5th, 7th or some other obscure part. Juli got her performance roots from singing in Church with the family. Her tastes in music vary from Gospel and Country Western, to 1940’s Big Band and Classic Rock. As a stage performer, other favorites include Broadway and Show Tunes. Juli says that she’s been blessed to have a 26-year performing partnership with her mentor in their widely popular area trio “Destination… An Andrews Sisters Review.” Back in 2000 they joined their “Andrew’s Sisters” act with the big band, “The Sentimental Journey Orchestra,” as “The Memphis Belles.”

Juli became aware of barbershop and Sweet Adelines back in the mid 80’s when she considered joining a chorus in the Arlington area. Unfortunately, the timing wasn’t right since she was the mother of a one-year-old, which prevented that from happening. But, fate intervened, and it was serendipity when Alamo Metro Chorus friends Bev Evans and Lisa Pitcher, both encouraged her to join AMC during the Spring of Covid-era 2021. Juli voice-placed via vocal recordings as a Bass (yes, you read that right… Juli is bi-sectional!) and subsequently passed her audition via audio recordings… she was one of the first to have been sung-in using those Zoom-era methods. It wasn’t long after joining that Juli was asked to be a part of a quartet and thus began Serendipity. She figured, “why not… how hard can it be?” Little did she know that barbershop would give her the biggest vocal challenge she’d ever faced.

Juli often says that she has learned more in the past year about singing, breathing, vocalization and performance than in all her previous 50-some-odd years of singing. She credits her amazing director, Ryan Heller, her section leader and quartet Bass, Lisa Deiser, and quartet members Lisa Eversden Pitcher and Daphne Vasquez for this thrilling, nail-biting, joyous ride that she’s been on and looks forward to what’s to come. To quote Juli, “There’s just nothing like the union of voices ringing over- and undertones that give you the ‘goosies’ knowing you’ve created something special.”

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Hey y’all! If you’re interested in following along with us as well as our Alamo Metro Chorus during Regional competition next month, you can do so from the comfort of your own home! The information below will guide you on how to access live streaming for the whole competition. 💜 JBD

Back by popular demand! Region 10 will have an official webcast again this year for $25, which includes the Quartet Contest, Chorus Contest, Web-host Commentary, Competitor Interviews, Show of Champions, and delayed viewing for 2 weeks following our convention. Access the webcast at www.region10webcast.com!

Can you feel the excitement growing?!? We sure can! We had an incredible coaching session with the magnificent Ryan Heller today in preparation for Regional competition coming up in just 3 weeks! 💜 JBD

It’s Lisa Deiser week! Our amazing Bass deserves not only a single day to be celebrated, but celebrating all week long! We love you, lady, and are wishing you the best Birthday Week ever! 💜🎂🎁🎉💜

Love our AMC family! From us to you, Happy Valentine’s Day! 💖

From our hearts to yours…have a wonderful day filled with love and singing! 💜💜💜
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