Cornell University Glee Club

The Cornell University Glee Club (CUGC) is the oldest student organization at Cornell University, having been organized shortly after the first students arrived on campus in 1868. The CUGC is a sixty-member chorus for male voices, with repertoire including classical, folk, 20th-century music, and traditional Cornell songs. The Glee Club also performs major works with the Cornell University Chorus such as Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, Handel's Messiah, and Bach's Mass in B Minor.

Achievements

The Hangovers (Cornell University)

The Hangovers are a men's collegiate a cappella ensemble based at Cornell University. Founded in 1968, they are the official a cappella subset of the Cornell University Glee Club, the oldest student organization at Cornell University. The Hangovers' repertoire consists mainly of popular songs arranged for the ensemble by its members and alumni, but the group also performs traditional Cornell songs, as well as selections from the Glee Club repertoire on occasion.

The Hangovers have competed in international competitions such as the International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella, advancing to the semifinals in 2001. The Hangovers can be heard on the PBS American Experience documentary "Rescue at Sea." The Hangovers have performed for Helmut Schmidt, the widow of Anwar Sadat, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, Gerald Ford, Henry Kissinger, Cornell alumna Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, and other notables.

History

The group's name is taken from the name that was given to fifth-year students in Cornell's five-year architecture and engineering programs of the '60s. After their fourth (senior) year, students in these programs had to hang over an additional year to complete their degrees. Several of the group's original members were "hangovers" in this sense at the time of the group's formation, hence the name. The double entendre of the more widely accepted meaning of the word is intentional, and is a theme carried on in the titles of the ensemble's concerts and albums.

The Hangovers (band)

The Hangovers were a band formed by The Raincoats member, Gina Birch, along with former members of Voodoo Queens, Stereolab and Laika.

History

As well as Birch the band also featured actor/composer Simon Fisher Turner (guitar, keyboards), Ida Akesson (keyboards, sampling), Phil Legg (keyboards), Laika member John Frenett (bass), Mary Deigan (bass), and former Th' Faith Healers and Stereolab member Joe Dilworth (drums).

The band's debut single, "Soho", was one of the first releases on the re-established Rough Trade Records in 1997.

Their debut album, Slow Dirty Tears, was released on Smoke Records and in the United States early in 1998 on the Kill Rock Stars label. It received a four star rating from Allmusic. A departure from Birch's previous work with The Raincoats, Charles Taylor of the Providence Phoenix described the album as containing "samples, keyboard twiddling, weird noises throughout, and a dark, echoey feel", and Peter Margasak of the Chicago Reader noted Birch's "relentlessly bleak" lyrics. Tom Lanham of CMJ New Music Monthly described the album as "some of the most mold-breaking alterna-pop around". Andy Gill of The Independent called the album "utterly beguiling", commenting on Birch's "cartoonish inflection that paradoxically carries more humanity than most singers' desperate attempts at evoking 'soul'".