Starving Artists' annual A Cappella Fest was held last Sunday night in Olin-Sang to benefit Project Zawadie. Starving Artists were joined by Rather Be Giraffes, Your Mom, Proscenium, Voices of Soul, Manginah, Company B and Up the Octave.Project Zawadie raises money for orphans and other vulnerable children in Tanzania and provides financial assistance for them to get school uniforms, school supplies and textbooks.
"There were several great submissions as far as charities go, but this one struck a personal connection with the group because one of our members knows the founder," Starving Artists' Business Manager Ashley Firestone '05 said.

Rather Be Giraffes opened the night with "Goodbye," a song originally
recorded by Save Ferris, featuring Lisa Lokshin '06. The song was pretty tight with a very nice percussive part laying a strong rhythmic foundation for the rest of the song. Lokshin was quite impressive vocally and set a nice tone for the whole night. In addition to the strong vocal percussion was a noticeable bass line, something that is often lacking in many other groups' songs. The strength in the root of the chord allowed for stronger harmonies and a better overall performance of the song .

Rather Be Giraffes followed up "Goodbye" with "Cornflake Girl," originally performed by Tori Amos, featuring Hayden Rockson '04. Despite a good performance, the song did not work completely, mainly because Amos' original version has a lot of instrumental elements that do not translate well into an a cappella arrangement. Also, Rockson seemed uncomfortable in the lower contralto range, though the higher notes sounded a lot better.

Rather Be Giraffes concluded with Meredith Brooks' "Bitch," featuring Adena Kemper '06. The song started off harmonically awkward, overpowering the lead vocalist, but not for long. The only other problem was Kemper's volume. The song would have been much better if there were more noticeable dynamic changes at the chorus.
Your Mom, Brandeis' newest a cappella group, followed and gave an interesting performance. Lead vocalist Sarah Orzalli '04 essentially put the group on her back and carried them to a successful showing. The group started off with a harmonically challenged plug for their next show that segued into their first song, which was very simplistic arrangement of "Like a Movie" by Midtown.

The group used very basic arranging styles on all of their songs, which is undoubtedly a product of being such a young group.
Your Mom founder Corey Frucht '04 joked that "we only practice one hour a week and most of that is spent on choreography." Sadly, it was an all-too-accurate representation of the group. And while a lot of their problems come from still being green, a lot of it also has to do with a noticeable priority of having fun over intonation.

Proscenium, Brandeis' musical theater a cappella group, followed Your Mom and opened with "A Whole New World" from Aladdin, featuring Sam Levor '07 and Samantha Sagui '06. The group was noticeably down a few members and that lead to an overall lack of vocal presence on their part, but, to their credit, they carried on anyway.

Emily Evans '04 then performed "Someone Like You" from Jekyll and Hyde. The song was sung quite well with some excellent phrasing on Evans' part. However, the song would have been better if she built on the last chorus and held out the final notes. While it is true that Proscenium need a group balance, it is still musical theater and they should not be afraid to uncork and let loose on a song.

Proscenium closed with "Out Tonight" from Rent and featuring Mia Winton '07. Winton seemed very comfortable in the the range of the piece and was able to really get into it. Additionally, the song had some very nice vocal percussion, which really added a strong sense of rhythm to it.

Voices of Soul closed the first act, opening their portion with En Vogue's "Never Gonna Get It," featuring Jamena Scott '04. The song was a clinic in stage presence and performing with just the right amount of attitude. Synchronized turning and some insightful use of the derriaere gave the song just the right amount of edge.

They concluded with Outkast's "Hey Ya," also featuring Scott. The song was a huge hit with the crowd and one again laden with energy. The only problem came from their use of hand motions, mimicking Andre 3000's motions in the music video. Because they were in a semicircle it looked a little odd at times, but other than that, it was an excellent presentation.
Manginah kicked off the second act, with their song "Brighter Day," featuring Marc Mendelsohn '06. The song was very poignant considering the global climate right now and was performed very beautifully by Mendelsohn and the rest of the group.

They followed "Brighter Days" up with "Darkeinu" featuring Meira Soloff '07. "Darkeinu" was another down tempo piece that was really in staunch contrast to Voices of Soul and everything else had been performed thus far. Soloff's phrasing was exquisite.

Manginah closed with "Boker" featuring Maya Cohen '04, which was a much more upbeat piece than previously performed, but not so much so that it was in dramatic contrast with the other songs. Manginah put together a very impressive set list for the performance that made them standout from the rest of the groups.

Company B took the stage next and opened with Stevie Wonder's "Signed, Sealed, Delivered" featuring Zack Mabel '04, which was very vindicating for an audience that had been waiting for a vocalist to really belt out a song. Mabel nicely introduced everyone there to the concept of a double forte.

They followed that up with a unique piece, Ella Fitzgerald's "Smooth Sailing," which featured each member of the group doing a skat solo. While all the solos were impressive, Ed Greenberg's '05 bass solo was a song highlight.
The group closed with The Doobie Brothers' "Free Ride," though this time they broke away from the traditional tutee to give Mark Lipman '04 a vocal guitar solo in the middle, which gave the piece a little improvisational flair.

Up the Octave followed, and opened with Aretha Franklin's "Natural Woman," featuring Jessica Friemen '07. The song was nice, catchy and poppy, everything that it should have been. The group also had a good blend between the soloist and the other performers.
They followed that up with Otis Redding's "Sitting on the Dock of the Bay," featuring Courtney Whyte '04 The arrangement was done a little differently than Redding had originally performed it, the song was a lot faster and Whyte had a very pop music quality to her voice and often slipped into verbrato, which isn't bad, just contrary to most people's view of the song.

Starving Artists finished up the evening, opening their portion of the show with The Police's "Message in a Bottle." The song's user-proof arrangement by Josh Geyer '05 was even more powerful in Firestone's capable hands; proving once again that you can have all the vocal talent you want in a group, but if nobody can arrange a song, you won't go far.
Their follow up song was Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain," also arranged by Guyer and featuring Nick Barasch '06, Jennie El-Far '07 and Jessica Peres '04. The song, though it had some blend problems in the beginning with a few stand out voices, was an excellent demonstration of purposeful movement. While it is fun to break it down like Voices of Soul, if the choreography does not give depth to the song than it is just wasted energy.

The Artists' closed with Maroon 5's "Harder to Breathe" and nicely incorporated Coolio's "Gansta's Paradise," which gave the song a much darker mood. In this case it is acceptable to play with the intentions of the originator because it is building off of an aspect already present in the song, and El-Far did it very well.

The show on the whole was a great musical success, each group did its part to combine to one excellent evening, and it says a lot about our university that we can have eight good a cappella groups excluding those who didn't perform.