What's New

April 2008

    Committed has been reviewed by the Recorded A Cappella Review Board where they said things like "the most creative and interesting a cappella album" and "lyrics are satisfyingly diverse" and "made me laugh out loud" and "quite an existential album" and "oddly pleasing". We're pleased to be odd! Read the reviews at the RARB site.
Jan-Feb 2008
    Yes, nominated again for two WAMMIES! One for "best a cappella group" and one for "best a cappella CD". Alas, always a bridesmaid... The WAMMIES were held Feb 17 and it was an honor to be nominated.
August, 2007
    CD RELEASED! Whew - it was a long road, but it's done and it sounds and looks great! Get a sneak preview on the on the Sound Files page.
June 13, 2007
    Recording for our next CD was completed today! A bit of mixing and mastering yet to do, but we're on schedule for a release in mid-July. We started work on this CD before we started on Mixed Messages (released in 2003) so this has been a long haul - but the songs sound great (if I may say so myself) and they're almost all original tunes. Look for it next month!
April 25, 2007
    The Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (better known as AIM) mission launched today. And while that's exciting to us, more exciting to most of you is that there's a new AstroCappella song about the mission and its goal of studying noctilucent clouds. Listen to the new song "Noctilucent Cloud" and read all about it, starting on our AIM page.
January 2007
    Check out our MySpace page. Join our friends list!

    Also, we've been nominated for a WAMMIE award again. This is the Washington Area Music Awards. If you're a WAMA member, please vote for us!

August 4, 2006
    Since my last post, we've recorded two more songs, "Passing Notes" and "Baby Steps". These are new songs that most of our audience has never heard. The sessions went well and there are photos. As an antidote to our 'techno-dark' series of songs, "Passing Notes" celebrates human ingenuity in the care and feeding of deep friendships. "Baby Steps" (our shortest song ever!) pushes the listener to not be afraid to take life in a new direction. The next few songs will probably be "Relax", "Suburban Dream" and "Bad Hair Day" - three more originals that have never been performed in public. And then we might be done!
June 16, 2006
    We're all just back from vacations, work trips, parental visits, etc and now we're spending some quality time in the studio! Yippee!! Last night we got a CD of our recordings (so far) for the new CD. On the new disc, we'll have "La La Land" (intense), "Lost It" (edgy), "Cowboy Chant" (funny!), "Reggae Time" (moving), "Science of Love" (Chromies go electronica!), and "Sunday Morning, Yellow Sky" (focused, and our only cover so far). The mixes are sounding great. Only 5 or 6 more songs to go! The album title is a secret; I can't wait to do the art!
March 20, 2006
    We finally won something!!! (Those of you who know us well realize how funny those words are!) The Chromatics won the Greenbelt Arts Center Musical Production of the Year Award. It's an honor!
December 31, 2005
    Whew! What a year. We finished it off singing at the top of a big hill, under the colorful and tall pillars of the Masonic Temple in Alexandria, Virginia. A big THANK YOU to all our fans who came out throughout the year and especially to our December GAC concerts. You make the rehearsing and lugging of equipment all worthwhile!

October 3-9, 2005
    The Chromies headed to Shreveport, Louisiana, for 7 performances at the Red River Revel, a teachers-in-training workshop, a concert and two educational workshops at the Sci-Port museum and a black-tie fundraiser. All told, that comes to 12 performances in 5 days. Whew! We had a great time (though we're a bit short on sleep right now). We ate and drank, met some fantasitc people and had fun performing at the Red River Revel. More details to come, after some rest! Some images are available.
August 1, 2005
    The Annapolis Capital newspaper ran a feature article about the Chromatics in their "Neighborhoods" section. The photos in the actual paper copy are fun! This reprint in acappellanews.com is the only way to still read it!
July 13, 2005 March 2005
    The Chromatics are heading into the studio to work on the next CD. We've got a couple songs already "in the can": La La Land; Sunday Morning, Yellow Sky; and Science of Love. In March, we'll be working on Lost It, Cowboy Chant, and Reggae Time.
January 2005
    The BBC site links to the AstroCappella's Swift Song from their news story about the Swift launch, and we're highlighted in Nature magazine's news blog regarding our poster at the American Astronomical Society meeting.

    We've been nominated for two more WAMMIES (Washington Area Music Awards). They're for A Cappella Group and A Cappella Recording (Mixed Messages). Stay tuned for the results (though we're up against Sweet Honey in the Rock in both categories)!

November 2004 September 29, 2004
    Starting in mid-October, the Swift Song will be part of the gallery content at the National Space Centre, in Leicester, UK. Visitors will be able to access the song and other content via museum-provided PDAs.
May 26, 2004
    The BBC's Radio 4 strikes again! Thanks to an attentive listener, we found out that portions of our song "Habitable Zone" were featured on the show Venus Across the Sun in the days leading up to the Transit of Venus on June 8. Take a listen to the archived show, to learn more about Venus. We're featured in Program 1 at about 4 minutes and 13 minutes into the show.
April 5, 2004
    We had a great time last night at the Mid-Atlantic Harmony Sweepstakes! We didn't win - the competition was very strong this year! We met and talked to a lot of the other groups, and we performed well, which is really all we can ask for! We'd like to thank all our fans who came out to see us and cheer us on. We really appreciate all of you, and are grateful for your encouragement and loyalty!!
February 17, 2004
    We're going to the Sweeps again! On April 4, we'll be competing with groups from all over the east coast (and Fargo ND) in the Mid-Atlantic Harmony Sweepstakes. Order your tickets now at the Birchmere web site!

    Our "Encounter at Farpoint! We had a great time singing and meeting all the folks at the Farpoint Con in Baltimore this past weekend. We really want to do it again!

December 4, 2003
    They're Here! At long last, and right in time for our holiday season, the Chromie Accessories have arrived! Chromie T-shirts, coffee mugs, and our limited edition CD, "Mixed Messages" are all available for your listening, drinking, and fashion enjoyment (not necessarily in that order!). Pick some up at our next concert in your area.

    Chromies Featured on mp3.washingtonpost.com Surf on over (or should that be snowboard on over?) to the Washington Post's Music hub on the Web: mp3.washingtonpost.com, and download our "impish a cappella" take on "One Horse Open Sleigh". According to the site, "the Chromatics just can't help it. Every song they do gets a humorous modern-day makeover. 'One Horse Open Sleigh' is no exception." Plenty of other DC-area music is there for your listening pleasure as well. And don't worry: RIAA won't send you a cease and desist letter... this time!

November 19, 2003 June 12, 2003
    The Material World, a program on BBC Radio 4 played part of High Energy Groove on a program about SIRTF, the Space Infrared Telescope Facility, to be launched this August by NASA. Program presenter Quentin Cooper stated on the air that he'd like to devote an entire show to us! Email him, and in your best British accent, tell him "yes!"
May 13, 2003
    The Swift Song wrongly triggered an RIAA cease-and-desist letter at Penn State University. This article and similar ones appeared in cnet.news.com, businessweek.com, slashdot.org and others. This press caused a run on AstroCappella 2.0 CDs and a boat-load of press for us. The irony was that the editor at cnet decided that crediting the artists in the MP3 file (us), was outside the scope of the article! But we thank Declan McCullagh for perservering and getting our names out there.
April 28, 2003
    On April 15, we were filmed for a 90-second TV News spot on UMTV (the University of Maryland TV station). The spot aired on Monday April 28. We hope to see a tape of it one day!
February 9, 2003
    Well, we didn't win a Wammie Award, but (and repeat after me) "it was an honor to be nominated!" We had a good time at the awards ceremony, although there are so many awards, they can only present about 1/3 of them and none of the three we were nominated for were actually "presented" with the reading of the nominees. Congrats to our buddies in DaVinci's Notebook for winning both a cappella categories!
January 14, 2003
    The Chromatics have been nominated for 3 Wammie awards (the Washington Area Music Association's annual award) in the categories
    • A Cappella Group
    • A Cappella Recording
    • Children's Music Recording
    We're sharing the ballot with notables such as Da Vinci's Notebook, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Reverb, and Tom Paxton. Needless to say, we're very happy. Wish us well - the awards ceremony is Sunday February 9 at the State Theater (Falls Church, VA) and tickets are available via the WAMA site.
December 30, 2002 September 3, 2002
    Anne Raugh, cofounder and former member of the Chromatics has had an asteroid named after her: Asteroid (12527) Anneraugh = 1998 JE3. What an honor - congrats Anne!

July 4, 2002

    This date marks Lisa Kelleher's last concert with the Chromatics. Lisa's leaving to have her second child, due in August. Lisa's been singing with us since way way back, holding down the alto part, doing her famous "little drummer girl" impression (the best female vocal percussionist we know), and acting as our accountant. She's been responsible for several AstroCappella songs, arranging and singing lead on "HST-Bop" and co-writing the music to "Habitable Zone." She also arranged and beautifully sang a few of our best-known modern covers. We'll all miss Lisa, her dry wit, her singing, percussion, and business skills.
May 2, 2002
    The Prince George's (MD) Gazette published a very nice article about us with some great pictures.
April 27, 2002
    Sad News: This date marks Paul Kolb's last gig with us. Paul is leaving the group because of a conflict between his job and rehearsals and gigs. He's got a night job! We will miss his voice and sense of humor.

    Happy News: This date also marks Barry Mahaffey's first gig with us. Meet Barry at an upcoming gig.

March 17, 2002
    The Carroll County Times (MD) published an article about the Chromatics. Read it online and find out who has a caustic wit, who would do just as well on "Jeopardy" as on "Star Search" and who thinks a cappella singing is mathematical!
March 1, 2002
    Read our interview with Dave Nuttycombe of the Washington City Paper's Pop Quiz! It's an irreverant look at the Chromatics: learn about Paul's pet rhinoceros, the crash-worthiness of Padi's house, and who wears color-coordinated underwear (and who doesn't wear any at all!).
February 28, 2002 February 27, 2002
    Sky & Telescope feature AstroCappella 2.0 in their "New Products Showcase" in the April 2002 issue. They describe AstroCappella 2.0 as "an astronomy class set to music."
February 5, 2002
    The Chromatics are in search of a tenor! If you are a tenor or know a tenor, please contact us at chromies@thechromatics.com.

    Here's the guy we're looking for:

    • a strong lead tenor
    • can blend in a small group
    • can read and/or sight-read music
    • enjoys being on stage
    • comes prepared for rehearsals and gigs
    • participates fully in the group, making it a priority in his life
    • can get along with a bunch of science/techie types

    Even better: the above, plus:

    • enjoys doing vocal percussion (sometimes!)
    • can write/arrange music
January 29, 2002 January 2, 2002 December 20, 2001 November 3, 2001 The State of the Chrome-Union October 10, 2001
    Whew! We're exhausted, but delighted. The Chromies are just ending a three week long stretch of gigs-a-plenty. September 29th brought us to the 2nd Annual DC A Cappella Festival on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. We shared the stage with other area a cappella groups, like Take Note! and Drastic Measures, and a tuneful time was had by all. Particularly memorable to us was the view from the steps of the Memorial. Nothing will compare to the experience of singing Paul Simon's American Tune out over the panorama of monuments, memorials and historical buildings filling our eyes. We thank the thoughtful and appreciative audience who ventured into town that day. And we loved hearing and getting to know the other groups in our neighborhood.

    Next, we brought our vocal mayhem to the New Deal Cafe in Old Greenbelt, MD for a benefit concert to save the cafe. Rocking tunes were flowing as freely as the speciality lattes, and as always at this venue, I think we had more fun even than the audience. It's a rush to sing in a packed house of friendly faces, in an acoustically live setting like the New Deal Cafe. May it continue onward for many years to come.

    Finally we rounded out our local road tripping with a visit to the Festival on the Ridge in Mt. Airy, MD last Saturday. The place certainly lived up to its name (brrr!). In between inhaling our hair, and wind that was often louder than the vocal percussion, we managed to put on a rocking show, with the help of sound maestro Kent Lopez from DC area sensation Primitive Mind.

    Gigs---so welcome after our long studio sessions this summer! We're finally finished with our new CD / CD-ROM AstroCappella 2.0. Sales are going well, we're psyched about all the content (songs and much more), and someday soon we'll even have a real CD Release Party to celebrate the achievement.

    But first, a short hiatus for breathing, and vacations. We'll be back November 3, 2001 at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, and then November 8 brings us to Teacher's Night at the Maryland Science Center where we'll engage educators in a tuneful tour of the universe. Check back here for details on our upcoming holiday season. We're putting the finishing touches on a schedule that will have us delivering Chromie holiday cheer to your area in December. If you can't wait that long, you can always order your copy of Unwrapped, our CARA- nominated CD from 2000. We'd love to take a spin in your CD player.

September 20, 2001
    The Chromatics released their 4th CD, AstroCappella 2.0. This latest CD is also a CD-ROM. Not only does it have 13 rocking a cappella originals about the universe, it's got activities, lesson plans, lyrics, a glossary, and background reading material for each of those 13 songs. It also has music videos, slide shows, and loads of cool pictures relating to each song. The music covers the Universe from our Sun, the Earth, and the entire solar system, to planets around other stars, the Doppler shift, nearby star systems, the Hubble Space Telescope, black holes and all the way out to the distant and powerful gamma-ray bursts. Learn about science the fun way!
April 12, 2001
    The Chromatics videotaped a Bowie (Maryland) Cable TV show, "Science, Science" to talk about our AstroCappella project. In addition to interviews, there's some live and taped music, and some beautiful images of the universe. The broadcast dates are Sat Jun 2 7:30, Tue Jun 5 8:30, Fri Jun 8 7:30, Sat Jun 9 7:30, Tue Jun 12 8:30, Fri Jun 15 7:30. The show is 50 minutes long.
February 2, 2001
    We are so excited to announce that Unwrapped has been nominated for two CARAs! Unwrapped is nominated for a 2001 Contemporary Acappella Recording Award in the "Christmas Album" category, and Silent Night is nominated in the "Christmas Song" category. We're extremely proud to have competition like Rockapella, GLAD, and the Gas House Gang. The winners will be announced in April.
December 29, 2000
    We got over 6 minutes of air time on the WUSA (Channel 9 in Washington DC) morning news hour promoting the Annapolis First Night celebration! We sang 6 songs spread over 7 slots (mostly just before commercial breaks) and sang "Let It Snow" under the weather segment (where they're forecasting 2-6 inches over the next 24 hours). DC Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (who was on the news program) said we "sound terrific!"
November 2000
    In late November we released our holiday CD, Unwrapped.
August 2000
    On August 1, we were videotaped singing four new astronomy songs. The four songs are part of our astronomically-correct project called AstroCappella. The songs are about the Solar System and and were filmed by the wonderful folks at Passport To Knowledge, who bring interactive science education into classrooms.
June 2000
    The New York Times published a "Word for Word" column about "Singing Scientists" featuring the Chromatics and two other acts from California and Switzerland. Quotes from "High Energy Groove" and "The Sun Song" are highlighted.
April 2000
    We recently got to hang with the unearthly beauty Jeri Ryan (the recovering Borg, Seven of Nine, on Star Trek Voyager) while we were all entertaining young girls at NASA Goddard's Take Our Daughters to Work Day. The obligatory "picture with the famous person" can be found on our Images page. Jeri was very nice and friendly, down-to-Earth, sat in the front row for our set, and said we rocked.
January 2000
    The Swift song (part of AstroCappella) was played during the end credits of a Soundprint broadcast, an award-winning weekly radio documentary series that airs on public stations across the country. The episode was titled "Gamma Ray Skies." There is a RealAudio file of the broadcast available for those who missed it.
December 1999 June 1999
    AstroCappella and the Chromatics recently received a writeup in the New Zealand Science Monthly Discovery section including a healthy quote from "Doppler Shifting".
April 1999
    "Live from the Sun", part of the award-winning PBS/NASA Select "Passport to Knowledge" series, featured two AstroCappella songs in its broadcast on April 13, 1999 at 1:00 PM EST. This segment featured live action at the SOHO operations center at GSFC, as well as pre-recorded segments. They filmed us in the studio "recording" the Sun Song and Doppler Shifting. The Sun Song, an original composition by Karen Smale, was used as a review of some basic solar physics. Alan Smale's original composition, Doppler Shifting, was also included to demonstrate how scientists use the Doppler Effect. With over 150 local PBS affiliates airing the previous segment of this series, the fruits of some of our outreach labors may be getting a national audience. Check your local listings for future airings of this program!
March 1999
    The Chromatics are mentioned in Physics Today, the publication of the American Institute of Physics. A small blurb about the AstroCappella Web site appears in their "Web Watch" column.
February 29, 1999
    The Chromatics take 2nd Runner Up in the Atlantic Regional Harmony Sweepstakes. More info.
February 6, 1999
    The Chromatics are featured in the Letters section of New Scientist magazine, a British science magazine similar to Scientific American. The letter was a response to a short article that appeared in January, publicizing our performance at the holiday party for the DC Science Writers Association.
1998
    The Chromatics were selected as semi-finalists in Disc Makers Independent Music World Series. Of the 800 acts entered, we were selected by "an independent group of A&R reps, radio programmers, music managers, and other industry heavies" as being in the top 7%. Alas, we did not win the big prize.