Our Campus Celebrity this week is The Sweet Carrollines’s President Rachel Distler!
What made you want to join The Sweet Carrollines?
I joined The Sweet Carrollines at the end of my first semester of my sophomore year. I was actually planning on joining my freshman year, but I missed auditions by a week. I have always loved to sing. When I was little, I did theater camp and all that kind of stuff, but I stopped singing when I entered high school. I was always self-conscious and didn’t feel like I measured up to the “theater people” there. I figured that coming to John Carroll was a way for me to do all of the stuff that I was scared to do in high school, so I auditioned! I was terrified, but it was totally worth it. I needed a musical outlet for myself that was more than singing to my shower head. A cappella music, to me, is the most beautiful and impressive thing. Filling a room with just voices takes a lot of practice and skill, which I have grown to appreciate.
As a leader, what has been the biggest challenge this semester/year?
This was my first semester as president of The Sweet Carrollines and before that I was the Public Relations officer. Because of that, I had a little experience being in a leadership role, but being president is a whole new set of responsibilities. This semester was particularly difficult for the Sweets because we lost a LOT of girls at the beginning of the semester going from 13 to 9 girls. Although all our girls are very talented – with so little membership – it is hard to have practice when even 1 or 2 people are missing (everyone is crucial). However, all of our girls really stepped up in arranging songs and taking on responsibility. I am very proud.
How do you go about arranging songs?
This semester was a little different for The Sweet Carrollines. In the past, we had a music director who would arrange most, if not all of the songs for the group. This semester, we decided that the music director role was too time consuming for one single person, so we divided out set up so almost each girl would arrange a different song. During practice we will bounce new ideas off of each other until we think the arrangement is perfect! Arranging music takes a special talent, one which I do not have. I am very proud of each girl who arranged a song this semester. With only 9 girls, we arranged 6 new songs for the semester, which is impressive. Learning new songs takes a lot of time and focus.
Any advice to any girl who wants to get involved with The Sweet Carrollines?
Contact me!! We are planning on having auditions at the beginning of the Fall semester, so stay on the lookout for those. The Sweets are an amazing group of girls who genuinely care about one another. We have practices twice a week for about an hour, so anyone needs to be ready to dedicate that amount of time, but it really is not demanding. If you’re looking to audition, show us your personality. Choose a song that not only shows your vocal skills (range, strength, pitch), but also who you are. The most important part of any a cappella group is blending voices and matching pitch. I would recommend trying to harmonize with your favorite songs and seeing how well you hold up against the melody!
Any future songs you want to learn for your group?
Tough question… We’re actually in the process of picking some songs for next semester so we can arrange them over the summer! Next semester, I am hoping to have more of a variety of music including some oldies, country, show tunes, etc. I can’t speak for everyone, but I would love to see us do something older, like a doo wop or vintage song. I love the barbershop feel. If anyone has suggestions, they can email me or send them into our Facebook page!