All A Capprofile: Brandeia Voicemale

In March of this year, WERS hosted an All A Cappella Live Competition, where many of the best Boston collegiate A Cappella groups competed. The Brandeis University Voicemale group was one of the competitors, and though they didn’t win the competition this year they recently had another chance to prove themselves.

At the CARAs this year, or the Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards, Brandeis University Voicemale was bestowed with the honor of winning two wonderful awards: The Best Scholastic Original Song of 2012 for their song “Phoenix” and the Best Male Collegiate Solo of 2012 for Adam Levine’s performance in the song “Phoenix”.

Previously, the Brandeis University Voicemale has been the winner of the All A Cappella Live Competition– in 2008 they walked away with the top prize (and the opportunity to open for Rockapella later that same year!). But since then the group has seen less praise– that is, until the release of their album Phoenix this past December. The album was nominated for four different Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards this year, and walked away the winner of two. The group chose eight different covers for the CD, as well as two original songs. The two original songs were written primarily by alumni of the group, but current members definitely did their part to help create the creative and wonderful songs that they turned out to be.

The Brandeis University Voicemale was created in 1994, and was made up of eight members at the time of the release of Phoenix. Each year the group does a tour, switching between the East and West Coasts. In an article released through The Justice, Brandeis University’s Independent Student Newspaper, says the name of the album, Phoenix, had to do the bird it is named for, and the story of the album relates to the story of that bird– a phoenix is “beautiful and then crushes into ashes and then is reborn from the ashes,” the album’s storyline is reminiscent of the life of a phoenix.

We often play the Voicemale on All A Cappella, but if you are dying to hear more of them, check out their CD! With a little luck, we’ll all get the chance to hear them again at next year’s All A Cappella Live Competition.

By Kali Rohrbaugh