[78-L] Ross Barbour (Four Freshmen) obit.

[Royal Pemberton]

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-ross-barbour-20110823,0,5018800.story?track=rss

Ross Barbour, the last surviving original member of the Four Freshmen, the
influential close-harmony vocal quartet that came to fame in the 1950s with
hits such as "Graduation Day," has died. He was 82.

Barbour, who had lung cancer, died Saturday at his home in Simi
Valley*,*said Dina Roth, the current group's personal manager.

Barbour's death came three months after that of another founding member, his
cousin Bob Flanigan, the original lead
singer.<http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-bob-flanigan-20110517%2C0%2C3749424.story>The
two other founding members were Barbour's brother Don and Hal
Kratzsch.

The Barbour brothers and Kratzsch were students at Butler University's
Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music in Indianapolis when they teamed with
fellow student Marvin Pruitt to form a barbershop quartet called Hal's
Harmonizers.

When Pruitt dropped out because of stage fright, he was replaced by
Flanigan. By then, the quartet had taken on a more jazz-oriented flavor and
a new name, the Toppers.

A self-contained vocal-instrumental group — they all played instruments,
with baritone Ross Barbour on drums — they were renamed by an agent. As the
Four Freshmen did, they played their first date in a club in Fort* *Wayne,
Ind., in September 1948.

"Ross always used to say they were trying to get the sound of five voices
with only four, and since they were so inspired by the Stan Kenton Orchestra
and especially the trombone section, they were trying to sound like the
instruments," Vince Johnson, who joined the Four Freshmen in 1999, told The
Times on Monday.

"When the first tenor went up, the three other voices would stay either in
the middle or lower register and sing full volume, which would create that
open harmony," Johnson said. "It was very characteristic of the Four
Freshman sound."

The group's big break came after Kenton heard them sing in the Esquire
Lounge in Dayton, Ohio, in 1950 and arranged to have Capitol
Records<http://www.latimes.com/topic/economy-business-finance/media-industry/music-industry/capitol-records-ORCRP000017369.topic>record
them.

After two flop singles, the Four Freshmen scored a hit in 1952 with "It's a
Blue World." <http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv=iggWvFgp3KE>

Other hits followed, including "Mood Indigo," "Day by Day," "It Happened
Once Before" and "How Can I Tell Her?"

Their 1956 hit "Graduation
Day"<http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv=OOVOllNHSis>was later covered by
the Beach
Boys<http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/music/the-beach-boys-PECLB0004929.topic>,
whose Brian Wilson has referred to the Four Freshmen as his "harmonic
education."

Indeed, the Four Freshmen's innovative four-part harmonies influenced not
only the Beach Boys but the Lettermen, the Four Preps, the Manhattan
Transfer and many other vocal groups.

Between 1953 and 1958, the Four Freshmen won the DownBeat magazine Readers
Poll as best vocal group of the year five times. They also received their
first Grammy nomination in 1958, in the jazz-group category.

"We earned people's respect by being honest in our music," Barbour said in a
2001 interview with the Sunday Telegram of Worcester, Mass.

The Four Freshmen underwent many personnel changes over the years, with
Barbour retiring from the group in 1977.

In addition to Johnson, the current members are Brian Eichenberger, Bob
Ferreira and Curtis Calderon.

As Barbour said in the 2001 interview, "I think within the first four or
five years, we had the dream to keep this alive and not let the group die
when we did."

Barbour, who was born* *Dec. 31, 1928, in Burnsville, Ind., chronicled his
career in* *the 1995* *book "Now You Know: The Story of the Four Freshmen."

Barbour is survived by his wife, Nancy Sue; three children, Kent, Gary and
Kathy Feese; and four grandchildren.