Pougheepsie group offers four-part harmony for your valentine

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Scott Salladin of Poughkeepsie organizes barbershop quartets to surprise your valentine with a song.KEITH FERRIS/For the Times Herald-Record

Published: 2:00 AM - 02/13/12

POUGHKEEPSIE — Scott Salladin and his fellow choristers sing in the rain, in the snow, on porches and in living rooms. They'll even sing, if someone asks them, in a barbershop.

Salladin is chapter secretary of the Poughkeepsie Newyorkers Barbershop Chorus, practitioners of a four-part singing style with roots in the early 1900s.

Anyone who's ever attended a high school production of "The Music Man" has witnessed a barbershop quartet in a capella action. It's old-fashioned. It's corny.

And it's romantic, especially as Valentine's Day nears. For a modest fee, Salladin and friends serenade couples all over the mid-Hudson region.

"We'll come right to your door, whether you open it or not," he said. "Sometimes they let you in; sometimes you stay on the porch."

Salladin has scads of stories documenting rigors and risks of appearing unannounced on a stranger's doorstep, wearing a tux and singing "Sweet Adeline."

Once, when the group was grabbing a bite at a McDonald's, an elderly gent asked for a tune. The group agreed: How about "Heart of My Heart"?

The man's wife, Salladin discovered, was a stroke victim, unable to speak. But when they finished singing, he saw the hint of a smile on the woman's face, and a tear ran down her cheek.

The man asked what he should pay for the song. There was only one thing to say: "No charge."

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Pougheepsie group offers four-part harmony for your valentine