The Springstreeters hit the Town on Saturday, traveling all over campus and Spring Street to spread joy to both happy couples and unwitting friends with their Valentine’s Day singing telegrams campaign. For the price of five dollars per serenade, the group of 16 singers performed two minutes of a cappella for each telegram, often in public locations. 

If you were looking to grab a midday Spring Street Market sandwich on Saturday, you may have run into a large crowd listening to the harmonies of the Springstreeters serenading the kitchen staff. Karen Gosselin, the owner of Spring Street Market, commissioned the Springstreeters to perform for her husband and the workers. The singing telegram was met with applause from workers and customers alike.

Celebrating their 45th anniversary this past fall, the Springstreeters are an a capella group specializing in barbershop, pop, rock, and jazz music. The idea for this Valentine’s Day initiative originated from Thomas Huckans ’26, the co-president of the Springstreeters, who had learned about the tradition from his little brother’s a capella group at Bucknell University. “I thought it was a great way to do something fun and mark the occasion, regardless of [whether] you have a partner or not,” Huckans said. 

Springstreeters Co-President Jacob Casper ’26 emphasized that the telegrams were also rewarding for the singers themselves. “It is a great way for the group to spend time together with something that is not as stressful as a concert,” he said.  

Alongside Music Directors Logan Spaleta ’28 and Lucy Stenger ’28, Casper and Huckans brought the idea to the rest of the group. They then arranged their own songs, braved the logistics of creating a Calendly for slot booking, and plastered posters around campus to spread the word. 

The Springstreeters prepared two songs for their telegrams. The first, as Spaleta and Stenger explained, is a tag — or a short barbershop medley — called “Happy Valentine’s Day to You,” which they sang as the opener for every telegram. 

The sender of the telegram also had the option to pass along a message with the songs. For the second, longer song, senders were able to choose between a 90-second cut of “Can’t Help Falling in Love with You” by Elvis Presley and a jazzy Springstreeter classic called “All the Things You Are.”  Spaleta explained that the Springstreeters, while occasionally dabbling in modern pop, prefer to perform songs from the late 20th century. “Older music has more of a nostalgic feel to it, and I think that kind of feeling is phenomenal,” Spaleta said. 

The Springstreeters delivered 17 telegrams in total. They sent a recording of a performance for a long-distance partner and surprised an unsuspecting hockey player at the Lansing Chapman Rink. The Springstreeters even fulfilled a special request by singing “Never Going to Give You Up” by Rick Astley in a gibberish-sounding made-up language.

Quinn Synnott ’29, a member of a different a cappella group, The Octet, said he thoroughly enjoyed the surprise, applauding the Streeters’ mastery of the songs’ difficult techniques. “I’ve known of colleges doing this for years, so it was fun to finally get to experience it myself,” he said. “Bravo, Streeters!”

Casper saw the performances as furthering the group’s mission of bringing joy to the campus community through music. “A cappella has inherent silliness,” he said. “This is a way for us to make people’s Valentine’s Day a little funnier, a little brighter.”

The group plans to make the singing telegrams an annual tradition. Proceeds will help fund the Springstreeters’ spring break tours to colleges and retirement homes in the area, Casper said. Because the group receives little funding from the college for the trips, raising money is especially important, Huckans said, adding that the group aims to ensure no member is excluded for financial reasons. 

“Every a cappella group on this campus is fantastic,” Huckans said. “But we have found our niche in our silliness and our willingness to not take ourselves so seriously when we are making music… and this is really right up our alley.”

The Springstreeters mid-semester showcase is coming up on March 7th.

Editor’s note: Christopher Hughes ’28, a member of the  Record board and a recipient of a song telegram, was not involved in the writing or editing of this article.