Hiring Info: Contact Ed McDevitt, Phone 708-366-2611
email: kensingtonroad@edmcdevitt.com
Kensington Road has been the actual name of a quartet for almost 4 years. Its current group of singers has been together for two. The quartet has established a substantial following in the community and sings many engagements for community organizations (Chicago Botanic Garden and Downtown Oak Park are two examples), birthdays, holidays, church services and special occasions. The good news: we get asked to come back.
The original version of Kensington Road made its debut in the Illinois District Fall Contest 2000 after being together for just over 6 weeks. The quartet won the Novice Quartet Award in the contest! It is not relevant that there was only one other Novice Quartet in the contest.
Since then Kensington Road has developed a tight, mellow sound, an entertaining repertoire and an eagerness to get out there and SING! for you.
Members:
Joe Saintcross, Lead:. Joe joined The West Towns Chorus and SPEBSQSA in mid-1999 and sang in his first chorus contest soon thereafter. Joe had sung in Broadway-style shows and church choirs before becoming a Barbershopper. He has an encyclopedic knowledge of opera and show tunes. So whenever the quartet comes up with a Barbershop arrangement of almost any song, Joe already knows it and picks up the lead part immediately. Joe's warm and lyrical lead makes for a very sweet sound. Joe is the only non-tech guy in the quartet. He worked for Jewel Stores for many years and now works at Trader Joe’s (no relation).
Bob Nicodem, Tenor: Bob is a Barbershop veteran, having started out with The West Towns Chorus in 1984 (as a Lead). The result is that he has won three International Silver Medals with West Towns, and won the Gold with them in 1987.He works for Corey Steel Company as an Information Services Manager. He also devotes considerable time to the first, second and third graders in a Catholic school near his work, singing and reading to them every week. Kensington Road is Bob's first serious attempt at singing in a quartet. He trusts the quartet enough to have had us sing for the school at which he volunteers and three times at his church’s Sunday services.
John Oberlin, Baritone: John is relatively new to barbershop but not to singing. He has sung in church choirs, coffee house bands, and in his car. He used to be a guitar-playing, harmonizing, longhaired freak. He sings Baritone, because harmonizing is what he likes to do. "All those hours and hours of singing along with the car radio while driving down the street are finally starting to pay off!" A graduate of Purdue, John also works as Human Resources Mgr for Molex Inc., and is blessed with a wife who encourages him to go out and sing with the guys. Not only that, we rehearse at John’s house and his wife, Georgeann, has become the fifth member of our quartet because (1) she says she loves to listen to us sing and (2) she cooks fabulous desserts for the end of each rehearsal.
Ed McDevitt, Bass: Ed, who didn't know any better, suggested forming a quartet very soon after becoming a member of The West Towns Chorus and SPEBSQSA in June, 2000. He persuaded the original singers of Kensington Road to get together with him, since he and two of them had already performed in a pick-up quartet earlier that year. He is an eclectic worker: a professional chauffeur, an IT consultant, an on-line bookseller. He founded the West Towns web site. Ed also skews the age average of the quartet upward by quite a bit. He claims that he wants to be a tenor when he grows up.
