The Sweetheart of Sigma Chi

There was a recent (March 1999) thread on the H@rmonet regarding the well known arrangement of that great ballad, "The Sweetheart Of Sigma Chi." Dick Johnson asked Pete Tyree, baritone of the 1953 International champions, "The Orphans," for the story, since this was their signature song. Here is Pete's story.

When I got out of college in 1951 my first job was in Kansas City where I joined the KC Chapter almost at once. I was reunited with several guys I had met at my first Society contest in Springfield, Missouri, that spring: Dr. Bob Bristow, Dr. John Myers, Jim Poindexter, the greatest woodshedder ever to hit the Society in my opinion, Bob Turner, and Don McPherson.

They had been woodshedding for several weeks on the chorus of "Sigma Chi" and were just finishing that up when I arrived on the scene. I informed them that, as a Sigma Chi myself, I could get the verse, which was little known even by the big bands that traditionally played this very popular waltz. I borrowed one of the songbooks from the fraternity house. We tried to woodshed the verse and struggled more than somewhat with it.

Bob Bristow was hell-bent on getting something together. He awakened one morning about 3:00 a.m., went to the piano and in an hour or so arranged the verse. The rest is history because Bristow wrote down the arranged verse and the woodshed version of the chorus and gave it to me. I took it on to "The Orphans" where it became our signature song.

Bob Bristow, still of St. Joseph, MO, should have the credit for putting the thing together, but the great chorus and ending were totally woodshed, and can be attributed to those great barbershop ears I listed above.

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