From Scarsdale to Schenzhen

Yale Spizzwinks(?) members let local performers perform for them in Schenzhen, China. (Yale photo)

BLUE BEAT


What did you do this past summer?  Yale's a cappella singing group the Spizzwinks(?) spent the months away from school in the Far East, navigating through Thailand, China and Myanmar, singing, eating, visiting sites, giving impromptu concerts, giving formal concerts, eating some more and delightfully telling classmates and parents back home of the good time had by all. 

Back up a few months to springtime. The Spizzwinks prepped for the summer tour by giving a concert last April in Westchester at the Scarsdale Teen Center, hosted by YWAA.  The group stormed into town one Saturday afternoon and thrilled an audience of Yale Westchester alums and Scarsdale-area residents. Some whispered they didn't realize or had forgotten how good the group could be.

YWAA board directors, BK Munguia '75, Regina Possavino '01, and Dan Leonard '76, organized the Scarsdale event as part of the YWAA series of inviting Yale a cappella groups to perform annually in the Westchester area. (Yale groups, the Alley Cats and the New Blue, presented concerts last year in Dobbs Ferry.)

In a suburb of Shenzhen, China,  members of the Yale group not only sang favorite songs from their repertoire to locals, but also got to hear local talent--including a chorus of migrant workers (above). The migrant workers performed a group dance for the Yale musicians, too.

The relatives of one Spizz member, who live in Shenzhen, greeted Spizz members and guided them on a tour of parts of the city.  One Spizz member wrote in his travelogue, "Overall, Chinese hospitality was exceedingly warm, with an abundance of food, conversation, gifts and generosity." Another Spizz member received a gift watch that was made by one of the singing-and-dancing migrant workers.

TW