COVER STORY : Barbershoppers and Sweet Adelines raise their voices, in four-part harmony, in an American tradition that’s gone global. : <i> Mary was a bashful little flapper, And Johnny was her beau. Every time that Johnny tried to kiss her, She’d blush and she’d cry, “Oh, no! Oh, no!”</i>

The song is so shamelessly outdated that it’s easy to wonder if the lyrics had been carved into stone tablets.

And the 40 fellows who sing, “Mary, You’re a Little Bit Old-Fashioned”--barbershop style--hark back to a time that their elders warmly reminisced about, a time of rumble seats, straw hats and bicycles built for two, to say nothing of straight razors and shaving mugs.

Just who do these mostly middle-age guys--called the Valleyaires--think they are, impersonating their turn-of-the-century vocal forebears and figuratively thumbing their noses at the contemporary clatter of rock and rap and heavy metal?

Why do they gussy up in black tuxedo jackets and white bow ties, white trousers and white suspenders, singing to hundreds of spectators (and often among themselves) homespun songs (“Lida Rose,” “Coney Island Baby” and “By the Light of the Silvery Moon”) that mesh with today’s music scene about as well as, say, Perry Como sharing a concert stage with Guns N’ Roses?

Well, it’s all part of a revival that cries out to hear America singing again--from a cappella barbershoppers and Sweet Adelines singers to nouveau doo-wop recording stars such as Boyz II Men. They’re raising their voices in dulcet, four-part harmony above the din of synthesizers, chain-saw guitars and high-voltage amplifiers.

And for many barbershoppers, it simply comes down to singing somewhere besides the shower.

“It’s kind of like my safety valve from my work,” says Stan Dean, 58, of Van Nuys, the group’s president and an insurance salesman. “You come here and sing, and you can’t help but be in harmony with yourself.”

Listen to Don Ribeiro, 62, of Canyon Country, who, as singer and speaker, excels at keeping his baritone voice down to the roar of a Boeing 747.

“Believe it or not, I was an absolute introvert before I got into barbershopping,” he says during a rehearsal break one evening at the Bernardi Multipurpose Center in Van Nuys. “I’ve been in this organization for 30 years, and I’ve never seen a fight--or anything that even resembles a fight.

“Nobody yells at you. You come down here to get away from that.”

Indeed, for a bunch of amateurs, the Valleyaires sound good enough to take their show on the road professionally, whether they sing in quartets at hospitals and civic clubs or at full strength in choral shows or events such as the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America (SPEBSQSA) regional competition, scheduled all day May 1 at Glendale High School’s auditorium.

Those hundreds of a cappella voices in at least 11 such groups in the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys alone--from the Valleyaires to their women peers in Sweet Adelines International groups such as the Verdugo Hills Showtime Chorus (130 strong), the West Valley Chorus (80 members), the Valley Harmonettes (30 members) and the Valley chapter (25 members)--bask in revivals of a uniquely American art form that is now heard ‘round the world.

And that’s not counting professional chorales such as the mixed 12-member L. A. Jazz Choir, a past Grammy nominee based in Woodland Hills, whose repertoire includes big band music and a cappella ballads.

“You’re hearing a lot of harmony in mainline pop music now because the essence of melody is something people always return to, even when we also hear rap and heavy metal,” says Linda Duffendack Mays, the group’s business manager and a choral director. “Since music is such a feelingful experience for everybody, people will always take home with them the melody and harmony.”

Barbershopping--by men and women--has taken giant leaps in popularity since mid-century, when some critics dismissed it as “four drunks singing under a lamppost.”

And Sweet Adelines-style singing has entertained millions ever since the international organization’s birth in the late 1940s when, as the Valley chapter’s only remaining charter member, Bea Thomas, 74, recalls: “Somebody said it was a nice little organization that keeps those ladies off the street.”

As long ago as 1960, barbershopping started going global. Before the Cold War’s end, a touring Soviet Union barbershop quartet won raves locally despite garbling some songs (“Chattanooga Shoo Shoo “), says John Krizek of Burbank, a longtime Valleyaire.

“One reviewer,” Krizek says, “was so impressed that she asked, ‘How can you nuke somebody when they can sing four-part harmony to “Lida Rose”?’ ”

What’s more, a cappella singing flourishes worldwide in various other forms, including those performed alongside barbershopping four weeks ago at a regional Harmony Sweepstakes in Hermosa Beach.

They include doo-wop (born of early 1950s black stylists who sang on street corners, making beautiful music out of doo-wops , she-bops, ram-a-lamas and other nonsensical syllables), gospel, jazz, blues, pop, New Wave and country, among others.

There’s even a Japanese group that sings polka and--hang onto your Alpine hats--an Austrian octet that yodels in a cappella harmony.

“People who sing are generally happier,” says Dan Jordan, 36, of Glendale, who distributes compact disc recordings of 160 assorted a cappella groups around the world and sings professionally in the Dapper Dans (a Disneyland barbershop quartet renamed the Toon Tones after the park’s new attraction, Toon Town) and in another group called Danny and the Doo-Wops.

What makes a cappella singing so appealing, Jordan says, is its raw simplicity.

“You don’t need a band or an agent,” he says. “You don’t have to carry instruments. And what better way to enjoy yourself than to sing regularly with people you share common interests with? Of course, if you don’t like each other, it won’t work.”

For her part, Chris Peurifoy, 56, choral director of the Sweet Adelines’ San Fernando Valley chapter, sings barbershopping’s praises as a stress reliever.

“Today, everybody is so stressed out,” says Peurifoy, who drives 100 miles one way from her house in Riverside County to rehearsals once a week in Van Nuys.

“And everything costs so much--whether it’s going to amusement parks or playing golf. Music gives you an opportunity for self-expression. It gives you a chance to share your voice, this wonderful instrument that God gave us. I just can’t imagine being without music.”

Try to talk informally with a group of Valleyaires during a rehearsal break. Just try it.

At first, they resist engaging in conversation. Just like that, they burst into song again and again--as if on cue.

And long before the music dies for the night, they succeed in dragging total strangers--guys who can’t carry a tune--into their impromptu act.

“Come on, you can sing!” Don Ribeiro beckons, tugging at a reluctant visitor’s forearm.

“You know the melody to the ‘Mickey Mouse’ song, don’t you?” he asks. “Well, you just sing one note--and hold it for a long time--and we’ll do the rest.”

Suddenly Ribeiro and two companions belt out the harmony: “M...I...C...K...E...Yeeeeee.” Their voices blend magically--and miraculously--with that of their guest, who struggles to hang onto that single note before his voice dies much too soon.

“Where did you go?” Ribeiro chides, his companions guffawing. “All you need is a little work!”

To the Don Ribeiros and countless others who rev up their voices one night a week at rehearsals, barbershopping--and, for that matter, Sweet Adelines International singing--isn’t just a stress reliever but a pastime that offers camaraderie, fulfillment and self-expression.

“Work is only something we do between barbershopping sessions,” the Valleyaires’ Steve Diamond, 51, an Internal Revenue Service tax attorney, says of an activity that brings together retailers, salesmen, firefighters, engineers, retirees and, yes, even a barber, Jerry Cottone, who persuaded customer Mitch Guzik to join the group.

As Dwight Peattie, another Valleyaire, puts it: “How can you be unhappy when you’re singing?”

Similarly, many Sweet Adelines--who are educators, nurses, computer specialists, executive secretaries and homemakers, among others--view their art as therapeutic.

“Going to rehearsals does tend to revitalize me,” says Laura Gindy, 47, a UCLA blood bank supervisor and president of the Sherman Oaks Sweet Adelines chapter, whose 25 singers include her daughter, Alison, 14. “It’s rewarding. After I sing, I don’t feel tired any more.”

Even as they rejuvenate themselves, barbershoppers and Adelines, some of them wives of barbershoppers, also rekindle an art form that peaked in the late 1800s and early 1900s, before music would be more widely enjoyed on radio and the phonograph.

Legend has it that barbershoppers decided to organize during the late 1930s after a group of traveling businessmen got trapped in a Kansas City snowstorm and had nothing else to do but sing the night away.

Today, the barbershopping society, known by its alphabet-soup name SPEBSQSA and headquartered in Kenosha, Wis., boasts more than 34,000 members in 825 chapters in the United States and Canada alone, with seven affiliated organizations in Great Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

Sweet Adelines International, based in Tulsa, Okla., includes 24,000 members in 20 countries and emerged in the late 1940s when, as Valley chapter director Chris Peurifoy recalls, “I don’t think we really had an image. We were nice little ladies stepping out for the night.

“I can remember my first costume--a $3.99 Mode O’Day gingham dress, white shoes and white gloves. We wore yellow, pink and lavender. We couldn’t wear red. Red was too daring.”

Sweet Adelines-style singing applies the same four-part harmony as men’s barbershopping in most cases, their lead singers sticking to the melody while others sing tenor, baritone and bass, but in a higher key than the men. Their repertoire includes newer songs than those sung by men’s groups (“That’s What Friends Are For” and a medley from “Phantom of the Opera”), as well as lots of choreography--finger snapping, hand clapping, toe tapping.

“The music is a lot more creative now,” Peurifoy says. “And anyone who’s snobbish toward barbershop sees only the old image. They don’t understand how difficult it is to sing a cappella and do it well. You can’t lean on a piano or other instruments. It takes a lot more work.”

The clock crawls past midnight.

A dozen Valleyaires have gathered at the Fish Broiler, a Van Nuys watering hole, for a post-rehearsal barbershopping tradition called “afterglow.”

Here, in a private room each Wednesday night, happy hour isn’t just a song in their hearts but beer mugs on their lips.

As they sing onward toward last call and closing time, their voices harmonize as flawlessly as ever. Woodshedding they call this impromptu four-part harmony--like jamming by jazz musicians.

And between songs, they philosophize about their art.

“There are guys well into their 70s still singing,” John Krizek says. “Some of them sound like a train wreck, but they all have fun.”

The Valleyaires, organized in 1959 as the society’s Reseda chapter but expanded in 1977 to encompass all of the San Fernando Valley, also give as much as they receive.

They sing gratis at hospitals. They contribute to SPEBSQSA charities such as the Institute of Logopedics in Wichita, Kan., which treats handicapped and speech-impaired children. And, like their Sweet Adelines peers, they encourage barbershopping among teen-agers at high schools where music programs have been slashed or eliminated.

“Music should remain a vital part of life,” Krizek says. “We’ve become a nation perched in front of our TV sets. We should be out singing songs.”

As Krizek and the other Valleyaires do exactly that--sing energetically into the wee hours, devouring every lyric and rhapsodizing over every chord--the thought occurs that barbershopping isn’t really coming back.

To its devotees, barbershopping is an old fraternity brother who never went away.

Where to Rehearse

Here is where and when local groups rehearse: Agoura Hills Harmony, Sweet Adelines International, women’s barbershop group, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Wildwood School, 620 W. Velarde Drive, Thousand Oaks. (805) 523-7445. Antelope Valley Chorus, Sweet Adelines International, women’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Lutheran Church of the Master, 725 E. Ave. J, Lancaster. (805) 942-3447. Chansonettes, women’s chorus, 10 a.m. Thursdays, Granada Hills Recreation Center, Petit Park, 10640 Petit Ave. (818) 363-9121. Crescenta Valley chapter, men’s barbershop, 8 p.m. Tuesdays, La Crescenta Women’s Club, 4004 La Crescenta Ave. (818) 952-3437. Granada Hills Chorale, men’s and women’s chorus, 7:30 p.m, Tuesdays, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 11315 White Oak Ave., Granada Hills. (818) 360-2209. Harmony Hills Chorus, Santa Clarita Valley, men’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Valley Oaks Village Clubhouse, 24700 Valley St., Newhall. (805) 259-6109. Harmony Tradition Chorus, men’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Temple Beth Hillel, 12326 Riverside Drive, North Hollywood. (818) 784-5151. L.A. Acappella Symphony, men’s and women’s chorus, 3 p.m. Thursdays, Valley College, 5800 Fulton Ave., Van Nuys. (818) 342-8214. L.A. Jazz Choir, men’s and women’s 12-voice jazz, 7 p.m. Tuesdays, 5759 Wallis Lane, Woodland Hills. (818) 704-8657. RiverOaks, Sweet Adelines International, women’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, St. Matthew Lutheran Church, 11031 Camarillo St., North Hollywood. (818) 981-6285. San Fernando Valley chapter, Sweet Adelines International, women’s barbershop, 7:15 p.m. Tuesdays, St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 14646 Sherman Way, Van Nuys. (818) 349-6509. San Fernando Valley Chorale, men’s and women’s chorus, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Our Savior’s First Lutheran Church, 16602 San Fernando Mission Blvd., Granada Hills. (818) 881-2604. San Fernando Valley Male Chorus, 7:30 p.m. Mondays, Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 6610 Shoup Ave., Canoga Park. (818) 348-3195. Valleyaires, men’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays, Van Nuys Multi-Purpose Center, 6415 Sylmar Ave., Van Nuys. (818) 994-7464. Valley Harmonettes, women’s chorus, 12:30 p.m. Wednesdays, United Methodist Church, 5650 Shoup Ave., Woodland Hills. (818) 222-6727. Verdugo Hills Showtime Chorus, Sweet Adelines International, women’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays, Masonic Temple, 2801 Montrose Ave., La Crescenta. (818) 848-2467 or (818) 363-9748. West Valley Chorus, Sweet Adelines International, women’s barbershop, 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Canoga Park Presbyterian Church, Hyatt Hall, 22103 Vanowen St. (818) 709-8703.