Materne will become the first person from Louisiana to lead the organization since its founding in 1938
NEW ORLEANS — NOLA Vox, New Orleans’ A Cappella Ensemble, announced that its president and co-founder, Zach Materne, has been elected president of the Barbershop Harmony Society. His term begins Jan. 1, 2027.
Materne will become the first person from Louisiana to serve as BHS president since the organization was founded in 1938, a historic milestone for Louisiana and New Orleans.
Materne has served on the BHS board of directors since 2022 and as executive vice president since 2025.
His election adds a new chapter to a relationship between New Orleans and barbershop harmony that stretches from musical traditions that helped shape jazz to more than 75 years of organized barbershop singing in the city.
Founded in 2023, NOLA Vox is the official New Orleans chapter of the Barbershop Harmony Society. The nonprofit community choral arts organization has a mission of enriching lives through vocal harmony in New Orleans and welcomes singers of all ages and backgrounds.
“Barbershop has been part of my life for more than 25 years, so having the opportunity to serve from New Orleans means a great deal to me,” Materne said. “This city understands that music is more than what happens on a stage. It is how people connect, how traditions are passed down and how communities are built. I want us to honor the history of this art form, strengthen the communities singing it today and make sure people continue to have a place to experience it for generations to come.”
A musical history connected to New Orleans
The Barbershop Harmony Society was founded in 1938 as the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America, commonly known as SPEBSQSA. The organization later adopted the Barbershop Harmony Society name as its work and reach evolved.
The musical tradition itself reaches much further back. Historical research recognized by BHS traces important roots of barbershop harmony to African American close-harmony traditions of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with connections to the musical environment from which jazz emerged.
That history has direct ties to New Orleans. Louis Armstrong sang tenor in a quartet on the streets of New Orleans as a young man and later spoke of those experiences as an influence on his musicianship. Historians have also connected Jelly Roll Morton, Sidney Bechet, Bunk Johnson and other early New Orleans jazz figures to the African American quartet-harmonizing tradition.
New Orleans also played an important role in bringing greater recognition to that history. Lynn Abbott, a jazz archivist at Tulane University, conducted influential research into early African American popular music, quartet singing and the origins of barbershop harmony. His scholarship helped reshape the barbershop community’s understanding of the music’s roots.
More than 75 years of BHS in New Orleans
The formal relationship between New Orleans and the organization now known as the Barbershop Harmony Society began June 19, 1948, when the first New Orleans chapter was chartered.
In the decades that followed, generations of local singers carried the tradition forward through the Crescent City Chapter, Riverside Chapter and ultimately the Greater New Orleans Chapter, home of the Mardi Gras Chorus.
Today, NOLA Vox carries that legacy forward as the first mixed-voice Barbershop Harmony Society chapter to represent New Orleans.
The city has also hosted major BHS gatherings through the years, including International Conventions in 1971 and 1992 and the Midwinter Convention in 2015. Harmony University, the organization’s premier music education event, was held at Loyola University New Orleans in 2022 and 2023.
Carrying the tradition forward
For most of its history, BHS membership was limited to men and centered on the traditional all-male barbershop experience.
BHS adopted its Everyone in Harmony strategic vision in 2017, calling for the organization to become a home for singers of all ages and backgrounds. In 2018, membership opened to everyone, including women, while BHS continued to support the traditional men’s singing experience. Today, men’s, women’s and mixed-voice chapters and ensembles are part of the organization.
NOLA Vox reflects that evolution while developing an identity rooted in New Orleans and centered on lifelong singing.
Since its founding, NOLA Vox has collaborated with local, regional and national singing organizations, artists and educators. Those relationships connect New Orleans singers with the broader vocal music community and create opportunities for collaboration through performance, education and shared singing.
At its core, NOLA Vox seeks to create a musical home where people can discover singing, return to it after time away or continue doing something they have loved throughout their lives.
That commitment also includes investing in future generations through the New Orleans Youth Harmony Festival. NOLA Vox will host the second festival Feb. 20, 2027, bringing students, educators and experienced singers together for a full day of music education and collaboration followed by an evening performance. Participation is free for singers in grades 8-12, with music and learning materials provided.
“For me, the future of BHS starts locally,” Materne said. “It is creating places where people can discover singing, return to it or simply keep doing something they love. It is young singers finding their voice, longtime singers finding a new musical home and communities coming together through harmony. That is what we are working to build with NOLA Vox here in New Orleans, and that is the perspective I will bring to this role.”
In 2027, for the first time since the Barbershop Harmony Society was founded in 1938, its president will come from Louisiana, adding another chapter to New Orleans’ long relationship with vocal harmony and the communities built around singing.
About Zach Materne
Zach Materne is a native New Orleanian, co-founder and president of NOLA Vox, New Orleans’ A Cappella Ensemble, and a longtime advocate for vocal harmony and strong local singing communities. He has served on the Barbershop Harmony Society board of directors since 2022 and as executive vice president since 2025. He will begin his term as president of the Barbershop Harmony Society on Jan. 1, 2027.
Professionally, Materne is a commercial insurance and risk management consultant specializing in the powersports industry and other middle-market businesses. Before entering the insurance industry, he spent nearly two decades in the powersports business, including as an operator of his family’s New Orleans dealership.
Materne’s musical roots in New Orleans began with the Jefferson Performing Arts Society’s Jefferson Children’s Chorus and continued through the St. Louis Cathedral Boychoir and Choir, Brother Martin High School Chorus, the New Orleans Opera Association, Tulane Summer Lyric Theatre and, later, the UNO Chorale while attending the University of New Orleans.
His New Orleans-based quartet, nile manski trio, placed third in the International Collegiate Barbershop Quartet Championship in both 2003 and 2004. Materne also sang with two International Barbershop Chorus Championship ensembles, winning with Southern California’s Westminster Chorus in 2007 and Nashville’s Music City Chorus in 2023.
Materne is a 2001 graduate of Brother Martin High School and a 2007 graduate of the University of New Orleans. A barbershop singer for more than 25 years, he has remained connected to the New Orleans singing community throughout his life. His arts leadership, including his work with NOLA Vox and BHS, is volunteer service rooted in a belief that people of all ages should have opportunities to discover singing, return to it and find a musical home in their community.
About NOLA Vox
NOLA Vox, New Orleans’ A Cappella Ensemble, is a nonprofit community choral arts organization and the official New Orleans chapter of the Barbershop Harmony Society. Founded in 2023 with a mission of enriching lives through vocal harmony in New Orleans, NOLA Vox brings together singers of all ages and backgrounds through a shared love of singing, community and a cappella harmony.
Rooted in the musical culture of New Orleans, NOLA Vox performs repertoire spanning genres, with a special focus on the music, artists and traditions that have helped define the city’s rich musical heritage. The organization collaborates with local, regional and national singing organizations, artists and educators through performances, music education and community partnerships.
NOLA Vox is committed to creating opportunities for lifelong singing, whether someone is discovering vocal harmony for the first time, returning to singing after time away or looking for a new musical home. Its educational initiatives include the New Orleans Youth Harmony Festival, which brings young singers, educators and experienced performers together for music education, collaboration and performance.
Through singing, education and partnership, NOLA Vox seeks to strengthen New Orleans’ vocal music community while carrying forward the city’s long tradition of people coming together through harmony.
More information is available at NOLAVox.org.
About the Barbershop Harmony Society
The Barbershop Harmony Society (www.barbershop.org) is a nonprofit leader in community singing and adult music education, and a global community of singers of all voices, ages, and backgrounds united by a shared passion for a cappella close-harmony singing. Founded in 1938 as the Society for Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America (S.P.E.B.S.Q.S.A.), the Society has grown to more than 14,000 members across North America, with allied organizations in more than a dozen countries bringing the total number of active singers to more than 70,000 worldwide. Headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee, the Society preserves and extends the reach of this uniquely American musical art form — whose roots lie in African American improvisational harmony — through active programs in music education, publishing, performance, and outreach. It hosts an annual International Convention and Contest, operates Harmony University, and supports a worldwide network of choruses and quartets, working broadly to bring the fellowship, fulfillment, and excitement of vocal music to a new generation of singers.
Follow the Barbershop Harmony Society on Facebook (facebook.com/barbershopharmonysociety).