The Ursa Minors perform frequently both on- and off-campus, in all kinds of venues and perform for groups of all ages and sizes.   The ladies have entertained at charity functions, sporting events, Brown faculty and student affairs and Providence community events.   In recent years they were featured singing the National Anthem and two concerts at the U.S. Tennis Open at Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York . They have also competed in the International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella (ICCA) and hosted two rounds of the tournament in 2006 and 2007, welcoming groups from across the Northeast region to sing on the Brown campus.

 

The Ursas also travel to other universities in the to join their a cappella groups in concerts and frequently invite outside groups to be guest performers at Brown.  Other groups the Ursas have recently sung with include the MIT Logarhythms, Tufts Beelzebubs, Yale Baker’s Dozen, Dartmouth Cords, and many of Brown’s other fabulous groups, most recently the Brown Derbies, Jabberwocks, and Higher Keys.

 

RECORDINGS

Every few years, the Ursas head back into the recording studio to produce an album. Their first album, Until the Morning Comes, was released in 1999 and was nominated for a Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award for excellence in arranging.   (“Yesterday,” which was originally recorded on that album, has since become a staple in the Ursas’ set.)   In the fall of 2002, the Ursas released their sophomore album, Note to Self, which received honorable mention from the Recorded A Cappella Review Board as one of its “Picks (favorite albums) of the Year.”  The group’s third and most recent album, The Little Black Dress, was released in 2005 and includes songs originally performed by Stevie Wonder, Jason Mraz, Madonna, Maroon 5, Ella Fitzgerald, and the Dave Matthews Band, among others.   In 2006, the album was recognized by the Contemporary A Cappella Society of America’s nominating panel as one of the top 10 female collegiate albums of the year.

 

April 2007 marks the release of the Ursa Minors’ fourth studio album, Minor Details, which was co-produced and engineered by CB Productions’ Ed Boyer and John Clark and includes songs by artists including Cole Porter, Marc Broussard, The Beatles, Bonnie Raitt, Fiona Apple and many other favorites.  The Ursas look forward to the opportunity to perform these songs and more for audiences across the Northeast in the near future.

 

EDUCATION/OUTREACH

In addition to keeping busy in the areas of performance and recording, the Ursa Minors are available regionally for educational workshops and concerts with student groups of all ages and sizes.  The group has customized performance and education programming on contemporary a cappella  for school choirs and music departments, conducted masterclasses with high school a cappella groups, organized school concerts where they co-headlined with younger performers, and worked with students from grades 2 to 12 to teach their arrangements and inspire the students to create and perform works of their own creation.  We have worked and/or performed with students from St. Mark’s School and Milton Academy.