Glee Club members are delivering these singing valentines during “tech week” for this weekend's spring production, “Where There’s Money There’s Treble.”
Credit: Jess KatzAt Penn, Valentine’s Day is celebrated with chocolate, flowers and singing men in blazers.
This year the decades-old tradition of Glee Club singing valentines continued. Each year, small groups of singers travel around campus, fulfilling orders in between their own classes in person or over the phone. They are armed with their “khaki-blaze” uniforms, a repertoire of four romantic songs and a list of locations to hit, Glee Club member and Engineering senior Bhavish Malkani said.
Malkani recalls a professor who ordered singing valentines for each of his classes. “It’s fun to wake a class up and break up the monotony of a day,” he said.
Finding the right person to serenade can sometimes be a challenge, but when searching a classroom proves fruitless, “it can still be funny when they’re not there,” Malkani said. He added that no-shows often earn laughs because the situation is awkward for the person who ordered it, and it often reveals that the person in question chose to skip class. The Glee Club members often sing to the whole class when this happens.
When singers are able to locate and serenade students, however, the reactions can be priceless. Matt Howard, an Engineering senior and Glee Club member, said that “it’s amusing to catch people off guard.”
“Some people order songs for their friends specifically to embarrass them,” Malkani said, adding that “many see it as a sweet gesture.” Students can commission Glee Club members to serenade a friend or a “special someone,” the organization’s website reads.
For Howard, the best part about this tradition is singing with his friends and delivering “unexpected joy” to others. “It’s a great feeling letting people know that someone cares about them,” he said.
Glee Club members deliver these singing valentines during their “tech week” for their spring production. This year’s production, which will take place in the Annenberg Center’s Zellerbach Theatre this weekend, is called “Where There’s Money There’s Treble.”
Until then, be on your toes for well-dressed groups of men interrupting classes, singing “My Little Margie” with roses in hand.
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