Serenading?

[UofISigKap]

Originally Posted by lovespink88

Well, we still have 'social calling', the second thing you described. Like you said, the purpose of them is to express interest for socials (and to tell the sorority/fraternity what a great time you had at your last event, if you had one that semester). The girls just look cute and bring food, while the guys have a little more variety. Some fraternities just bring flowers, candy and other little gifts, others do a song, dance or both. Oh, and chapters will only send about 2-5 people.

So they took away the 'all chapter' serenades but kept the rest. It used to be this HUGE production on the first day of the week for the sororities, and then I think the guys started on Wednesday. I have memories of my entire house getting dressed in whatever themed costume we were that time around, practicing our songs that had personalized lyrics that could be changed for each fraternity, and driving all over campus for a few hours for these quick 5 minute productions put on in the living/great rooms of the fraternities.

I remember when Brittney Spears hit, and OMG...I swear we saw at least two sororities in the school girl costumes at EVERY house we stopped at. (We'd wait outside in these big groups at the houses because we were all serenading on the same night, and there would literally be hundreds of women standing outside the fraternity houses waiting their turn.) Some other themes I remember were Hawaiian themes, WWE Raw, blacklight glowstick dancers, just anything you could think of. The costumes and lyrics definitely were starting to get more and more outrageous, so I can only imagine what the very few years left of it were like.

The "left over" days that weren't the official serenade night were when the mini groups went to the houses we wanted to exchange with. If I recall correctly, they would bring cookies, brownies, candy baskets, Pokey Sticks, etc... to leave with the guys. So that part is the same. Don't get me wrong, serenades were A LOT of work, but I loved them! Occasionally a song will come on the radio that we used, and I don't even know what the right lyrics are; I know the ones we sang though. Ahhh, memorieeeeees!

[crusse10]

Glad I'm not the only Sinfonian in here...Serenading rules.

You gotta be able to sing, though. Serenading, but sounding like garbage, is useless. You'll go back, and they'll laugh.

[aephi alum]

Originally Posted by crusse10

Glad I'm not the only Sinfonian in here...Serenading rules.

You gotta be able to sing, though. Serenading, but sounding like garbage, is useless. You'll go back, and they'll laugh.

LOL. It's a good thing we didn't do serenades, then - much as I love my sisters, most of them couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. Made pref night interesting, especially the year I (the only active at the time who could sing) was a rho chi. Serenades just weren't part of the campus culture where I went to school.

[OPhiAGinger]

I come from a big family that loves to sing, so the descriptions of serenades sound magical to me! This was not part of the campus culture where I went to school, and I had no idea this charming old-fashioned tradition was still alive and well at other campuses. Keep it up!

[IrishLake]

We only serendaded when we went Christmas caroling to all the houses, but we sang at other sorority houses, too. Some fraternities serendaded us to show off new pledge classes.

[MysticCat]

Originally Posted by WaxOff

Many of our Chapters will hire themselves out for serenades on Valentine's Day and other occasions.

Yep. We used to do that.

And when we went caroling at Christmas, it was complete with a brass ensemble.

Originally Posted by crusse10

You gotta be able to sing, though. Serenading, but sounding like garbage, is useless. You'll go back, and they'll laugh.

LOL. Very true.

To the OP, though, why is it done? It's fun . . . and potentially romantic. And tradition. So why not?

[sapphirekey]

At my school, the fraternities do the serenading, but my chapter always sings back (I think we may be the only sorority here that does so). They only serenade during Monday night meetings, and we know in advance when they'll show up, so we can plan meeting accordingly - usually they serenade to introduce their new member class (in which case just the new brothers sing & dance), or to promote some kind of event coming up, like Derby Days. They often bring flowers to give to our president and some of the other sisters, too.

I really like the custom-- it's one of those things that I barely knew about before I decided to go Greek, and my first serenade, I was like, "seriously, this is REAL??" But I think it's really cute and fun, and most people seem to enjoy it.