Last month, Bill Schmitz ’62 contributed to the Wagner College archives a treasure he had found in his attic: a reel-to-reel recording of Songfest 1962, from back in the day when Songfest was an a cappella singing contest between the college’s Greek organizations.
The recording is far from perfect; an electronic hum from the microphone along with random noise created by the aging of the magnetic tape accompany the music — but, even so, the charm of all those students’ voices singing across the decades rings loud and clear.
Here is a slideshow of Kallista photos from Songfest 1962 — and, below it, you'll find a playlist of 11 songs performed in 1962, without accompaniment, by Delta Zeta, Alpha Sigma Phi, Phi Sigma Kappa, Alpha Omicron Pi, Tau Kappa Epsilon and Alpha Delta Pi.
The singing prizes for Songfest 1962, by the way, went to Phi Sigma Kappa and Alpha Omicron Pi, and the Songfest queen was AΔΠ’s Linda Dengel ’62 of Upper Saddle River, N.J.