The Rip Chords

The Rip Chords are the premier women's a cappella group at the University of Illinois. Welcome to our website! We have just recently released "Chordially Yours," our seventh album. It is available on our merchandise page, so...go order it! In the meantime, thanks for visiting and supporting the Rip Chords!

Sunday, March 16th, 2008

Hello Everyone!  As you may already know our big Spring Show is coming up soon!  It's April 11th and we are so excited to share all of our new music with you.  We've spent the last few weeks adding some sweet tunes to our repertoire and also filming this year's spring show movie!   This years theme, "THE OFFICE" is quite hilarious and we hope you come join us!

Tuesday December 4th, 2007

Awsome news!  As you know the Rip Chords released their latest CD "Chordially Yours" this past spring.   We just got news that our songs have been chosen for three different national compilation CD's.  These include BOCA (Best of Collegiate Acapella), Voices Only, and AcaTunes (the official itunes for acapella.) Along with using our song on their new CD, Aca Tunes awarded the Rip Chords with the "2007 AcaTunes Award" for "Happy Face" one of our latest recordings.  

Friday, November 30th, 2007

Hey Guys!!!!!   It's been a while!  Just wanted to take a second to update you on the fabulous lives of the Rip Chords!  THis year started off really great.  We added seven new talented rippies! If you haven't done so already, check them out on our members page.  Since the addition of these lovely ladies we have been super busy building up a new repertoir, recording our new CD, and rehearsing for this years ICCA a capella competition!!!!   Its crazy but also really exciting! We hope you come check us out sometime!  ...and good luck with FINALS!!!!! 

Tuesday, April 10th, 2007

Hey everyone! Colleen here, with a few updates! We have been so busy these past few months and I can't wait to share all the news with you! In February and March we competed in the International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella, placing 2nd in the Midwest quarterfinal and 3rd in the Midwest semifinal. It was an absolute blast and on behalf of all of us, thank you all so much for coming out and supporting us! We couldn't have done it without you. In the past month we have turned our attention to our spring show and even more importantly, the release of "Chordially Yours," our seventh album! Our show is coming up this Firday and we hope to see all of you there. For more information please just check the box above this. You can also click on the above link to pre-order our new CD and either pick it up Friday night at the show, or have it mailed to your home.

Hey Guys! I just wanted to take a second to update you on the fabulous lives of the Rip Chords.   This year started off with a Bang.  We added seven new wonderful and talented rippies!!! If you haven't done so check them out on our members page.  Since then we have been super busy building up this years new repertoir, recording a new CD, and rehersing for this Year ICCA a capella competion!!!  We're really excited about our work and we hope you come check us out sometime!

As our year slowly comes to close, I'd like to remind you all of our end-of-year events. First: we will be doing a high school tour in the Chicagoland area from May 14th-18th to promote the U of I, the Rip Chords, and our new CD! If you know if a high school we should visit, please send an e-mail to theripchords@gmail.com. Secondly, our second annual suburbs show will be on the evening of May 18th at Prospect High School in Mt. Prospect, IL. For furthere details on that show, please continue to check our shows page.

Thanks again, and we hope to see many of you on Friday!

______________________________________________________________________

Monday, November 13th, 2006

Greetings, fans, family and friends! Hope you are doing well and just as excited for the holiday season as we are! Things have been so busy for us lately and I'm  excited to give you all an update. First of all, we held a second round of auditions last week and I am so proud to annouce the addition of two new Rip Chords: Erin Larson and Christina Wertke. Congrats, ladies! You'll be able to check out their bios on the members page soon!

We also just recently completed our Family & Friends Magazine Fundraiser, which many of you participated in. Thank you all so much for your support. With your help, we were able to raise over $1,500 for our new CD! We can't wait to share the results with you in April. Thanks, and happy reading:)

We want to remind you all that our winter break high school tours are coming up soon. If you know of a high school in the Chicagoland area that we should visit, let us know by sending an e-mail to theripchords@gmail.com. If you are on the U of I campus, we have lots of shows coming up before the holiday break, so check out our shows page! Most notably, we'll be opening for both Cutting Edge and Chai-Town's winter shows! Are you looking for entertainment for you holiday event? Let us know! In the meantime, Happy Thanksgiving, and we hope to see you all at a show soon!

Monday, September 11th, 2006

Hope everyone has been settling well into the new school year! After a long first week of auditions, the Rip Chords are proud to announce that we've added two new rippies to the bunch: Mallory Burdick and Ana Pappageorge. You can check out their bios on our members page. Congratulations, girls! This year's talent pool was amazing and we wish everyone who auditioned the best of luck!

We have since begun rehearsing for the new school year and things are looking better than ever, so keep an eye out for us! Feel free to look at our repertoire page to see what you'll be hearing from us this year, and stay tuned to our schedule as well, which has begun filling up with plenty of opportunities to catch the Rip Chords in the Champaign-Urbana area and beyond. Thanks for reading, and we'll see you soon!


Saturday, July 15th, 2006

Happy hottest day of the summer! With temperatures soaring at high temerpatures in Chicago, this seems to be the perfect day to make some much-needed updates to the Rip Chords website. After spending the last couple months relaxing and working, we are beginning to gear up for the 2006-2007 school year.

First, I'd like to throw out a huge, well overdue THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to all of you who came to our "Evening of A Cappella" in the Chicago suburb of La Grange, IL. Not only was Emmanuel Episcopal Church packed to the brim with our family, friends and fans, but we raised an incredible amount of money to put towards our upcoming CD release! You can be sure that it was the first of many concerts to be held in the suburbs of Chicago. After a short break we began recording once again last weekend, and we could not have done it without your generous support. Thank You!!

Be on the lookout for new audition times for the 2006-2007 year, which will be posted in the coming weeks. If you have any questions about auditions, please visit our Frequently Asked Questions page. And as always, please contact theripchords@gmail.com to hire us for your next party, luncheon, meeting, or whatever!

Thursday, April 20th, 2006

Greetings Everyone! Hope you all have been enjoying the beautiful weather lately! The Rip Chords have been busy as usual. First of all we'd like to extend a huge thank you to everyone who came out to see our big spring show on April 7th, The Fabulous Life of the Rip Chords! We had a lot of fun and hope that all of you did as well. Big thanks to the Xtension Chords for their lively performance at the show. Visit our photos page for pictures of the event, which should be up soon!

In other news, check out our schedule for upcoming shows, particularly the big Xtension Chords show tomorrow night, Acappellapalooza XIII. We'll be opening for them along with Soul Essence, another women's group on campus. The show will be at 8:00pm in Foellinger. Don't miss it! Also, next week on Wednesday April 26th, we'll be holding auditions for the 2006-2007 academic year! Click here to find out more and sign up for an audition slot.

Lastly, we are proud to announce that the Rip Chords have entered the studio once again! We have chosen to record our 7th release with STTM Productions, an up and coming recording studio right here in Champaign. We have set an ambitious goal for ourselves and hope to produce the CD by the end of the 2006-2007 school year. We'll keep you updated! As always, thanks for your support and have a great weekend!


Sunday, March 26th, 2006

Hey Rip Chords fans, hope this update finds all of you relaxing after a great weekend! This past week was spring break for the Rip Chords, and as many of you know we ended our break by reuniting this past Saturday night to compete in the ICCA Midwest Semifinal at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. So many talented, entertaining groups gave their best on Saturday night and we are proud to say that we received 3rd Place out of the eight competing groups! We are ecstatic and want to thank the MadHatters & Redefined for hosting the event and of course, to all the fans who came out there to cheer us on!

Now we are back at school, gearing up for the most exciting event of the year: our annual spring show! It will be held on April 7th, the Friday of Mom's Weekend here at the U of I. That's only two weeks away, so let your moms know now that this is one show they cannot miss while they're visiting! For more specific details, look at our shows page and keep checking back for an exciting update on the homepage.

Thanks again to everyone for you continued support!


Tuesday, March 7th, 2006

Hi everyone! This is Colleen with some exciting Rip Chords updates:) Please check out our photos page! Lots of pictures have been and will be added this week to our most recent albums. Hopefully you will also see updates to our Rip Chord archives as well, as some of our dedicated alums help us fill in the blanks!

Today is March 7th, meaning our annual spring show is only one month away! This year's show will be on April 7th, which is the Friday of Mom's Weekend here at the University of Illinois. It will be a very busy weekend here and our show is one event you won't want to miss! Bring your friends, family, and of course your mom to see one of the best a cappella shows all year! Please check our gigs page for more details as the show approaches.

As always, thanks for tuning in and we hope to see you soon!


Sunday, February 12th, 2006

Greetings, a cappella lovers! As most of you know the Rip Chords competed in the ICCA quarterfinal this past Saturday, right here at the University of Illinois. It was a competitive, exciting event in which we competed against six other fine a cappella groups for a chance to go to the Midwest semifinals. And since the event we have not been able to contain our excitement. We received 2nd Place, meaning that we will be traveling to Wisconsin-Madison on March 25th to compete in the semifinals!! And to make things even better, our lovely music director Becky Kim won the Best Soloist award for her solo on "Yesterday!"

We will be joining two other U of I groups in Madison: The Xtension Chords, who won 1st Place at the Michigan quarterfinal and The Other Guys, who received 1st Place last night! We are so thrilled and we want to extend a big congratulations to them and a HUGE thank you to all of our alumni, family, friends and fans who were there cheering us on! Your support means so much and we could not have done it without you! Please check out our Photos Page for pictures of the event, and stay tuned to our Schedule for ticket and location info for the semifinals.