The Suntones

Mc Ewing Burrows, [Mac], is a barbershop quartet singer. I met him while giving his wife physical therapy in Fallbrook, California. Right now Mac is too busy nursing his wife to engage in his singing hobby. Mac was in a first class quartet called the Chicagoans from 1949 to 1959 in the midwest. During that time he was also working with the police to stop vice and gambling in Chicago. From 1959 to 1965, he was a street detective. He is no ordinary man. He is a modest individual who does not seek credit for his accomplishments.

Mac told me about the many times his Chicagoans Quartet was featured on the same shows with the international champion barbershop quartet The Suntones. After the shows he woodshedded [adlib harmonizing] with one of his favorite singers in the whole world, the tenor of the Suntones from Florida. A week after my talking with Mac Burrows, Barbara and I checked into a New York City hotel on a vacation from California. We walked one block from the hotel to Carnegie Hall and bought tickets to see a Barbershop Harmony show featuring The Big Apple Chorus and surprise, surprise, none other than The Suntones. We sat in the front row. The show was wonderful and the Suntones received a standing ovation at Carnegie Hall. Boy! What a thrill! Jackie Gleason, Mike Douglas, and Bob Hope were all fans of The Suntones. Many years later Bill Cain who sings wonderful bass came to sing with the Vista Barbershop chorus, and I was able to sit next to him in practice. Small world.