District Barbershopper of Distinction - DBOD

This award is presented to an individual or individuals who have done substantial work in promoting Harmony on a District and/or Society level. It can also be presented to an individual or individuals who have made substantial contributions to the work of the District.

The recipient(s) of this award will be chosen by the same committee established to select the District Barbershopper of the Year.  All Society members in good standing are eligible for this award. It shall be the duty of the selection committee to actively solicit nominations from throughout the District.

The Alan Lamson
Chapter President of the Year  Award - CPOTY

Awarded and presented to an individual who best exemplifies the qualities of an outstanding chapter president. It is usually presented each year at the Fall District Convention during the Saturday night award presentations, for the previous years' achievements.

The Alan Lamson Chapter President of the Year Award is presented to a chapter president, usually nominated by his chapter, whose actions during that calendar year, best reflect the following qualities:

• Integrity and honesty

• Dedication

• Competent humility

• Forward-looking creativity

• Fairness

• Sense of humor and empathy

• Acceptance of challenge

• Constructive spirit

• Pursuit of personal growth

Nominators are asked to tell us about the nominee’s accomplishments in that year, changes in the chapter as a result of the nominee’s leadership, examples of the nominee’s display of the qualities, and any other reasons why this individual would be more deserving than other nominee.  All nominations are kept confidential within the CPOTY committee; names of all nominees are retained by the NED Awards Committee. The CPOTY committee comprises the three most recent recipients of the award.

Barbershop Harmony Society ~ Hall of Fame

The Barbershop Harmony Society Hall of Fame was established by action of the Society Board of Directors as a means of bestowing Society recognition and honor to members and quartets — living or in memorium — for exceptional contributions made that have enhanced the barbershop experience for the Society.

Any living or deceased Society member, Society staff member, or quartet, with the exception of the current Society President or any current Hall of Fame committee member, is eligible for nomination.

Honorees are selected by a majority vote of the committee, and there is no maximum or minimum limit on the number of inductees in a given year.

The award criteria used by the committee fall into general categories of music and administration/leadership. In music, judging, arranging, composing, chorus directing, coaching and singing are important. In administration/leadership, service as an officer, advisor, and in planning, writing or editing are considered.

Northeastern District Member ~ Alan Lamson - 2020

The son of a Society member and a Sweet Adeline, Alan Lamson joined the Barbershop Harmony Society in 1981 and immediately began to make a difference in the Manchester, CT chapter. He served as chapter President, Executive Vice President, and Music VP, and was awarded Barbershopper of the Year in 1989 and 1991, along with Barbershopper of the Decade for the 1990s.

At the district level, Alan has served as the Northeastern District (NED) president in 2003-2004, and has served as the NED VP-Contest & Judging since 2017. He has served on many Society committees, too many to mention here, and was named the Barbershop Harmony Society President in 2011-2012. He assumed the Society Interim Executive Director position in the summer of 2012 as he led the search for the new CEO.

Alan holds Bachelor’s degrees in Building Science and Architecture, as well a Master’s Degree in Public Administration. This would prove very beneficial to the members of BHS, as he took a leadership role in the Headquarters Location Search Committee. Alan identified the new headquarters location in Nashville, and made a significant contribution to the design of the building remodeling project. Alan’s administrative influence at the chapter, district, and society levels has had a lasting impact on thousands of barbershoppers and has helped to shape the future of the Barbershop Harmony Society.

Inducted - June 2020 / Celebrated - July 2022 at International in Charlotte, NC

Past District Presidents

The "Tommy Spirito" NED Patriot Division
Barbershopper of the Year Award

Presented by: Concord, MA Chapter, SPEBSQSA

At this point in the whole structure of all-things IT (that's "Information Technology" for you young-ones), the NED would be severely remiss if we, the current and past leadership of the NED, did not recognize the amazing dedication and commitment of two amazing, tireless individuals.

On behalf of the District, I hereby acknowledge and extend our gratitude to:

M."Rod" Rodrigues  -&-  Fred Kingsbury

Both originally from the Providence chapter, Rod has since migrated to the warmth of Florida. (Lucky guy!) Fred continues today, singing with fortitude in the Narragansett Bay Chorus , while his day job continues with new ColdFusion parent company, PaperThin Corp.

I have a new appreciation of the incredible amount of work these two men donated to our causes by volunteering to be the "webmasters" of the NED, beginning in 1998.  Wow!

Honorable mention must be granted to Rod's nephew, Michael, who had been the "hardware" guy - providing the actual server on which the District and many chapters were stored and hosted - all at no charge - for all these years (1998-2015)

Thank you, gentlemen - for the great job above and beyond.

In 2015, Steve Salamin (Marketing/ VP) set out to update and modernize the NED web site, after working with Rod and Fred on the old HTML server site for the previous four years. After numerous trials on different platforms, Steve settled on Squarespace as a host, which included a real-time web site builder with templates and many options, including Commerce (selling) and a controlled design. Steve set out rebuilding the site from the ground up, with Antonio Lombardi assisting from the “district secretary” perspective. Steve rebuilt the pages you see today, updating history and establishing storage and cloud solutions. Squarespace was chosen for its powerful integrated and collaborative tools, overall architecture, easy access, its functionality and configuration for ease of use by anyone. No special skills needed.

Steve also applied for and was granted the ability to create the Google For Nonprofits organizational unit with Google (Alphabet, Inc.), allowing better control of analytics, user and group controls, email and database collection. This allowed the use of “NEDistrict.org” for user email management.

Steve also established two powerful tools to manage email marketing, Beefree.io (Bee Design Content/Growens) and MailChimp (a marketing automation platform and email marketing service). With these two new tools, we abandoned the Yahoo Groups for email communications and marketing - a completely powerless media for communications. With BeeFree as a powerful content builder, and MailChimp for our email marketing and user/list management, we entered a new era of online experiences, content management, marketing, with ease of use, multi-user control, speed and flexibility.

~ Steve Salamin

NED DVP-Marketing & PR / Jan-2012 to Sept-2022

Updated: 3/15/2015 & 9/1/2022 @ Keene, NH