Stanford Talisman

{{Primary sources|section|date=November 2019}}

From founder Joe Pigato at Talisman's 25th Anniversary Show:

"October 1989 - I was a sophomore here at Stanford and I had just started my second year and was not singing again, though I'd been singing most of my life. A good friend came up from my hometown and was lamenting the fact that I wouldn't be singing again. He said, 'Well, why don't you start your own group?' And I thought, 'Well, bit of work, my friend Ben [is] a super excitable guy - it's going to take a bit of work to do.'

I went home from that breakfast and my ideas was that I wanted to do world music because that's what's I grew up listening to and that's what I love, and as wonderful as college a cappella is, it wasn't the style or what I wanted to sing. So I went home, I jotted down a few songs - I wasn't going to start the group, I just jotted down a few songs, what I thought we might sing, what our name might be, maybe where we'd practice, maybe when we'd practice, and uh, pretty soon I realized I was on my way to doing this. I sat back and I thought, 'World music - it's not the thing that brings in the audience, I don't know if anyone's going to want to sing this.' But I decided on January 15th, 1990 at Braun room 105, I was going to have my first auditions.

I put 2,000 fliers up around campus talking about singing music with stories from around the world. I was sure no one was going to come to our audition. I woke up with an awful, awful migraine. My accompanist couldn't come and play scales. I thought, "Maybe this isn't meant to be." I went over to Braun 105, there was a big crowd outside the room, and I had already messed up scheduling a couple times. I thought maybe the Ram's Head Musical had got the room for auditions, and now I'm just a wreck. I walk up, there's a crowd, I'm like, 'So what is this for?' Someone looks and says 'It's for Talisman?' And I panicked, and I said, 'Um, great. Well, good luck with that.' I walked away to the Tresidder Parking Lot and was justing thinking, 'Okay, here.' I was humming this song, N'kayalamakawa, this African song that I loved. I was thinking about the music that I wanted to sing, the stories and music from around the world. I thought, 'I know this music can exist on campus. If I can just find people who would sing this, we could do something big.' I looked back at Braun and I thought, 'There are those people.'

So I walked back, I said 'Did you say Talisman?' and he said 'Talisman!', and they were there. From that group, we found 15 fantastic singers. For the next 25 years, every year we have 5 or 10 new singers who have wonderful heart, wonderful vision, who want to bring the stories of the world to express them, and we've now been able to bring those people together for 25 years."{{Citation|last=Stanford Talisman|title=Stanford Talisman's 25th Anniversary Show|date=2015-11-06|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpvnA7QMa4I&t=|access-date=2019-02-06}}

• No Murmur, No Zealots (1992)
• Tonic Rhythms (1994)
• After Silence (1996)
• Anthem (1996), greatest hits album
• Held in Shining (1998)
• Shine (2000), 10-year anniversary album
• Passage (2001)
• Watch Me Fly (2003)
• The Quick Day is Done (2006)
• Twenty (2010), 20-year anniversary album
• Going Home (2011)
• New Crossroads (2012), a joint recording with Peace Africa Children's Ensemble
• Stanford Talisman Live (2020), a compilation of live Talisman performances from 2018-2019
• Your Voice, Above the Storm (2020)

• Featured in "Calling All Dawns", debut Christopher Tin album (2009)
• The Knoll Sessions (2017), a five-song collection recorded at CCRMA at Stanford University in the summer of 2017
• Muliwai (2018), a five-song collection recorded at CCRMA at Stanford University in the summer of 2018

{{Awards table|5}}

|-

| 1995

| Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards

| Best Mixed Collegiate Soloist

| Elena Melendez

| style="background: #F4F2B0" | {{Center|Runner-up}}

| {{cite web |title=1995 Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award Winners |url=http://www.casa.org/cara1995w |website=The Contemporary A Cappella Society |access-date=13 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191030104250/http://www.casa.org/cara1995w |archive-date=30 October 2019 |url-status=unfit}}

|-

| rowspan="2" | 1997

| rowspan="2" | Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards

| Best Mixed Collegiate Album

| After Silence

| {{nom}}

| {{cite web |title=1997 Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award Nominees |url=http://www.casa.org/cara1997n |website=The Contemporary A Cappella Society |access-date=13 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190618125404/http://www.casa.org/cara1997n |archive-date=18 June 2019 |url-status=unfit}}

|-

| Best Mixed Collegiate Song

| "The Rainmaker"

| style="background: #AFFBA3" | {{Center|Won (tie)}}

| {{cite web |title=1997 Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award Winners |url=http://www.casa.org/cara1997w |website=The Contemporary A Cappella Society |access-date=13 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190811001016/http://www.casa.org/cara1997w |archive-date=11 August 2019 |url-status=unfit}}

|-

| 1999

| Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards

| Best Mixed Collegiate Album

| Held in Shining

| {{nom}}

| {{cite web |title=1999 Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award Nominees |url=http://www.casa.org/cara1999n |website=The Contemporary A Cappella Society |access-date=13 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190615002438/http://www.casa.org/cara1999n |archive-date=15 June 2019 |url-status=unfit}}

|-

| rowspan="2" | 2004

| rowspan="2" | Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards

| Best Mixed Collegiate Album

| Watch Me Fly

| {{won}}

| rowspan="2" | {{cite web |title=2004 Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award Winners |url=http://www.casa.org/cara2004w |website=The Contemporary A Cappella Society |access-date=13 February 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190811050244/http://www.casa.org/cara2004w |archive-date=11 August 2019 |url-status=unfit}}

|-

| Best Mixed Collegiate Arrangement

| Ron Ragin for "Swing Low"

| style="background: #F4F2B0" | {{Center|Runner-up}}

{{end}}

The International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella (ICCA) first judged live a cappella performance competitions in 1996.

Former members include composer Christopher Tin, class of '98;{{cite news |title=Stanford alumnus wins Grammy |url=http://www.stanforddaily.com/2011/02/15/stanford-alumnus-wins-grammy/ |work=The Stanford Daily |date=15 February 2011 |accessdate=3 December 2019}} filmmaker Jeff Orlowski, class of '06;{{cite news |title=From now on his ride is free|url=https://stanfordmag.org/contents/from-now-on-his-ride-is-free/ |work=Stanford Magazine |date=1 May 2004 |accessdate=7 October 2020}} Sameer Gadhia, frontman of the band Young the Giant class of '11;{{cite news |last=Wilson |first=Lauren |title=A chat with Young the Giant|url=http://www.stanforddaily.com/2012/02/03/a-chat-with-young-the-giant/ |work=The Stanford Daily |date=3 February 2012 |accessdate=3 December 2019}} and author Yaa Gyasi, class of '11.{{cite news |last=Scott |first=Sam |title=The story behind 'Homegoing'|url=https://stanfordmag.org/contents/the-story-behind-homegoing |work=Stanford Magazine |date=1 July 2017 |accessdate=26 September 2020}}

• List of Stanford University a cappella groups

{{reflist}}

• {{Official website|http://www.stanfordtalisman.com/}}
• [https://www.youtube.com/user/stanfordtalisman/featured Youtube Channel]
• [https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTalisman/ Facebook]

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Category:Collegiate a cappella groups

Talisman

Category:Musical groups established in 1990