A glee club is a musical group, historically of male voices but also of female or mixed voices, which traditionally specializes in the singing of short songs—glees—by trios or quartets. The first named Glee Club was founded in Harrow School, in London, England, in 1787. Glee clubs were very popular in the UK from then until the mid 1850s but by then they were gradually being superseded by choral societies. By the mid-20th century, proper glee clubs were no longer common. However, the term remained (and remains) in use, primarily for choirs found in Japanese and North American colleges and universities, despite the fact that most American glee clubs are choruses in the standard sense and no longer perform glees. Glee in this context does not refer to the mood of the music or of its singers, but to a specific form of English part song popular between 1650 and 1900, the glee.

The oldest glee clubs in the United States are the Harvard Glee Club, founded in 1858; the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club, founded in 1859; the Yale Glee Club, founded in 1861; The University of Pennsylvania Glee Club, founded in 1862; the Amherst College Glee Club, founded in 1865; the Cornell University Glee Club founded in 1868; the Virginia Glee Club, founded in 1871, and the Rutgers University Glee Club, founded in 1872.

Noun

glee (countable and uncountable; plural glees)

1. (uncountable) Joy; merriment; mirth; gaiety; particularly, the mirth enjoyed at a feast.
   • 1968, The Rolling Stones, “Sympathy for the Devil” (song), in Beggars Banquet (album): 

     I watched with glee while your kings and queens fought for ten decades for the gods they made.

2. (uncountable) Music; minstrelsy; entertainment.
3. (music, countable) An unaccompanied part song for three or more solo voices. It is not necessarily gleesome.

• lege

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