A mere case of misinterpretation inspired the name of the close-knit music group, Key of Gee.

The Key of Gee is an a cappella group made up of Ohio State students, which officially started in October 2010.

The idea came from when a former president of A Cappella Alliance opened up a forum where people who wanted to be in an a cappella group could meet and form various groups.

“I stood up after the first informational meeting and said I wanted to hit the ground running and attempted to organize the large group of approximately 40 people,” said Nick Navaratnam, president of Key of Gee. “After auditions, we had a group of 16 people.”

The name of the group came shortly after, out of frustration with a twist of misinterpretation.

“I was plucking out notes for a song in the key of E and while I expressed my frustration with the odd key, I said, ‘I hate the key of E.’ One of the members misheard me and thought I said key of Gee,” Navaratnam said.

E. Gordon Gee is the president of OSU, and the inspiration on the play on words.

The group had its first gig with OUAB’s Buckeye Showcase and has since performed at various campus locations including “Best Day of Your Life,” OWL kick-off and the Freedom Festival.

The Key of Gee members said they feel they are a close-knit group compared to other music groups, and that they are musicians who love to perform, no matter whom that may be with.

“I would definitely say that there isn’t another a cappella group on campus that has the close relationship that we have with one another,” said Katie Leach, a third-year in human development and family science.

The group has latched onto one another, creating life-long friendships.

“I found a group of individuals on campus that share my love of music and can do it amazingly, and we make an amazing product,” Navaratnam said.

Now with 19 members, the group practices twice a week and has students from different majors but interestingly enough, does not have any music majors.

“We have a finance major, engineering major, pretty much everything except for music. But somehow we all come together and we make beautiful music together,” Navaratnam said.

Even with a variety of different music tastes, the members feel when they are performing the audience can see their connection.

“We go from listening to everything from classical music to rock to dubstep, we just bring all that musical taste to our group,” said Josh Goldfarb, a third-year in communication. “When we do pitching sessions, you get every single kind of music taste coming in. You can feel it in the music, you can feel all these different interests and the audience feels it too.”

Will Blocher, the group’s music director, arranges all the music after the group devotes an entire day deciding on a song.

The Key of Gee just wants to be the group on campus that everyone knows, Navaratnam said.

The group will be performing at OUAB’s “OSU Sing-Off Featuring Rockapella” Nov. 9 at 7 p.m.

Navaratnam said the group has been practicing for the “Sing Off” and is excited about the playful competition with the other a cappella groups.