Barbershop harmony is a form of four-part a cappella singing practiced by around 70,000 singers worldwide. The rise of modern barbershop singing closely follows the timeline for late-stage capitalism and subscribes to its market logics; namely, success, competition, meritocracy, and self-improvement (Verhaeghe, 2014). From its 1930s reinvention as a formalised “genre” (Döhl, 2014), barbershop has positioned a complex contest system at its centre and included a plethora of educational events that centre on upskilling its members. Through a combination of auto-ethnographic and ethnographic examples, this paper explores the neoliberal logics at play in three types of barbershop events: conventions (where competitions happen), “harmony brigades” (weekend quartetting events), and “afterglows” (informal party after an event). We make two central arguments. Firstly, drawing on scholars such as Harvey (2005), Verhaeghe (2014), and Wilson (2024), we demonstrate the ways barbershop organisations and their members subscribe to the neoliberal focus on self-improvement and success. Secondly, we highlight how some barbershop events and activities (such as afterglows) can challenge neoliberal market logics. As such, this paper provides a vital contribution to the study of ethnomusicology: while we focus specifically on the barbershop style, this paper can provide a greater understanding of the neoliberal influence on other styles of musicking that also centre around competition and upskilling. Overall, we argue that, while barbershop provides a great sense of joy and community to its singers, these effects will remain limited so far as they subscribe to the market logics of success and self-improvement.