Martha the Mop Lady Maggie Kinabrew: 'It's By Far the Largest Crowd I Ever Sung For'

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — More than 17,000 Indiana basketball fans packed Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall to watch their Hoosiers face the Ohio State Buckeyes on Jan. 28. What the crowd didn't know was they'd be getting a special live performance from Indiana icon Martha the Mop Lady, also known as Maggie Kinabrew.

In 1971, Indiana Farm Bureau Insurance became the sole sponsor of both Indiana and Purdue basketball games on television station WTTV-4. In the mid-1970's, the Martha the Mop Lady campaign was introduced and ran during the basketball games.

The spot features Martha Webster, an opera singer who dressed as a cleaning lady and swept the Hall while singing the school's fight song, "Indiana, Our Indiana."

Now, the traditional video plays before every men and women's home game on the big screen, but this year, Indiana opera singer in the Jacobs School of Music Kinabrew transformed into Martha and gave her own rendition of the performance.

"I could hear the fans stomping on the bleachers, and I was like 'ok, we got to do this', but also too though there was such a lovely energy from the crowd," Kinabrew said. "Once I got out there, I felt like 'let's go for it'."

Kinabrew's performance sparked the Hall to get on its feet and perhaps was a good omen for Indiana to defeat Ohio State 86-70.

Kinabrew was first contacted to play Martha through her performance website in October 2022 by senior assistant athletic director of marketing Mark Skirvin as Kinabrew was referred to him by Eric Smedley, the associate professor of music in bands within the Jacobs School of Music.

At first, Kinabrew wasn't aware of the mop lady tradition as she completed her undergraduate degree at Oberlin College near Cleveland, Ohio. However, she has always had ties to Indiana despite growing up in Connecticut.

"I have always had this kind of connection to IU and IU basketball because my grandparents both taught at the law school in the seventies," she said.

Kinabrew's mom spent the first four years of her life in Bloomington while her parents taught. Now, fast forward to when Kinabrew's grandmother first heard her granddaughter would perform as Martha — you can imagine the emotion.

"My grandmother was very excited," Kinabrew said. "She watched the whole game."

Before the live performance, Skirvin explained the tradition to Kinabrew, who then started practicing around mid December.

"I am an opera singer, so most of the time I'm doing a very different kind of singing that Martha called for, so I listened to the recording a lot," Kinabrew said. "I really loved the way the original Martha sings the fight song."

Learning the tune and words didn't take long as it's a short piece, Kinabrew said, but she more so spent time on trying to emulate the performance while making it comfortable for her own voice. It then started to get more real when Kinabrew began practicing in the near empty Hall.

"We had a meeting right after the spring semester started where we got to go down to the court, and we kind of blocked out where I was going to walk from, how long it was going to take, where I was going to end up," she said.

The university did a great job of dressing Kinabrew to look like the original Martha except for one key change.

"The only real big difference is they put me in the special IU Adidas tennis shoes instead of in the original video you look really close, she's wearing like white loafers," Kinabrew said.

Ready to go with her Adidas kicks and full costume, Kinabrew had some nerves while sitting in the wrestling office that served as her green room.

"It's by far the largest crowd I ever sung for," Kinabrew said.

The performance clearly was a success, and Kinabrew's couple minutes of fame didn't stop and won't stop there.

Not only did her friends, family and fellow Jacobs School of Music classmates show support for her, but she also received random Facebook messages from Hoosier fans appreciative of her performance.

Soon after her gig, Kinabrew was substituting to sing in a church choir downtown, and the organist recognized her as Martha. Kinabrew said although she doesn't wear the Martha getup on the street, she's still getting encouraging praise from strangers.

"It has expanded beyond the music school circle," Kinabrew said.

Kinabrew will continue to sing her way to graduation in May as she looks for even more opportunities to perform. She could end up anywhere, she said.

"I am currently pursuing an operatic career," Kinabrew said. "I've been auditioning all year."

Martha was a great way to start her final semester as Kinabrew said she's thankful for Smedley and Skirvin for the opportunity as well as the Marching Hundred for hyping her up in practice.

"All of that really helped me to turn in the performance that I did," Kinabrew said.

Kinabrew has a big audition coming up soon, but as far as suiting up as Martha again: "As far as I know, this is kind of the one time for me."