  We synthesize the rest-frame Stroemgren colors using SDSS spectra for 99,088
galaxies selected from Data Release 1. This narrow-band ~200 AA photometric
system (uz, vz, bz, yz), first designed for the determination of effective
temperature, metallicity and gravity of stars, measures the continuum spectral
slope of galaxies in the rest-frame 3200-5800 AA wavelength range. Galaxies
form a remarkably narrow locus (~0.03 mag) in the resulting color-color
diagram. The Bruzual & Charlot population synthesis models suggest that the
position of a galaxy along this locus is controlled by a degenerate combination
of metallicity and age of the dominant stellar population. Galaxy distribution
along the locus is bimodal, with the local minimum corresponding to an ~1 Gyr
old single stellar population. The position perpendicular to the locus is
independent of metallicity and age, and reflects the galaxy's dust content, as
implied by both the models and the statistics of IRAS detections. A comparison
of this locus with the galaxy locus in the H_delta-D_n(4000) diagram, utilized
by Kauffmann et al. (2003) to estimate stellar masses, reveals a tight
correlation, although the two analyzed spectral ranges barely overlap. Overall,
the galaxy spectral energy distribution in the entire UV to near-IR range can
be described as a single-parameter family with an accuracy of 0.1 mag, or
better. This nearly one-dimensional distribution of galaxies in the
multi-dimensional space of measured parameters strongly supports the conclusion
of Yip et al. (2004), based on a principal component analysis, that SDSS galaxy
spectra can be described by a small number of eigenspectra. Apparently, the
contributions of stellar populations that dominate the optical emission from
galaxies are combined in a simple and well-defined way.
