Photo by Kyle Vertin
CHARLES PRITCHARD
Staff Writer
With FREDFest no longer on the table, Spectrum has gone to great lengths to bring some end-of-the-year entertainment to Fredonia. Do the songs “All Night Longer” or “L.A. Story” ring a bell?
“We used to do FREDFest, which consisted of … outdoor activities,” President of Spectrum Rachel Ando said with a small laugh, “which led up to a concert the next night. Eventually, that got too big, so we couldn’t do the concert any more. When [FREDFest] got taken away last year, we thought that we had to do something, so we thought to bring back the concert.”
Revealed on WNYF-TV’s Fred Before Bed, the headlining act of the Spring Concert will be none other than Sammy Adams. MTV’s bio on the up-and-coming rapper claims he mixes “Shwayze-like beats, the caustic attitude of Ke$ha, and a tough version of suburban rap.”
The choice for a rapper to headline the event wasn’t a shot in the dark for Spectrum, but rather the result of planning and a canvassing done last semester.
“Last year, during our Dinosaur Bar-B-Que and throughout that whole week, we surveyed students throughout the campus as to what genre they would want to see on campus,” Vice President of Spectrum Meghan Flynn said. “We felt like we weren’t reaching out to the students and seeing what they wanted to hear and it’s hard for us. There’s only nine of us and representing the whole campus as nine people is not usually the easiest thing to do.”
Photo by Kyle Vertin
Sammy Adams may not be a household name (yet), but when planning events like this months in advance, it’s important to understand that Spectrum has to be realistic when booking events such as the Spring Concert.
“We have a budget, but it isn’t large enough to get someone super popular like Beyonce,” Ando said. “We found a few within our price range and consulted with them.”
While more than a few students here would more than love to see and hear Beyonce at Fredonia, BookingEntertainment.com tells us that someone as prolific as Beyonce costs upwards to $1 million or more to book.
Besides Sammy Adams headlining the event, Flynn said, “We do have two other acts, but we’re holding off their names until a little later.”
While not an event that could compare to FREDFest, the Spring Concert is an attempt to inject some life into the student body and offer a last hurrah before the end of the semester, the last semester for some students here.
The Spring Concert will take place April 23 at 7 p.m. in Steele Hall. Doors open at 6 p.m.