By Hailey MacDonald
Sunday, May 1 will mark a special day in the Western New England University community: the first fully in-person Spring Event concert since 2019. This festival-style afternoon will be filled with outdoor games, a pop-up thrift store, a handful of photo ops, food trucks, and most importantly, musical performances by Olivia O’Brien and special guests 3OH!3 and girlfriends.
The Spring Event executive board has been working hard to plan and successfully execute this event since last October. Not only was the group challenged with wanting to think outside of the box and try new things for this traditional event, but we were challenged with the pressure of putting together a large-scale on campus concert for the first time in 3 years.
The Spring Event executive board is made up of eight undergraduate students and advised by Claire Wright, the Assistant Director for Clubs and Organizations in the Office of Student Involvement and Leadership. Clarice Berardinelli, the Chair of this year’s Spring Event, has been involved in this process in different capacities for the past four years, and she has motivated the group to be creative and make this event whatever they want it to be.
The other members of the Spring Event executive board are Samantha Denault, the Box Office Chair; Cameron Stansbury and Kyle Sandberg, the Co-Production Chairs; Nicole Acevedo, the Hospitality Chair; Hailey MacDonald, the Marketing Chair; Brendan Cassidy, the Security Chair; and Samantha Blau, the Special Events Chair.
Since the very first time the Spring Event executive board met, we knew we wanted to do something big. Besides the current seniors, most students here have never seen what the traditional Spring Event concert is like. Last year’s show with Lee Brice and Maddie & Tae was a live virtual concert experience with screens and viewing parties around campus, but it simply wasn’t the same. Therefore, we knew that this year needed to be unforgettable.
“It’s been so much fun getting to know our committee better over the last few months, and we’ve all been working so hard to make this the best Spring Event the campus has seen (especially since so many students have never had one),” said Acevedo. “I can’t wait for our Release Day party and to see everyone’s reactions!”
This year’s Spring Event Release Party took place on the afternoon of Tuesday, March 29. There was music BINGO for an activity for students to participate in, and winners were given the opportunity to announce this year’s artists to the campus community that gathered around.
There are a few details about this year’s event that are completely different than before. The concert will be outside on the Pine Grove, and the entire grass area will be filled with fun activities, food, giveaways, and more. We are aiming for a festival-like feel, which will be further promoted by having three different acts.
The first act of the day is girlfriends. Releasing their debut single in August 2020, Travis Mill and Nick Gross are punk artists with successful backgrounds in music. Travis Mills has transitioned into punk from a previous hip hop career, and Nick Gross is the co-owner of “Big Noise” record label. They have said that their musical inspiration comes from Blink-182, Good Charlotte, and Green Day.
3OH!3 is a classic alternative/electronic band who have created a lot of top hits over the years. Their songs “My First Kiss,” “DONTTRUSTME,” and “Starstrukk” are their most popular, coming out between 2008-2010 and all being on the Billboard Hot 100 for many weeks. The band’s singers, Sean Foreman and Nathaniel Motte, are from Boulder, Colorado, and have continued their music career for a decade and a half, first joining together in 2004. They have had a variety of other musical successes over the years, including co-writing songs for Ariana Grande and Maroon 5. In 2021, they had 3.34 million monthly listeners on Spotify.
Headlining this year’s Spring Event concert is Olivia O’Brien. O’Brien, who released her first EP in 2017 and has been putting music on Soundcloud since her freshman year of high school, taught herself to play both the guitar and piano on her own. Her biggest hit, “i hate u i love u,” peaked at number ten on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States, but hit #1 in Australia. In 2017, she was nominated for the iHeartRadio Music Award for Best Solo Breakout Artist as well as Radio Disney’s Music Award for Best Breakup Song.
This year’s Spring Event Concert is something that you don’t want to miss. Be sure to follow us on Instagram, @WNESpringEvent, for updates on Day of Show activities as well as pop-up programs throughout the semester.
