Last year, Andrew Holzaepfel, associate director of the Campus Involvement Center, made it very clear that The Convo spring show could not continue in the way it was managed last year.
Now this year’s Student Senate will attempt to bring the year’s largest university-sponsored music event — The Convo Concert — back in full swing. But it has some hurdles to overcome yet.
To move forward with a show for this spring, Student Senate President Nick Southall said the senate first has to gain backing from other student organizations to help fund the operating costs of the event. Ticket sales will cover the remaining contract fees, he said.
“We’re hoping to return to music,” Southall said. “The concert last year was put together last minute, which is why they went with a comedian instead of a big-name artist.”
He added that he hopes to have details nailed down by the end of the week and to send out a student survey in which students can vote on whom they would most like to see at The Convo before the semester is over, or at the beginning of Spring Semester.
Last year, Student Senate sent out a survey in early December asking the student body if it would prefer a big spring show in The Convo or more shows in Templeton-Blackburn Alumni Memorial Auditorium. The results said students “overwhelmingly wanted shows in the auditorium,” according to a previous Post article.
As a result, the Spring Convo Concert was nixed last year; however, after funds were reallocated into the General Fee, then-Student Senate President Zach George proposed hosting a Convo comedy night. In late spring, comedian Jim Gaffigan headlined the event.
“My biggest concern is to make sure students are aware that (The Convo Comedy Night) was a one-time thing,” Holzaepfel said in a previous Post article. “They had this General Fee surplus, but that money doesn’t exist in the budget for next year. The loss for that show alone was greater than my yearly budget for the Performing Arts Series.”
Austin LaForest, Student Senate treasurer, said he is “pretty confident” the executives can reach out to student organizations and raise enough money for the concert before time runs out to make solid plans.
Holzaepfel said many decisions for program coordination rely on Student Senate’s ability to plan the concert, as it affects how the Campus Involvement Center and the Black Student Cultural Programming Board book their spring concerts.
But after this semester, the Campus Involvement Center has fewer funds to work with as it was unable to make up the costs on two shows it expected to sell better — Fitz and the Tantrums and Capital Cities, and Craig Robinson.
“I feel like we didn’t have another huge concert that I would have liked to have,” Holzaepfel said. “I thought Fitz and the Capital Cities was going to be that concert because of how they were doing in the top 40.
“Looking back, probably the feeling among students might be that (a large concert) was missing, I would argue it was there, we just couldn’t get them to come out for it.”
Because of the low ticket sales, Holzaepfel said he had to dip into the center’s yearly budget of $94,000 more than he would normally liked to at the halfway mark. That leaves less funding to work with next semester; however, he said the center normally books fewer acts in the spring, aiming instead for a few select larger acts.
He added that the cancellation of Tal National also left something to be desired from this semester’s lineup. However, Holzaepfel said he is still dedicated to working with Stuart’s Opera House in the future and collaborating with different schools and areas of studies on campus.
@Wilbur_Hoffman
wh092010@ohiou.edu
This article appeared in print under the headline "Senate may book Convo concert"
