As customers find themselves walking up the stairs of Donkey Coffee, they are greeted by a mural of many different musicians, bands and artists. The shop invites customers to test their knowledge through the Donkey Music Contest centered around the mural.
Donkey, located at 17 W. Washington St., is hosting a contest for its customers and local visitors. The Donkey Music Contest involves identifying and listing over 40 bands and musicians from the mural in Donkey’s stairwell.
The paper contest can be found by the register, or a barista can help locate the paper copies. The due date of the contest is Sept. 15 and the drawing Sept. 20. The winner is determined by the highest number of accurate names and will receive a $100 Donkey gift card and T-shirt.
The original mural of bands started over 10 years ago. The mural is done by Kevinn Fung, Donkey’s in-house artist. The idea came from Chris Pyle, owner of Donkey. Pyle brought this idea to the shop as a tribute to his love for music.
“We’re just a whole bunch of music geeks here,” Pyle said. “We love sitting around talking about music all the time, and we thought, oh, that would be a cool Donkey thing to do where we give away…$100 of free drinks.
This contest has been discussed for a long time, and they’re finally bringing it to life. Pyle said the mural features all kinds of musicians, and is continuously being added to today. It consists of around 200 bands and artists, featuring different musicians throughout history.
“What’s represented is everything from the beginning of recorded history where, you know, bands started to be recorded with Louis Armstrong in the 20s, and then all the way up through today,” Pyle said.
The mural provides another creative display for guests, decorating the stairwell leading to upstairs seating. Through the contest, customers can get to know the artwork better and become familiar with the musicians it showcases.
Chrysallis Janes, a barista at Donkey, shares the contest is a fun event for customers to get involved with Donkey. Janes said she is married to Fung, and feels “connected” to the mural.
“My husband was the one that was putting together the paintings for the mural, and he basically gets to design the outlay and everything like that,” Janes said. “Chris just decides all the bands that are going to go up there, it's got to go through him.”
Janes said the contest also creates engagement for the local art displayed in Donkey.
“We thought it would be fun to try to involve the community and be like, ‘take a look at the mural and see if you could actually identify some of the artists on there just from the album art cover that he put up,’” Janes said. “It’d be a good, fun way to get people to pay more attention to the stairwell, as well as just come in and share the enthusiasm for music that Chris has.”
Although Donkey's baristas see the mural as a part of their everyday work experience, the contest allows customers to further interact with the coffee shop. In doing so, the mural becomes more than just wall art and into an interactive experience for those visiting Donkey.
Cooper Brown, a senior studying contemporary music and digital instruments, shared his thoughts on Donkey’s Music Contest.
“I like it a lot, and it supports the artist that does the mural,” Brown said. “It gets his artwork out more, which he’s really talented, and all the art on that wall is really cool.”
Brown said he hopes all participants are truthful in their responses in order to keep the event fun.
“I hope no one cheats,” he said. “I don’t want people to look it up. I think it’d be cool just to test everyone’s music knowledge, which is fun. And it’s definitely the vibe here.”
The contest gives customers the opportunity to test their music knowledge of all different artists featured in the mural.
