Officials explored options before double headliner picks

J. Cole performs at last year’s spring concert, hosted by UPC. Incoming Vice President of UPC Walter Hartley said complaints about last year’s single headliner show led UPC to seek a double headliner this year.

The University Program Council officially announced the performers for the Spring Concert May 1. Mat Kearney and Phillip Phillips will be the double-header for the show and Gin Wigmore, an up-and-coming artist, will be the opening act.

The process in choosing the artist to perform begins with the council looking at their annual budget. UPC has $75,000 to spend on live acts for a year.

“Out of our annual budget, we decided not to spend a dime over $60,000 for the Spring Concert,” said Aaron Lovelady, UPC live acts chairman. “Before we begin to look at talent, we decide between having it at either Flowers or Norton. UPC chose to host the concert at Norton Auditorium and that knocked off $8,000 for bringing in a stage if it was held in Flowers.”

UPC explored talent options with budget in mind and the venue reserved.

“UPC looks at how much we can spend on talent,” Lovelady said. “This year, that amount was between the $40,000 to $45,000 range. If you think about it, as far as how much talent costs on a scale of one to 10, it’s about a two and that’s what we have to work with.”

Some students have said that they would prefer one bigger artist over a double headliner, but incoming Vice President of UPC Walter Hartley said it’s difficult to please everyone.

“In the past, we’ve brought in one big artist for the concert and groups of students complained,” he said. “Now we’re bringing two and different groups are complaining that we should only have one. This is a perfect example of how you can’t please everyone.”

Finding two smaller artists is easier than bringing one larger artist, said incoming SGA President Laura Giles.

“With the big artists, you have to consider everything — touring, location, costs,” she said. “It’s difficult to bring a huge artist here. We don’t have that in our budget. It’s easier sometimes to find two artists who want to work together for one set cost.”

UPC takes that price and works with a middle agent to contact artists who fit the price and the schedule. The list is narrowed down to three and put to a vote in UPC. After the decision is made, UPC tries to work with the artist of choice and negotiate price and scheduling. From the list of three were Phillips and Kearney.

“After we started working with Phillip Phillips a little, Mat Kearney was interested in performing as well,” Lovelady said. “Kearney worked well with us on the price, and he and Phillips merged very well to perform a double-header for us. Their music isn’t too contrasting, and I think it’ll be very smooth and seamless.”

Since the announcement has been made, several students have voiced their opinions about the choices for performers.

“I look forward to every Spring Concert,” said Bethany Downs, UNA student. “I like a variety of artists, so I anticipate seeing what UPC chooses each time.”

“As an American Idol fan, I am very excited to see Phillip Phillips at the Spring Concert,” said Kayla Caruso, UNA student.

“I’m not a big fan of American Idol or Phillip Phillips, so I will not be attending this year’s Spring Concert,” said Amecia Smith, UNA student. “I do feel that UNA could do better with the Spring Concert choices and maybe have a choice of artists for the whole student body to vote on.”

Mikeil Jones, a pre-engineering major, said he had not heard of Phillips until UNA revealed he would be performing. Jones feels that UNA should choose someone more popular to the students.

Lovelady commented on the proposal of voting as a student body and said that UPC tried to poll students last year and it didn’t work out because there were troubles with the artist.

“We pick a variety of diverse students to try and represent the voice of the student body in UPC,” Lovelady said.

UPC will be selling a limited amount of T-shirts for $5. These T-shirts will be used in a Twitter contest for a chance to win one of three meet-and-greet tickets. Any student wearing one of the T-shirts can take a picture and Tweet it using #UNASpringConcert2013.

There are still free tickets available by showing a student ID at the Student Engagement Office in the GUC.

Lovelady added that UPC meetings are open and students are welcome to sit in and offer opinions every Monday afternoon at 3:30 in the upstairs conference room of the GUC.