Following the announcement of performers for the 2011 Ivies concert last Friday, student praise and criticism for the Entertainment Board (E-Board) selections began flowing immediately.
Janelle Monáe, Mac Miller and Local Natives are the three acts who will perform at the April 30 concert.
Morgan Andersen '12, co-chair of the E-Board, believed that student feedback has been largely positive.
"A lot of people don't actually know that many of the bands," he said, but "everyone who knows even one of the bands is really psyched."
Mik Cooper '14 agreed, saying, "I don't know much about any of the three artists... [but] I'm excited."
According to Andersen, the E-Board "made a conscious choice to go for smaller, middle size acts" instead of a single, more expensive performer.
"I understand the reasoning for three little acts as opposed to one big one, whose performance might be bad," said Peggy Zhao '13, bringing to mind Sean Kingston's widely-disparaged Ivies performance in 2009.
When the E-Board distributed an online survey to the student body in the fall, hip-hop artist Wiz Khalifa received a surprising amount of support.
The Board selected Mac Miller as a less-expensive alternate to Khalifa, who was already booked during Ivies weekend. Miller has toured extensively with Khalifa and performs in a similar style.
Zhao, however, had never heard of Miller.
"Matt Miller?" she asked. Benjamin Ziomek '13 echoed Zhao's sentiments.
"[His] music is fine, but I'd never heard of any of [the groups] before," he said.
Janelle Monáe was chosen to headline the concert for her upbeat, energetic performances and charismatic persona.
"She has an 'everyone likes to dance' approach to music [and an unbelievable] stage presence," said Andersen.
"She's awesome," said Jordan Payne '12. "I just know she does the cool dance moves with her feet and wears tuxedos and has a little hair pouf."
Ziomek, however, disagreed.
"I totally agree about wanting danceable music...but Janelle Monáe's music isn't danceable," he said. Ziomek also suggested booking a student band or DJ act to open Ivies concerts in the future as a way to save money.
Local Natives was selected to please the wide range of indie music tastes indicated on the E-Board's survey.
"I feel like Local Natives has been around a long time," said Cooper.
According to Andersen, the E-Board made an effort to please as many students as possible by including such musically diverse performers.
"The original music survey results were all over the map," he said. "Once people actually listen to the bands, [we think student reaction] will be extremely positive."
"I feel like [these artists] are up and coming," said Cooper. "If anything, they're gaining success."
Local Natives will open the concert, to be followed by Miller. Monáe will be the last to perform, creating what Andersen described as a "build-up in sound and intensity."
"Obviously not everyone will be thrilled [because] that's impossible," said Andersen, "but we did as good a job as we could have this year."
"It's going to be a great show," he added.