The Future of Music: Oberlin College and Conservatory

Kendrick Lamar: Y'all got a whole lot of motherfucking energy up in here tonight.
Like I said, my name is Kendrick Lamar. I'm from a place called Compton, California.
Luna: That's the sound of Kendrick Lamar at the Oberlin Dionysus Disco. In 2011. His breakout
sophomore album, good kid, mad City, came out the following year. Now he sells at stadiums.
How did a Grammy award and Pulitzer Prize winner come to a small liberal arts college in the
middle of Ohio?
All: My name is Luna. My name is Callie. My name is Micaela.
Luna: and we set out to investigate how bands are chosen to perform at Oberlin. The answer is
a small but mighty team of Oberlin student bookers. We spoke to third year, Seiami Kim-Aoda,
about her experience as a SCO Booker.
Seiami: So I work for SUPC, which is the Student Union Programming Committee that is
basically just like the booking organization for the ‘Sco.
As bookers, we reach out to various artists, then they're like management teams, and if they're
within our budget, we do what we can to bring the artists to the ‘Sco. And then once they're at O

Berlin. Booker to make sure that the artist has everything that they need and like that they are
feeling welcomed and taken care of.
Seiami:I just booked my first show. It was LSD-X-O-X-O
Callie: LSD-X-O-X-O is a DJ from Philly, who's based in Berlin and has more than 78,000
followers on Instagram.
Seiami:I actually started pursuing him as a booking in May. I found his agent's email and then
reached out, and then you have to send over the contract and make sure that the hotels are
booked and sound like concert sound.
Seiami:He came here on November 22nd. I feel like that's kind of like the typical, the typical run
of operations
Micaela: To get another perspective on the music that's brought to Oberlin. We spoke to Sloane
DiBari. A writer and DJ for the Student Run Radio show, WOBC.
Sloane: My name is Sloane DIBari. I've been DJing at WOBC since my first semester of my
freshman year.
Sloane:I was just a DJ for a while and then I joined the blog work group in the spring and it was
super fun and so I went for worker director, which I do with two to four other people. It depends
on the semester. It's a really great way to be involved with music journalism on campus. So I
write a lot of criticism, I've reviewed shows like on campus.
Sloane: I've been to some amazing, amazing shows here. It was my first week at Oberlin and
Solow played here and it was crazy.
Callie: SoulGlow is an American punk band from Philly.
Sloane:I mean, the mosh pit was horrible because no one knew how to mosh, but it was, the
music was amazing. I feel like with concert board coming back, they've been bringing, I don't
wanna say like trendier, but a lot more like, I don't know, kind of like really talked about acts like
very, very current ones, both with like SUPC and concert board, especially with like Jane
Remover and like bass victim,
Callie: Jane remover and bass victim are both considered alternative slash indie artists.
Sloane:There's those, and then there's this kind of indie folk chamber pop types that are also
very trendy, like Racing Mount Pleasant and Villager.
Callie: We asked Seiami how she selects bands she wants to book.

Seiami: For me personally, it's a lot of talking to my friends and acquaintances and stuff and like
seeing what other people are listening to.
Seiami: And just sort of like getting a gauge on what would be well attended. Ultimately, we're
doing this for the students and for community members who want to just go and see some good
music. I think it is super important to factor in what we think would be successful at the school.
Sloane:I think that kind of points to this really interesting trend. We're bringing these cult favorite
artists who have major followings at Oberlin. Obviously, Solarity focuses more on hip hop
generally speaking. But it would be cool to have more hip hop and like r and b acts here, like I
think Black hibiscus at Cat in the, at the Cat and the cream was really cool and I wish that there
were more of that.
Luna: Black Hibiscus is a Nigerian born indie soul artist
Sloane: But I feel like, honestly our bookings and stuff are pretty diverse. Definitely not saying
that it leaves much to be desired because I think the music scene here is great and the student
bookers are doing a great job and this is something that you really don't see at a lot of other
colleges.
Luna: We then spoke to Jeremiah Ince, a student performer, to get his perspective on the
process of performing at Oberlin.
Jeremiah: My name is Jeremiah Ince, I'm a rapper and a jazz pianist, so I'm able to be behind
the mic and also behind the keys on stage, whether it be for like the band Sangria or whatever
shows my friends that to play.
Jeremiah:And then I also produce, and so I get on stage, I rap, all those types of things.
Luna: Here's a sample of Jeremiah's work.
Sample of “Witchachess”
Callie: We asked Jeremiah what it's like to put on a show here.
Jeremiah:Yeah, I mean, it's not crazy difficult. I think for me personally, it's more, having to
figure out who's gonna be in the band and luckily have made so many connections my first
couple of years that, that's never a question for me about who's gonna be in the band.
Jeremiah: I always book my shows like crazy far in advance so that I don't have to worry about
having to compete for a spot.
Micaela: Jeremiah also had some thoughts on how bands are selected to come perform at
Oberlin.

Jeremiah:Yeah, that rock, that indie is really the genre of Oberlin, even though it's like a mis
group of students, mis group of genres, mis group of everything.
Jeremiah:But rocking and indie are like the genres there. Yeah. I'm not, I'm not mad at it. I do, I
do wish that there was more like, like rap and R and B. At the same time, it's like we're in
Midwest, Ohio, there's, there's this rap quintet or this quintet called What More, and they just
dropped an album this past year.
Jeremiah: I feel like they're really, really dope artists. That would be really, really dope to have
in Oberlin. But they're more on that rap, R and B side of things, so I don't know how many
people will want to come to that show.
Callie: Being that some genres seem to be more prominent at Oberlin, we were curious to ask if
there is a certain type of musical artist that says yes to Oberlin.
Seiami: I think most artists are open to it if we can pay what they're asking for. Because of that,
we have to sort of look to smaller artists. I would say like most of the people that I've reached
out to who are within our budget have all been very enthusiastic about me reaching out.
Jeremiah:Who do you know who wants to come to this show? Because that's all it is in the day.
You're not gonna pay like 5K for an artist that 10 people are gonna come to see. You know, so
it's a thing of like a conversation of, yes, I enjoy this artist, but will they bring people to the scope
or to the cat? And that's really the thing.
Seiami: I mean, I think that one of the main reasons why I applied for this job was because of
the fact that like Oberlin is a P-W-I
Luna: A P-W-I stands for predominantly white institution.
Seiami: And the lack of diversity within the student body translates to a lack of representation
within events. For me personally, it was really important for me to use this as an opportunity to
bring in more artists who are artists of color. That's definitely something that I've been very
aware of in the Oberlin music scene.
Micaela: After witnessing the artists that I've taken the stage and brought life to our otherwise
sleepy little town, it's evident that they belonged here from the moment they set foot on campus.
The environment here, albeit eccentric, is a breeding ground for creativity and expression.
Jeremiah: We're surrounded by some of the future's, world's greatest musicians, and so to
have those people like in your back pocket that you just know of that can either A, put you on or
B, you put them on, is insane.

Callie: Whether playing on stage in front of the entire campus or playing alone on a bench
outside, musicians can be seen perfecting their craft every day because of this culture. Oberlin
has great success in bringing artists to the school to perform.
Luna: And who knows, maybe the next Pulitzer Prize winning rapper is performing at Oberlin
right now
Sample of “Witchachess”
The video of Kendrick Lamar at Oberlin is by Turbo City on YouTube.
Music composed by Luna King O'Brien.