 "Photo: Dan Bracaglia / Associate Photography Editor")
For the first time ever, the Rutgers University Programming Association hosted a silent rave at the Rutgers Student Center on the College Avenue campus where they announced the lineup of the artists performing at this year’s Rutgersfest.
The anticipated lineup up will open up with this year’s battle of the bands winner The N Result and then be followed by the three co-leads Ryan Leslie, Motion City Soundtrack and N.E.R.D.
“[Rutgersfest] has been a tradition for the past 10 years as a great way to celebrate the end of another successful academic year,” said RUPA Assistant Director of Programming Kiran Singh. “We work hard at making [Rutgersfest] a fun, substance-free way to celebrate across the University and bring together the huge campus community.”
Rutgersfest, which takes place on Livingston campus, will also provide students a chance to unwind with inflatable rides, carnival games and food vendors. This year’s festivities will be larger than last year’s and are free to students with the exception of the food, Singh said.
Usually, the lineup for Rutgersfest is announced during Hot Dog Day, but with Hot Dog Day moved to the fall semester because of a crowded late spring schedule of events, RUPA had to look for a new way to raise the curtain on the popular end-of-the-year celebration, Singh said.
Silent raves are an up-and-coming form of fun where participants bring their own MP3 players and listen to their favorite genre of music while dancing in a club-like atmosphere. These raves have been gaining a lot of popularity; last summer, a silent rave attracted over 7,000 “ravers” in Union Square, said RUPA Assistant Director of Programming Matthew Ferguson.
“Participants come and bring their iPods and listen to their own music,” Ferguson said. “They get together and dance; it’s really an interesting dynamic.”
Prior to the event, Ferguson said the best part about the silent rave is that everybody will be listening to his or her own music in one spot, and it would be interesting to see the different styles of music blend together when everybody is dancing.
Some of the University’s exchange students are familiar with the silent raves from their home countries and are excited to participate in one here.
“We have them at our festivals. There is usually always a silent rave tent,” said Gee Wilson, an exchange student from Sydney, Australia. “They are definitely increasing in popularity and it will be cool to do one [at the University].”
Students were also excited about being able to try to figure out what another raver was listening to just by the way they were dancing.
“Here everyone listens to lots of different genres of music. They could be listening to rap, rock or electro,” said Justine Szalay, an exchange student from Sydney. “It’s cool to see how people react to the different people dancing to their own music.”
The use of the silent rave is new to introducing the bands at Rutgersfest and could be back next year if this year is a success, Ferguson said. Since Hot Dog Day was in the spring, it gave RUPA a chance to do something different from the old tradition and perhaps start a new one.
“If it’s successful, it could be a fun, cool new tradition,” he said. “Doing something over and over again necessarily doesn’t mean it’s successful.”
Correction appended: A previous online version of this article stated that Rutgersfest is on Busch campus. Rutgersfest is actually on Livingston campus. This was corrected before the newspaper went to print.
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How is it only open to Rutgers students if it's a free event? Are there tickets?