Brown and White Vol. 126 no. 15

              Vol. 126 No. 15
Tuesday, March 25, 2014
‘All the Lehigh News First’
THE BROWN AND WHITE
Lehigh University’s Student Newspaper Founded in 1894
SPORTS
Wrestlers fall
in championships
Page 12
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Panelists discuss
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Page 5
LIFESTYLE
Old and new blended in choral performance
By LAURA MELONE
University Productions has officially an­nounced that it has revamped Lehigh’s annual Sundaze music festival with a new concert se­ries called QUEST that will officially premiere on April 24.
Instead of the outdoor, daytime concert that UP has put on in springs past, QUEST will now feature two EDM musicians, Brillz and Flosstradamus, in the ArtsQuest building. Doors will open at 6:30 p.m.
Nevin Sackson, ’14, the music executive of UP, decided that the Sundaze music festival needed to be changed after students were not responding well to the artists selected and were not attending in large numbers.
“We were not seeing the return in the student’s attendance [or] their excitement over the concert,” Sackson said. “Sundaze was a great tradition, but we felt like it was time for something new.”
This “something new” that Sackson and the UP team were searching for was found in Floss­tradamus and Brillz. Their rave-like, techno music is much like the artists who once came to Lehigh for another event, “Dancing in the Dark,” a Halloween concert put on by UP in 2011.
According to Sackson, these artists will give the concert a lot of energy and make the year end with a bang.
UP’s main marketing director, Rae Riccardi, ’16, explained that Flosstradamus and Brillz are big names in the trap music genre, which is a combination of hip-hop, rap, heavy bass and dance music.
“It’s a re-emerging genre that people don’t necessarily know a lot about, but are seriously into every time it comes on,” Riccardi said. “Songs like ‘Turn Down for What’ made a big presence on campus, and we wanted to take it to the next level.”
UP has fielded a large public relations effort
By ABBY McBRIDE
On Friday and Saturday, the Lehigh University Choir, Dolce and Glee Club per­formed a combined concert entitled “The Best of All Possible Worlds” at 8 p.m. in Baker Hall of Zoellner Arts Center.
The show was directed by Sun Min Lee, accompanied by Susan Frickert, and con­ducted by Casey Rule, ’11.
The choral groups showcased the tradi­tional songs of Brahms, Bach and Rhein­berger, as well as contemporary American music by Bernstein, Ives and Hogan. The music was performed using instruments from the respective time periods.
The show was especially eclectic, with even spirituals and folk arrangements gaining their time in the spotlight alongside Bach and Rheinberger.
The groups performed Bach’s Cantata No. 106 with a baroque ensemble, violas da gamba, a postiff organ, recorders and a cello.
The show dealt with the idea of time by combining a variety of artwork.
“It’s kind of looking through different time periods, moving from Bach to Braum to spiritual pieces,” said Jess Heymach, ’16, a member of the university choir. “That’s kind of where we got ‘The Best of All Pos­sible Worlds’ from. We put a lot of effort into this performance, it’s the last university choir concert for the seniors. It has a variety of genres, and we really hope people enjoy it.”
Kelly Mayid, ’17, attended the concert and thought that it did a good job of em­bodying its theme.
“The whole theme was around the world, [and] at the end, they brought it back to old spirituals,” she said. “You could really under­stand what they were saying.”
B&W photo by BRISHTY KHOSSEIN
The Lehigh University Choir prepares to perform at its concert Friday night. “The Best of All Possible Worlds” concert showcased multiple genres of music.
See QUEST Page 2
See CONCERT Page 3
Talk focuses on religion and tradition
Flosstradamus, Brillz to headline
QUEST in April
The inner workings of Yik Yak
By NICOLE MONTALBANO
Professor Philip Gorski spoke about the value of tradition as part of the Humanities Center’s “Home” lecture series in Lin­derman Library on Thursday afternoon.
Gorski, a sociology professor at Yale University and the co-di­rector for its Center for Compara­tive Research, began his lecture with an overview of his most recent book and work in prog­ress, “Prophetic Republicanism: The American Civil Religious Tradition.”
According to Gorski, the focus of the title and prospective subtitle for his book is the civil religion as a tradition.
Gorski split up his lecture into three distinct parts: first defining civil religion and tradition, then sketching out the development of the tradition and finally defining its broader political and cultural implications.
Throughout his talk, Gorski referred to a founder of the idea of civil religion, Robert Bellah.
“Bellah says that the civil reli­gion is woven out of two strands of thought: prophetic religion and civic republicanism,” Gorski said. “Again, I agree.”
He then added to Bellah’s defi­nition of civil religion.
“First, I prefer to conceptual­ize it as a tradition, rather than a myth, as something that contains truth as well as confers meaning,” he said. “Second, I prefer to think of it as one of several competing traditions.
“Third, I think the history of
See TALK Page 3
By CHRISTINA CAVANAUGH
The social media app Yik Yak has recently grown in popularity among Lehigh students who have been using its anonymous posting feature to comment about their Lehigh experiences.
The app uses GPS features to track people’s locations; the posts that make up users’ news stream are posted by people near them geographically, rather than allowing them to choose their own networks.
This has led to an ongoing stream of posts that have been crafted by people on or near Lehigh’s campus be­ing available to users who have downloaded the app near campus.
The anonymous feature of the app has caught people’s attention, as users are able to say whatever they want with­out having to necessarily stand by their comments.
Lehigh associate professor of journalism and communi­cations Jeremy Littau teaches courses on incorporating the use of newer media forms into the traditional journalism field. He mentioned that the anonymity feature is becom­ing more common in today’s apps.
“I think this [type of app] is a bit of a market correction against what some feel is their giving away too much of themselves in social networks,” he said.
Privacy, he argues, has become more of a central focus as people have been forced to combat tendencies to over-share with new social media apps.
“Privacy is something to be protected,” he said. “A good example is Snapchat; it’s a chatting app, but the sense that they’re trying to make content disappear sheds light on the fact that nobody wants these things to be permanent.”
Nicole Montalbano, ’15, has been checking in with the app for around a week, she said.
“I don’t post anything, I just check it when I’m bored,” she said. “I don’t contribute to it at all.”
Users are able to cast votes for posts, indicating their overall like or dislike for the posts. If posts receive too many negative votes, they are removed from the overall viewer feed.
“It’s completely anonymous, so nobody’s held account­able,” Montalbano said. “And it’s very, very explicit.”
Littau mentioned that the app’s anonymity may be
See YIK YAK Page 3