North Texas Daily

John Jacob Hough / Contributing Writer

The University Program Council will soon hold a vote for students to choose which musical artist they want to perform a concert at UNT in the spring.

The vote will open in the next few weeks once a committee of student leaders selects the artists to grace the ballot.

The potential artists will be selected from a pool of nationally known artists collected by a talent agent from ConcertIdeas.com, which has been working with UPC to organize the concert. The selected artists will be revealed once the survey is opened.

“The first survey we sent out was just to see what the most popular genre on campus was,” UPC President Lucy Hill said. “We used that to get a feel for who we should put on this survey where students will actually choose who will play.”

Former student body president Rudy Reynoso and former student body vice president Justin Wood came up with the idea to hold a concert at UNT while they were still in office in the spring.

They hoped an event like this would bolster the university’s extracurricular reputation to that of other schools such as the University of Texas-Arlington, which has had concerts of this type in the past.

“I wouldn’t even really call it our idea, because it’s something that the students had been talking about for a while now,” Wood said. “We just wanted to bring something that would give people a positive view of UNT.”

This spring a survey was sent out to determine what kind of events students would be interested in at UNT. Hill said that having a concert was “the most prominent” event that students wanted to bring to UNT.

“It’s going to grab students’ attention more than just having someone come and speak,” hospitality management junior Andrea Meza said.

The ability to choose who plays is also appealing to some students.

“Having something that encourages participation of the student body is going to be more engaging,” English sophomore Frank Telesca said. “And it’s going to have better results because people will be more inclined to go to something they took part in planning.”

A budget of $150,000 has already been set for the concert through the Student Services Committee. Further specifics such as the date and location are still being determined, but Hill said that more of these details will be announced once an artist is chosen.

Over the summer the Student Government Association worked with UPC to gain approval for the event through the Student Services Committee, and now that the concert has been approved, the event is being handled by UPC.

Links to the survey will be provided to students through Eagle Connect. Questions, concerns or comments can be directed to the UPC office in room 170 of the Stovall Temporary Union Building or by email at upc@unt.edu.