“For students, by students.”
That’s the motto that Music Industry Club prioritized throughout the creation of MICfest, a music festival showcasing multiple student acts. The event spanned five hours and also featured collaborations with WUTK and Vintage Market Kox.
After last year’s success, MICfest returned on April 17 at HSS lawn. It showcased five individual singer-songwriters on a small stage by the pathway, and a larger band stage was set up at the base of the steps. Four of the five scheduled bands performed here, as the closing set by Pocket Ace got canceled due to the weather.
MIC president Caroline McDearman, a junior business management student, highlights how the event came together in hopes of creating both community and experiences for students on campus, especially for those within the club.
“I would say (the goal is) to bring the community together and to provide experiences for our MIC members — resume-building experiences. Not only is this event a great professional development tool, but it’s fun. It’s really social, people make a lot of friends doing it,” McDearman said.
The event was lively with students dancing with their friends, singing along to performances and hyping each other up.
“MICfest is such a great opportunity to just show your talents. Not only just some people on campus, but the people in your club … it’s really nice to just have them be so supportive,” said Grace Hany, a pre-med sophomore.
Hany is a member of MIC and is the chairman of the Songwriting Performance Committee. For MICfest, she also volunteered as the stagehands’ supervisor.
“We’ve been planning this for months. There’s a lot of people involved, but that’s part of the reason why we’re able to go so smoothly, because we start so far in advance,” McDearman said.
They started planning the event in December and have worked with not only on-campus collaborators, but also companies in the greater Knoxville area.
Bandit Lites is a local lighting company founded by UT alum Michael T. Strickland. They donated lighting equipment and also volunteered to help run MICfest after the university reached out to the company with information about MIC and what they do as a club.
“They have been so giving and also so supportive of us as young industry aspiring professionals, so we’re extremely grateful for them,” McDearman said.
Many members of MIC have toured their facilities, and the company has helped land members interviews in Nashville for positions in the live music industry. These connections help students to build networks for future careers, both behind the scenes and as performers.
MICfest is the biggest event that MIC puts on each year and helps the performers to grow their outreach. While it’s mainly students who attend, people from local venues will come out to listen as well.
“A ton of people in the community come to MICfest, (like) people who book bands for bars or frats,” McDearman said. “So (by) playing MICfest, you get the opportunity to play other places as well.”
Live performances give people a basis for networking. Whether it’s through someone being in attendance, seeing footage from the event or by word of mouth, a solid performance gives artists a chance to meet new people and work their way up the music scene.
“I want to do more (live performances) because you get better every single time. You learn something. It’s reps. The more you do it, the better you will be,” Hany said.
For Luna Blue, the first band to perform, this was their second gig of the semester.
“I feel like music is such a live activity and being able to play with people and form relationships through that is just, like, the best part,” Lily Rutherford, a marketing student and Luna Blue’s guitarist, said.
For Rutherford, the connections made while playing music are what make the performances worth it. For Hany, one of her favorite parts is when she’s able to play for the joy of it without feeling weighed down by nerves.
“I love that moment when you’re performing and, like, you realize you’ve got it,” Hany said. “I like feel like whenever I’m, I get really nervous and like, ‘okay, I’ve practiced this. I need to know where I need to put my fingers. I need to know what lyrics I need to say,’ and I’m thinking about that, but once I reach, sometimes a point, I’m like, ‘you got this,’ and I just have so much fun.”
At MICfest, she performed two originals, one that’s released on all streaming platforms under her name, “i hate october,” and one that’s unreleased called “work for you.”
She wasn’t the only performer to play or release music. Mason Johnson, a freshman music business student who uses the name Lucas Official, performed several originals from his album released in January.
“I think it went better than I ever could have imagined,” Johnson said. “Because people showed out for me in a place where I don’t always feel accepted because I do something so different, and they showed me that people are really there and that people can rock with what I do.”
Hany adds that performing original music adds a layer of stress because of the uncertainty of crowd enjoyment. However, according to McDearman, part of the joy of MICfest is that the crowd is always open to hearing new music.
“My favorite part of performing is being able to see that what I’m doing is bringing someone else joy based on what I create and what I express for myself,” Johnson said.
There’s a two-way channel of communication. The artists are appreciative of the crowd engagement offered to them during their sets, and the crowds and the MIC members are grateful to the artists for being there and sharing their music with them.
“We acknowledge (that the musicians) are donating their time and their talents for free. We appreciate them a lot, so we want to make them feel appreciated,” McDearman said.
