FED
Member
I work as a technician for my former high school as a theatre tech. I graduated in 2012, but decided to work before going to college. I am officially a staff member, but not well versed on a number of SOPs, either because those SOPs do not exist or there hasn't been time for the admin to brief and revise with the staff on a regular basis.
Last night I found myself in a situation where a student band performed an inappropriate song in the school talent show.
The event was hosted by the school's Tri-M chapter and was fully student run. I was technically the only 'adult' supervising the show. All songs were pre-approved by the student organizers and performers have respected the process over the years, so there hasn't been much worry about anyone making a stunt on stage. It's tradition to end the show with some heavy tunes and the band in question was allowed to perform two songs (being one of the more popular bands in school). They played both songs during the rehearsal without much problem. But when it came to the actual show, they performed the first song as planned, then started the second song with the lead saying "This next song is going to piss off a lot of people tonight," and went on to play a different song with direct references to weed and ecstasy. (I didn't catch the name of the song.)
Call me uncultured, but I wasn't familiar with the song; and the singer wasn't that good of a singer, so the lyrics were inaudible to my ears. I almost sat through the whole thing not knowing what was happening. Apparently the Tri-M president was demanding everyone to shut down the show over the comms, telling the crew to interrupt the show while coaxing the emcees to step on stage and stop the band (I could be wrong, but I have a feeling that the emcees were in on it with the band). No one knew how to interrupt the show and was just panicking about what to do over the comms. I on the other hand couldn't hear anything over the comms in the booth because the band was loud and both my light and sound techs were off headset (I stupidly dismissed the noise from my can as just chatter because the crew wouldn't stop chatting the whole duration of the show). They were two-thirds into the song before I realized what was happening, and then I proceeded to panic myself. Shortly after the emcees finally went out, stopped the band (who didn't look surprised) and ended the show.
The band was reinforced with amps on stage; so there wasn't a possibility of shutting off their sound, aside from the lead singer's mic. Though I could have easily walked over to the power DB and tripped the power outlets on the stage.
It bugs me that it went on for so long. What really bugs me is how there wasn't an administrator in charge to oversee the event. (This happens quite often for small events.) Even-though it was a student run event, there still should be faculty/admin making sure things go right. There were some teachers seated near the booth, one of them was the Tri-M faculty sponsor, but no one took the initiative to shut it down. I talked to one of them, and she just shrugged and wondered why no one stopped it earlier.
This is probably one of my biggest screw-ups (mainly due to my own ignorance). Any thoughts?
Last night I found myself in a situation where a student band performed an inappropriate song in the school talent show.
The event was hosted by the school's Tri-M chapter and was fully student run. I was technically the only 'adult' supervising the show. All songs were pre-approved by the student organizers and performers have respected the process over the years, so there hasn't been much worry about anyone making a stunt on stage. It's tradition to end the show with some heavy tunes and the band in question was allowed to perform two songs (being one of the more popular bands in school). They played both songs during the rehearsal without much problem. But when it came to the actual show, they performed the first song as planned, then started the second song with the lead saying "This next song is going to piss off a lot of people tonight," and went on to play a different song with direct references to weed and ecstasy. (I didn't catch the name of the song.)
Call me uncultured, but I wasn't familiar with the song; and the singer wasn't that good of a singer, so the lyrics were inaudible to my ears. I almost sat through the whole thing not knowing what was happening. Apparently the Tri-M president was demanding everyone to shut down the show over the comms, telling the crew to interrupt the show while coaxing the emcees to step on stage and stop the band (I could be wrong, but I have a feeling that the emcees were in on it with the band). No one knew how to interrupt the show and was just panicking about what to do over the comms. I on the other hand couldn't hear anything over the comms in the booth because the band was loud and both my light and sound techs were off headset (I stupidly dismissed the noise from my can as just chatter because the crew wouldn't stop chatting the whole duration of the show). They were two-thirds into the song before I realized what was happening, and then I proceeded to panic myself. Shortly after the emcees finally went out, stopped the band (who didn't look surprised) and ended the show.
The band was reinforced with amps on stage; so there wasn't a possibility of shutting off their sound, aside from the lead singer's mic. Though I could have easily walked over to the power DB and tripped the power outlets on the stage.
It bugs me that it went on for so long. What really bugs me is how there wasn't an administrator in charge to oversee the event. (This happens quite often for small events.) Even-though it was a student run event, there still should be faculty/admin making sure things go right. There were some teachers seated near the booth, one of them was the Tri-M faculty sponsor, but no one took the initiative to shut it down. I talked to one of them, and she just shrugged and wondered why no one stopped it earlier.
This is probably one of my biggest screw-ups (mainly due to my own ignorance). Any thoughts?
Last edited: