Invasion Of Privacy: Co-presidents of Karaoke Club, Dave and Ivan
Photo courtesy of Dave Dreyer and Ivan Jesus
Freshmen Dave Dreyer, history and adolescence education major, and Ivan Jesus, biochemistry major, are co-presidents of the Karaoke Club on campus. This is a club where people can sing karaoke-style to their heart’s content and participate in contests to win modest sums of money. It’s hosted at 8 pm almost every Wednesday. The creation story of Karaoke Club is as simple as it is interesting. During this, Jesus recounts, “Basically, we were going to YoBerry Frozen Yogurt and we came to the MCC (Multicultural Center) to play Fortnite on the PS5 until David found a”—Dreyer interrupts to fill in the blank—“Microphone.”
Jesus continues, “…and then he got up there [the stage of the MCC]…” From there, Dreyer takes charge of the story, “…I just used my phone [to] pull up—I don't know—probably a Queen song, and just started singing the lyrics.” Once inspired, they felt the need to spread the word, posting a Snapchat story to the Geneseo class of 2028. This ended up working pretty well, as at the club’s first meeting, around 10-20 people were in attendance. The following week, they had another meetup, which they viewed as the first unofficial Karaoke Club meeting. After this, they went through the motions of becoming a club funded by the Student Association.
When asked what it takes to make an average Karaoke Club night happen, Jesus answered, “So much undivided focus.” Dreyer added to this with, “… not that much. We need a computer for lyrics and music. We prefer to use Spotify, where we do a jam…and people can join the jam and add their own songs to the queue…And then we set up some chairs. Chairs allow it to make it look like a stage, just in case people want to sit down, or if they want to get up and dance. That's basically all it takes.”
When asked how an average meeting turns out and how much success they have been seeing thus far, Jesus answered, “Absolutely wild, wild [like a] movie…we average, like, 20 people.” Dreyer reflected on how numbers have dwindled slightly since the beginning of the year due to classes, tests, exams, and other stressful or time-consuming academic affairs, but despite the lower numbers, Dreyer said the club is “A hoot and a holler, alright.”
When asked what they do besides the Karaoke Club on campus, they admitted that they only do a few things outside their club president duties. Dreyer said, “We play a lot of basketball…Basically, every day. We're just always at the court with some of our other Karaoke friends;” Jesus added “Me personally, it’s either Karaoke or bed rotting or school work.”
I asked them when and where one could find the Karaoke Club. “Karaoke club meets on Wednesdays at the MCC [Multicultural Center] at 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm,” Jesus informed me. I asked them if they wanted to promote anything along with the club. They were mainly excited about their Halloween Karaoke Session, which is being held on Wednesday, Oct. 30 (Unfortunately, after the release of this article). Their final message was, then, “Come To Karaoke—don’t knock it until you try it.”