This year’s Serendipity started with a bang — or maybe a thrum — with the Meadowfed dinner on March 29 hosting two local jazz bands. For the entire weekend, most of campus was filled with music. The weekend climaxed with two of the best concerts in recent Serendipity history: the trance and electronic sound of Wowser Bowser and RJD2 on Friday night and the funk and blues rock styles of Africa Unplugged and Holy Ghost Tent Revival on Saturday night.

Headliners RJD2 and Holy Ghost had each played at Serendipity before, and both students and community members were ecstatic to hear them play.

“I traveled all the way back from the beach to come see these concerts,” said former Greensboro resident Joseph Fitzpatrick. “Holy Ghost and RJD2 were two of the best performances I saw at Serendipitys past. It’s great to see the college bring them back.”

The Friday night concert started with Wowser Bowser getting the crowd riled up, throwing balloons for them to play with and playing music that could be heard all over campus.
“It was a really lively show,” said senior Tali Raphael, a trance and house music aficionado. “This is my fourth Serendipity and (Wowser Bowser) fit the enthusiasm of the event, as I would have hoped them to.”

Unfortunately, due to how loud the event was, a noise complaint was filed by neighbors of the college, and the performers were asked to tone it down. Because of this, RJD2 was unable to play as loud as the crowd would have liked.

“I still had a lot of fun, (RJD2) talked to the crowd a lot and got the people dancing,” said senior Caroline Corbett. “It was great how he could just throw on a random record and make it sound good, like something you just want to dance to. He gave off a good energy and because of that, the crowd had one too.”

Though most agree that RJD2 was great and gave the students something to dance to, some were disappointed with the overall sound of his music.

“The music didn’t engross me as much (as Wowser Bowser’s),” said Raphael. “It was a chill playlist but unless you were up close, the music seemed underwhelming.”

On Saturday was the Africa Unplugged and Holy Ghost concert. Many were wondering how the bands would play with the noise complaint from the previous night. However, as soon as the concert started, people’s doubts quickly subsided. Africa Unplugged’s medley of percussion beats could be heard all around campus.

Finally, it was time for Holy Ghost to take the stage. The band changed their music from their normal smooth style to a rock/dance mix for the crowd. Despite having recently lost a singer, the band managed to create a style that got everyone in the crowd on their feet and moving along to the music.

“They appealed to both the people who wanted to dance and the people who wanted to chill,” said Corbett. “They created a new sound for themselves and that, with their usual enthusiasm, got all of us excited.”

True enough, even after the concert was supposed to be over, the members ran up on stage again in response to the crowd’s shouts for an encore. After that, band members stayed around to hand out free copies of their music, sign autographs and talk to fans.

“(Holy Ghost) really loves their fans,” said friend of the band John Nolan. “They know that their success is because of their fans and love to give back whenever they can, especially when it comes to their music.”

“We love playing at Guilford College,” said Stephen Murray, Holy Ghost’s banjo player and singer. “The people here just love to express themselves in such creative ways. It’s incredibly rewarding to get to watch that, let alone be the cause of it.”