The Geneseo Environmental Organization, in collaboration with Amnesty International Geneseo, hosted the third annual Carbon Free Concert—Jamnesty—on Friday April 22. The event took place outside on the Integrated Science Center’s patio facing the College Green.
The Carbon Free Concert is one of the many events that GEO hosted during Earth Week, and sought to show people that electricity is not required to have a good time. As the name implies, the Carbon Free Concert put on the show using no electricity, therefore emitting no carbon. No microphones, aux cords or lights were used during this concert in order to conserve energy and to reduce the carbon footprint.
“It’s basically a fun, outdoorsy concert with no plug-ins and no electricity so we don’t produce carbon because it’s Earth Week,” sophomore Carrie Seche said. “We’re advertising that you can have fun without hurting the environment.”
GEO went above and beyond to ensure that the concert produced as little waste as possible. The signs GEO created were made with leftover cardboard boxes from the MacVittie College Union Mailroom—something that shows how important the environment is to the organization.
“The best part is that it’s not really a ‘producing’ event,” Seche said. “You’re not producing energy from the musicians and you’re not producing paper waste from the signs because the signs are made out of recycled cardboard.”
The concert brought in a small crowd of just over 20 students and one Siberian husky. The atmosphere felt natural, with one student blowing bubbles into the wind as the performers played. Part of the natural aura was created by the noticeable fact that the event didn’t use any form of electricity, and it didn’t produce any waste.
Additionally, various singers and bands sat in the middle of the patio to perform their music. OK Artichoke was the first band to play, consisting of two guitars, a tambourine and a ukulele. Next up was Bong Pong, a band that incorporated a guitar and a ukulele into their performance. After the two bands played, various solo performers sang or recited slam poetry. The acoustic sounds produced by both bands, as well as by the vocals, reiterated the fact that no electricity was used during the performances—something that is so rare in today’s industrialized world.
“The idea is to raise awareness and show people how much carbon they are using,” senior Julia Mizutani said. “People don’t even realize that electricity uses coal. Even by being inside and turning the lights on, that’s emitting carbon. That’s why we’re doing the concert outside—to get away from carbon for just a few hours, not using any lights and not using any electricity.”
As the president of GEO, Mizutani feels strongly about the ever changing environment. “We do need to go off fossil fuels,” Mizutani said. “We do need to go carbon free. Not at some point, but now. It has to happen now. It’s almost already too late.”