“font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: 15px;”>The

2011 Homecoming concert lineup was announced at the Welcome Week

Festival Aug. 26 by co-chairs Chris Wade, vice president for

external affairs, and 

“margin: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style-type: none;”>Kawanna Foster, SUAB president.

The lineup is as follows: Meek 

“margin: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style-type: none;”>Millz,

Ace Hood, Miguel, Marsha

“margin: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style-type: none;”>Ambrosius,

Wale, DJ 

“margin: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style-type: none;”>Khaled,

and Rick Ross.

The 2011 Homecoming concert lineup was announced at the Welcome Week Festival Aug. 26 by co-chairs Chris Wade, vice president for external affairs, and Kawanna Foster, SUAB president.

The lineup is as follows: Meek Millz, Ace Hood, Miguel, Marsha Ambrosius, Wale, DJ Khaled, and Rick Ross.

As the lineup was announced, Twitter and Facebook lit up as everyone at the event relayed the info to the world. The reaction to the lineup was mixed. Freshman Elexsis Trapp was excited, saying, “It’s good! I like it!” Meanwhile, junior Trier Settles said, “It’s not that exciting. I wanted to cry. My excitement was at a 10 and now it’s down to a 2.”

Many students admit that they don’t know what all goes into the process of putting together the concert each year. “It’s a long process that begins right after elections,” explains VPEA Chris Wade. “After final exams a planning meeting was held with Kawanna, Ryan Maltese, Tony Williams of Diamond Life Promotions, and myself.”

At the meeting they made a list of artists who fit the following qualifications: had radio play in Greensboro, had an album out or coming out, and had good album sales.

“We also have to be financially conscious. If we get a really big artist such as Nicki Minaj or Chris Brown the lineup would be smaller because they cost more,” said Wade. The list of artists they came up with were then made into a survey and sent out to students over the summer to vote on. Once they got the students’ opinions they checked to see which artists were available.

“We have to take into consideration if they’re routeable or isolated. By routeable I mean if they’re in the area because of a tour or something. Let’s say Mary Mary is in Raleigh that week due to a show. It’s cheaper for us to transport them here than if they were, say, in California,” explains Wade.

Next they put bids out to the artists’ agents. Williams handles the negotiations. Once a price is decided on and the university approves the artist, the contracts are signed.

The two most voted on artists from the student survey were Wale and Wiz Khalifa. “We couldn’t get Wiz because he had a contract with another concert promoter for a year, so he wasn’t available to come,” Wade said.

The survey also included an “other” box where students could write-in the artist of their choice. The artist most written was Chris Brown. Though having Brown in the lineup would mean fewer artists as a whole, the overwhelming demand for him by the students caught the team’s attention.

Extreme efforts were made to get the university to approve Brown as an artist for the concert, including offering to donate 50 cents of each concert ticket to a domestic violence organization and Miss A&T writing a letter to the Board of Trustees in defense of Brown coming.

Eventually Wade said they succeeded in getting the University to approve Brown.

“What stopped Chris Brown from headlining our concert this year was the “Watch The Throne” concert,” said Wade. It’s coming to Greensboro Oct. 30, which is too close to the homecoming concert according to Live Nation, an entertainment company that powers both Chris Brown’s shows and the “Watch The Throne” tour.

Because Greensboro is only a secondary market, the company didn’t want two of its biggest shows to happen here back-to back.

“We offered to move the concert to the beginning of homecoming but they wanted to push it all the way back to Oct. 1 and that was too detached from homecoming,” Wade said. Wade says they also thought about joining the homecoming concert with the “Watch The Throne” concert the way N.C. A&T had with the R. Kelly and Jay-Z concert in the past.

The concert may no longer have an artist of Brown’s stature but it does have a wide variety of artists. Wale’s music has strong D.C. metro influences. Meek Millz is from Philadelphia. Miguel and Marsha Ambrosius provide the R&B mix. Ace Hood and Rick Ross bring the street rap.

“Myself and Kawanna fought for diversity so that every person had at least one artist to rock with for an affordable price,” said Wade. Sophomore LaRod Brown

questioned Miguel’s presence in the lineup. Brittney Copeland said she would trade in Ace Hood. Some students complained about the return of Rick Ross, who has been part of the homecoming concert lineup twice already.

used to having huge names.

“Rick Ross is an artist who came to homecoming one year and fell in love with it,” said Wade. “He’s willing to come at a very affordable price.” Senior Khaliel Abdelrahil points out that the mixed reactions to the lineup could have something to do with A&T being somewhat spoiled as a university because the campus is used to having big names.

“It’s been better in past years but it’s still better than most HBCU’s. We still have the best homecoming on earth,” he said.

• Sylvia Obell