We arrived at 9:30pm, as the bands were testing and setting up for later in the night. The only people in the bar at that time were us, the music performers for the night, and some friends of the music performers. While the first performer had a lovely voice, only a few people filed into the bar to listen to her. First, people began arriving in large groups and travelling to the back of the bar away from the performance stage. The groups seemed to be sorority and fraternity groups, which each remained near each other without any contact between the two groups. As the first performer neared the end of her performance, more people began filing in, mostly in groups of 4 or 5, or as pairs. The groups tended to be all male or all female.
No real changes in the crowd occurred until the third band came on, by which time the bar was packed. The singer's family had even shown up, both old and young. Most of the people standing near the front by the stage seemed to know the singer, as they all hugged her when she walked in. The crowd was younger in age, and the groups that had remained solitary earlier were now broken up, mingling with other groups. When the final band came on, the crowd cleared out, indicating that many of them were only there to see the third band. Many people filtered out onto the outside patio to have conversations without the loudness of the music. By this point, the crowd was a bit older, perhaps with an average age of 25.
Also interesting to note, every band but the third one remained to listen to all of the others out of respect. Also, the fact that throughout the night, people seemed to be picked off from their groups seemed to be very interesting as well. Next week, we will be going to a different place to listen to a different band, and it will be interesting to see if any of the trends observed this time will occur again.
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