Madeleine Coles

Life Editor

Since the Stephens Performing Art Center opened in 2005, ISU students and Pocatello community members have had the opportunity to attend the yearly ISU Concert Series. The series, which typically begins in late September and ends in mid-April, features a variety of musical performances.

According to ISU Director of Events George Casper, quite a bit of behind-the-scenes work takes place in order to put the series together.

It begins with booking the artists, something Casper said can be sometimes challenging.

“It’s sort of like putting a puzzle together,” he said. “I determine what artists are available and routed in the area, then I put in offers to the agent, and they’ll either accept or pass.”

Casper added that the key to increasing the chances of securing an artist is working with their schedule. If an artist is going to be touring through the area, Casper said they are typically much more willing to perform.

“If they’re playing in say Salt Lake or Boise, if we can offer them a couple of different dates and they can play three performances instead of one, that’s a better offer,” he said. “Each year is a new year.”

Since the series lasts seven or eight months, Casper said he tries to space the acts out so there is one a month, although there is often more performances than that.

“I average eight to 10 performances a year,” Casper said. “Of course that depends on who is available.”

Another aspect Casper must consider when booking performances is what will sell.

The series is self-funded, so all of the acts are paid for by the money generated from ticket prices.

“You have to do as much research as you possibly can to try to secure acts you think are going to be profitable,” Casper said.

In addition to the acts themselves, Casper said he would encourage students and community members to attend the concert series events for the sake of the venue itself.

“We just recently upgraded the Jensen Concert Hall. We put a brand new sound system in it, and I can guarantee you that when students and community members go to the hall itself, the quality of the performance is going to be superior to anything they’ve heard,” Casper said. “If someone wants to go and actually hear a quality performance, they’re going to get that in that hall.”

In fact, according to Casper, one of the reasons the concert series began was to showcase the Stephens Performing Art Center, which was ranked the number four performing arts facility on a college campus by bestvalueschools.com.

However, that wasn’t the only reason the concert series was started.

“We also wanted to offer a variety of cultural offerings,” Casper said. “We’re trying to offer something for all different tastes.”

The 2016-17 concert series, titled “A Season of Note”, kicked off on Sept. 24 with a performance by Don Williams. The next performance will be on Oct. 27 by country singer Suzy Bogguss, and the season will end on April 5 with “An Evening with Garrison Keillor.”

Individual ticket prices will vary.