Against all odds, Bacchanal 2021 will be the best Columbia has had in years, thanks to yours truly.

To the Bacchanal committee: you’re welcome. I did all of your work for you. This is the completed plan for Bacchanal 2021: Virtual Virtuosos (I am willing to be flexible on the title, but nothing else).

In deciding on a virtual platform, I took a page out of the University’s Covid-19 Response playbook. Instead of Zoom or another tried-and-true platform, Bacchanal will be hosted on a custom, Columbia-designed app. Barnard will have a separate app for the same purpose because there must be a good reason for that, right? 

Will it work? Probably not. That’s kind of the goal: it’ll be like hazing, but in a good way. Nothing brings a community together like having something to complain about. 

Promotion for the event will be led by the student who has received the most likes on Buy/Sell Memes over the course of their time at Columbia and the only people who can join their committee are people with the “Conversation Starter” badge in their respective class Facebook pages. 

The two students with the most TikTok followers will emcee the event but the top five Columbia Twitter users will write their scripts. 

The performers will be live-streamed from Butler 301 to save money on staging Low steps and everyone will perform from behind a table like an NPR Tiny Desk Concert.

Now, for what you’ve all been waiting for: the performance lineup.

For the first opening act, there will be an orchestra made up of everyone who flexed playing an instrument in their Common App but hasn’t practiced since starting college. Their setlist will include the “Avengers Theme” and “Viva La Vida.”

Next, our ears will be blessed with an acapella group made up of every student that was rejected from their first choice acapella group. They will recreate the riff-off scene from Pitch Perfect 1. 

For the final opening act, we will have a Vampire Weekend cover band. I know everyone wants Vampire Weekend to come back but I asked and they said no. Bear with me though–I found a group made up of generic white guys with brown hair so you won’t even be able to tell the difference. 

The headliner will be none other than queen Taylor Swift herself because I got Karlie Kloss, a new member of the Barnard board of trustees, to rekindle their friendship and pull some strings. The only conditions are that Swift gets Prezbo’s house afterward and she will only play Betty on repeat.

A Bacchanal of the Before Times via Bwog Archives