Album Class hard at work preparing for their end-of-year performance.
LEONARDO TORRES / COURTESY
Laili Shahrestani, Editor-in-Chief
Manhattan University’s (MU) Album Class recently announced their album for this year — “The Stranger” by Billy Joel, alongside a revamped marketing campaign aimed at building excitement for their end-of-year performance, attracting greater audience engagement.
Efforts to revitalize this year’s marketing approach came about through the contributions of Billy Walker, a senior communications major and student at MU, who is now spearheading the campaign.
Walker expressed how past end-of-year performances for the class had little marketing and were often promoted only days before the actual shows.
“In years past, they would only share clips from rehearsals that would be posted the week of the shows, or even the day of the shows,” Walker said. “So I said we should give people a sneak peek earlier on and create that excitement.”
The first announcement and teaser for this year’s Album Class was posted on March 5 as a voice memo from Kevin Beckett, a senior at MU, who sang a snippet of “Vienna” by Billy Joel, one of the nine songs on his 1977 album “The Stranger.”
Beckett shared this is his first year participating in the class and that he will serve as one of the main singers during the performance.
“This is my first year doing the Album Class, and any music here at MU,” Beckett said. “But I’ve been doing music for the majority of my life. I have a deep love for it … I’m definitely honored for my voice to be on the teaser. I think there’s a lot of very talented people in the class … So, I’m definitely honored.”
After posting the initial teaser and continuing the campaign, Walker emphasized that everything shared so far has received a high volume of views and strong audience engagement. He noted that these results make this year’s marketing efforts stand out compared with previous years.
“The voice memo already got like 5000 views, which is more than any other video the Album Class has ever posted before,” Walker said. “And the other announcement video is getting close to 10,000 views … So it’s a really good looking sign for what’s to come, and how the marketing has changed.”
In addition to the voice memo, Walker has incorporated many other marketing tactics, using photography, video trailers, graphics and he hopes to implement vlogs in the future. As the weeks go on, leading up to the Album Class performance in May, Walker will continue to promote the show by posting on a weekly basis.
Olivia Bailey, a senior public relations and music major, has worked closely alongside Walker this year to help bring the campaign to light. Both Bailey and Walker hold certain ideas about the success of the campaign and are making a behind-the-scenes effort to create as much publicity for the event as possible.
“The marketing for Album Class started with Walker,” Bailey said. “The first time he did the class, he rose to the occasion. And then when I took the class the following year, he kind of just passed the torch. So we’ve just been slowly building this together.”
Bailey went on to speak about her role in the marketing campaign and how she contributes to creating more outreach for the performance.
“I’m actually doing all of the email releases,” Bailey said. “I definitely think this marketing is affecting the class in a bigger way. I’m going to be doing a lot of outreach with alumni and admissions, even to see if accepted students want to come see [the final performance]. It’s really about getting the word out to the greater Bronx community.”
The objective of this year’s marketing campaign is to align the posts with the overall theme of the album. “The Stranger” album cover is presented in black-and-white, consisting of a grainy tone. Walker emphasized that through his campaign, he is doing his best to incorporate that same black-and-white feel while maintaining the “70s vibe” throughout the marketing process.
“I’m trying to incorporate a visual vibe, as the album came out in the 70s,” Walker said. “I’m trying to make rehearsal pictures and behind-the-scenes pictures look like they were taken from that era … Those may include more pictures … with a black and white graininess to it.”
While the entire campaign is based on an aesthetic from around 50 years ago, Andrew Bauer, the director of the Performing Arts Department and professor of the Album Class, still classifies “The Stranger” as timeless.
Bauer shared that for an album to be considered for the class, it must meet three basic criteria: “It must be an album that greatly influenced the music of its peers in the time that it was written,” said Bauer. “It needs to have instruments other than the typical rock band lineup… And it needs to survive the test of time.”
As the performance in May approaches, Bauer, Bailey and Walker have all expressed their hopes of the marketing reaching an audience outside the MU community to ensure a full house at The Black Box.
Bauer hopes Walker’s efforts excite prospective or current MU students to join the class, as currently, there are no other known institutions that offer the same concept of the Album Class.
“I’m very excited about the advertising this year, because Walker is spearheading it, and he’s really magnificent,” Bauer said. “I’m hoping that we can get this Album Class even beyond the MU community, because this class is not being offered anywhere else that I know of. There’s lots of music classes out there … But they don’t actually play the music [as our class does] … and so I want to get that out to the public, so that this puts MU on the map.”