On Sunday night, November 5th, the Chinese Student Association (@csaumich) collaborated with 24 other organizations to host its most popular event: Celebrasia. Each year it takes place in Angell Hall Auditorium A, making Mason Hall so crowded it’s hard to walk through and meet up with friends.
The performances were scheduled to begin at 7 PM, but like in the past, the seats were already half filled when the doors opened at 6:30 PM. By 6:50 PM, people began to sit in the aisleways and soon after, they closed the doors to the public. This year, CSA did a really good job of organizing the event; they guided the audience well, had quick transitions between performers, and there weren’t any sound issues.
There were a total of 12 groups, some familiar and new. In order they were:
Seoul Juice (@seouljuice.umich), the band under the Korean American Student Association (KASA). In my freshman year, they were a very small group, so it’s great to see how much they’ve grown not only musically but in popularity.
Annappella (@annappella.a_cappella), a co-ed Chinese acapella group. It’s the first time I’ve heard of them and they’re also the first acapella group I’ve seen on campus. They were really good at harmonizing and the male student in the center sang a majority of the melody with a soulful yet gentle voice.
Revolution (@revolutionyoyo): the Chinese Yoyo team. I always love how hype the crowd gets when watching them do tricks and flips.
Flowdom (@flowdom.umich): a co-ed hip-hop dance team. They added more flare to the selection of dance performances and I was really impressed by their charisma.
K-Motion (@kmotion): an all-female K-pop dance group. As always, they served an amazing assortment of K-pop songs with talent as well as their iconic confetti.
Blue Records (@blue_records_group): a student organized record label that arranges and produces their own music, although they did a cover at Celebrasia. The guitarists in particular stood out to me because they sounded just like the studio track.
Konnect (@konnect_umich): the largest and most inclusive co-ed K-pop dance group on campus. The amount of performers and rotations they had were astounding.
Sanya Bhati (@sanya_bhatia): a student soloist pursuing Drama in the Residential College. Her set was definitely one of my favorites. She had a charming presence and commanded the stage with only a backtrack accompanying her powerful and clear vocals.
Female Gayo (@femalegayo): the all-female K-pop dance group under KASA. In addition to their coordinating outfits, their synchronization as a team is out of this world. From the timing of bold hair flips to the subtle flex of their fingers, nothing felt out of place when viewing them as a group.
VeryUs (@veryus.umich): an all-female dance crew that aspires to highlight multiple cultures in Asia. I appreciate that they focus on diversity and inclusion of not only cultures but music and dance.
rXn (@rxn_umich): the traditional and modern hip-hop co-ed dance group under CSA.
DB3 (@db3_umich): the all-male K-Pop dance group as well as the crowd favorite. The cheering never stopped during their entire set, which was a fun way to end the night.
The University of Michigan has so many gifted students outside of SMTD too, and I can’t do all of them justice with this review. I highly recommend attending Celebrasia in the future, even if it’s just for part of it! It’s a free event and a great way to meet more of the community.
