Hannah Platt is one of those girls that sang before she learned to talk. After singing her way though high school, Hannah arrived at Penn and graced the a capella group, Off the Beat, with her soulful voice. Now, as a senior and president of Off the Beat, her final show is just around the corner. Not only is this upcoming performance her last, but it will also be her biggest, with over sixty alumni returning for the 25th anniversary of their beloved a cappella group. After months of hard work, this star of the show and everything that goes into it, has planned a performance that will ensure she goes out with a bang. But, if we know this girl, graduation won’t stop her from continuing to share her music – we’ll be hearing her again when she returns for the alumni song. HerCampus caught up with Hannah to chat about getting ready for the upcoming show on March 23rd and 24th.
What is Off the Beat?
Off the Beat is Penn’s premiere co-ed a cappella group. We do pop and rock music, sort of like whatever’s new and popular. We are student-run and completely student-led.
How is it different than other groups on campus?
I think our arrangements are a little more complex than other groups. We tend to only do what’s very cutting edge as opposed to other stuff that’s older. We also do twelve new songs each semester.
That’s a lot of songs!
It’s a lot. But that in itself makes us different because every concert will be new music no matter what, we never repeat.
What is your role as president?
As president I basically do everything that isn’t the music. I help lead rehearsal and do arrangements also but my main job is overseeing all the other things. So the preparation of the show in terms of ticket sales and advertising and making sure everyone’s coordinated. I help out with the business manager booking gigs and help being in charge of our bank account. Every job that everyone else has I sort of help out with and just oversee and make sure everyone is doing his or her jobs.
How do you find your gigs?
Well a lot of people actually reach out to us because we’re kind of an establishment at Penn now. This is actually our 25th anniversary show coming up. So we’ve been around for a while. But they’ll email us, sometimes it’s schools that have seen us, or people that come to out shows and want us to come to their events. We get a lot of offices on campus that want us to sing at their holiday parties or at a conference or something like that.
What has been you favorite event to sing at?
Well last year we did a wedding of a Penn alum in Philly. And that was really sweet we sang at her reception and her husband didn’t know we were coming so it was a surprise and we sang a song that they really really loved together.
What song?
It was called Pageant of the Bazaar by Zero 7. It’s a very random song but she had contacted us like eight months in advance and she was like I will pay you extra if you would do this arrangement for us, it would make our wedding. So we did it. And we went and the look on his face was just so exciting.
How long have you been singing?
Pretty much since I could talk. I think I sang before I talked. But my family members are big singers. So I was singing since I was very little. I wasn’t very good when I was little, but I thought I was.
Did you do the musical thing?
I did the musical thing all through high school. Never really the pop and rock singing, which was very much new to me when I came into Off the Beat but I’ve always done the musicals and took voice lessons in high school.
How do you choose songs?
It is a very grueling process. Every semester at the beginning everyone brings in a certain number of songs. Freshmen bring in three, sophomores bring in four or five, juniors bring in six, seniors bring in seven, something like that. And we sit and listen to all the songs together which can be 80 to 100 songs. And it takes six or seven hours to listen through all the songs, which is just brutal. But then the music director and I will go and, based off votes and the reactions of the group, we’ll narrow it down to 30 and then we’ll discuss them as a group. Then we narrow it down to six songs for girls and guys from two lists of fifteen. Then we just discuss and discuss and discuss to find songs that compliment each other. We don’t want all the same kind of songs. We want some slow, some high, some low. So it’s a very long discussion and takes anywhere between ten and thirteen hours to do. It’s the worst day of the year. So I’m glad I don’t have to do it again.
Are you doing anything special for your 25th anniversary show?
We’re doing a lot of events over the weekend. There are usually between ten to maybe eighteen alums that come to every show. But we’re having over sixty alums come to this show, which is more than has ever come to a show in the history of OTB. It’s pretty crazy. The alums are coming in and we have a couple of events planned on the weekend not during the show to just get everyone together. But during the show it’s going to be the same except for we always do an alumni song at the end of the show. It’s usually just twenty people on stage singing it. But this year it’s going to be madness. Getting people up on stage is going to be the longest part of the show. It’s also the seniors’ last show so the main focus of the show will be that. We do a little senior send off and the juniors make little slide shows for the seniors and talk about them and then we get to sing our favorite song at the end.
Which song are you going to sing?
I picked Sitting on a Dock by the Bay, Sara Bareilles’ version. I did it sophomore year and that sort of jazzier style is what I did all through high school and it really is more me than anything else I’ve sung. I am really looking forward to singing it again. It’ll be emotional but it’ll be great.
How do you make arrangements?
We make them from scratch. We use a computer program and you just listen and write down what you hear. And sometimes you just need to make up stuff because there are twelve people that need to sing something. So it might just be so simple to have all of the basic chords. You might add little things. One thing we’re known for is putting snippets of other songs in the background to fill it out. And it’s cool.
How did you get involved in OTB?
My brother was also in Off the Beat and my sister actually married someone who had been in Off the Beat. So when I came to Penn I knew if wanted to sing at school I wanted to do Off the Beat. So I was like I’ll try out and if I don’t get it that’s a sign that maybe I should do something else. Maybe I’ll do the musicals or maybe I’ll just get involved in something completely different. But, I got in and it all worked out.
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at U Penn chapter.