On August 31st, student rappers from a number of local schools met together at the Vancouver Elk’s Lodge to perform at “Echo Fest”, a youth rap concert.
“These guys… student rappers like myself, [who] go to various schools…put on this event, and it was for them and other rappers to perform at, and it was pretty cool,” sophomore JT Tuason said, who performs under the stage name “JTVIUS” and was the opening act for the concert.
The concert was put on during the first weekend for students attending UHS, and soon after, students attending Camas High School (CHS) had their first day of class.
“It was really kind of a summer project collaboration,” Tuason said. Several other student rappers attended the festival and worked together to create it, including JTVIUS, Nolo, Cloudi, Luh Preme, and Ilo.
The project was almost entirely put on by the student rappers attending the concert, who all contributed funding to the project (Tuason paid $165, but wasn’t sure how much the other performers paid).
“[There was] very little adult involvement…a lot of the performers were in their 20s, and the great staff at Elks Lodge helped put it on…but for the most part it was really put on just by us [the youth rappers] and ran by Nolo,” Tuason said, “a fully youth-run event.”
Nolan Simmons, who performs as “Nolo”, a student at Union High School (UHS), planned the event.
“A lot of the setup [was managed by] Nolo…he’s a friend of mine, another artist in the local Camas-Vancouver area,” Tuason said.
Simmons came up with the idea some time ago.
“Echo fest is a concept I’ve had in mind for a while, the main goal of it is to bring people and artists together and highlight the talent that goes unseen in local areas,” Simmons said.
“I was brainstorming with my friend for, like, a week, [and] then we came up with the name, the logo, and the overall plans for where we wanted it to go,” Simmons said.
Estimates for attendance range from 45 to 100 concertgoers. One student, who wished to remain anonymous under the pseudonym “John Denver”, shared his experience.
“JTVIUS was the only one who I could understand, the rest of them were mumble rappers, and after he performed I just hung in the back and played Pokemon Go…and skateboarded,” Denver said.
There will be another Echo Fest on November 30th, the second in a series of Echo Fests that Simmons plans throughout the school year, but Tuason will not attend it.
“It was a positive experience, but a one-time thing,” Tuason said.
