Coffeehouse: Exes and XO’s – Themes of love and heartbreak surround upcoming event

The desolate, gut-wrenching feeling of heartbreak intertwined with the inexhaustible, seemingly limitless feeling of love describes the upcoming spring Coffeehouse: Exes and XO’s, taking place at the Vines Center on March 25 at 11:30 p.m.

Similar to Coffeehouses in the past, this one incorporates a specific theme throughout the show, pulling students into a night filled with on-theme performances and entertainment. For this semester, Student Activities announced a Coffeehouse centered around relationships.

“Each year, we sit down as a team to discuss themes,” Cort Comfort, director of Student Activities, said. “Our assistant director, Jordan Kreitzinger, came in with an idea that he was particularly passionate about. He pitched it as ‘love is in the air’ — that was the original title — and as we started talking about it, the whole room fell in love with it.” 

Performances inspired by hit songs sung by popular artists and student-made videos reflecting blockbuster movies will grace the stage during the event-packed night, each act falling into the categories of love and heartbreak.

“Someone had introduced the idea that we would not only do love, but breakups as well, so it would be like a two-pronged theme,” Comfort said. “You have your Olivia Rodrigo and Taylor Swift breakup songs and the scenes from movies where the characters are yelling at each other and one of them storms out mixed with love songs and the moments where the characters get back together.”

The popular songs, heart-wrenching movies and familiar artists weren’t the only inspirations behind this year’s theme.Another large, very well-known detail came into play when the team discussed options for this Coffeehouse.

“Liberty has a very interesting dating culture,” Comfort said. “Running into the spring, you know, there’s ‘ring by spring,’ and there’s Rot dates, and there’s proposals and wedding venues on campus. I think that when you put thousands of people on campus together who are looking to find others with similar, goal-driven values as themselves, there is going to be some sort of unique dating culture to come out of that. That’s really the second reason why we settled on this theme.”

Coming to a final decision for the upcoming event wasn’t a short process, and it took over six months to come full circle. According to Comfort, the theme-reveal video that was shown at the conclusion of Coffeehouse: Christmas in the City this past December took two months to finish, and the rest of the creative processes totaled four months in length, combining to give the project a total of six months to complete. 

The hard work and decisions weren’t made in vain, though, as tickets for the upcoming Coffeehouse have begun selling earlier this year, as the love-centered theme sparked the interests of students from across the university.

“I’ve sold almost twice the amount of tickets at this time this semester as I did at this time last semester,” Comfort said. “Tickets are selling better than ever, and I really think that a lot of students are going to come to this (Coffeehouse).”

Grace Avery, a junior at Liberty who purchased a ticket early, shared her excitement on attending the event. 

“It’s such a fun night to spend with my friends and watch lots of great acts and videos,” Avery said. “I look forward to it every semester, but I am especially thrilled for this semester’s theme.”

According to Comfort, the event brings students together in a variety of unique ways not seen at other universities and is a one-of-a-kind night that students can’t afford to miss.

“I think there’s a few things that are unique to Liberty University. Coffeehouse has been around for a long time, and there is nothing like it at any other school. I would be really hard-pressed to find anything remotely close to this,” Comfort said. “To miss this night, specifically this Coffeehouse, I think would be very much like missing a night that is very crucial to the culture that surrounds Liberty.” 

Tickets for Coffeehouse: Exes and XO’s can be purchased by going to their website.

Hess is the asst. news editor for the Liberty Champion. Follow her on Twitter