The One Army, or OA, and Delta Gamma, or DG, performance inspired by the movie “Bird Box” won the dance competition Songfest and its $20,000 grand prize at Rudder Auditorium on Saturday night. The group coordinated movie clips, lights, and music to convey the eerie yet thrilling story, going as far to spend a portion of the performance blindfolded.

The DG and OA chairs wanted to focus less on the horror aspect of Bird Box — where characters must wear blindfolds to protect against an ominous presence killing people —  and more on the journey of a mother and her two children desperate to find safety. OA Songfest Chair and management senior Alexander Gould said they wanted to keep the audience on the edge of their seats.

Just to kind of not give you a chance to breathe, was the whole goal of that,” Gould said.  “And really just tell that theme of just like intensity and a never ending run away from something.”

The time, energy and skill it takes to put on a seven-minute performance should not be underestimated, especially when that performance includes 120 dancers from two organizations, plenty of rope and blindfolds. 

When the DG and OA Songfest Chairs devised the idea of doing the movie Bird Box as their theme, they knew they needed to incorporate blindfolds into the performance. Kinesiology senior and DG Songfest chair Emily Ferreira said they went to the store and searched for the best fabric that would still give the dancers an appearance of being blinded but still let them see. 

“We finally found a fabric that we could do that for the only issues we don’t have our peripherals, so we could vaguely see through the blindfolds with brighter lights like we had on stage,” Ferreira said. “But the peripherals were definitely a challenge because we didn’t have those. So a lot of spacing and stuff was kind of muscle memory.”

By winning first place, DG and OA each took home $10,000 for their philanthropies. OA’s philanthropy is Still Creek Ranch, an organization dedicated to rescuing at-risk children. OA both fundraises for the organization and mentors some of the boys at Still Creek Ranch. Ferreira said it was so admirable to see the energy and passion the OA boys were willing to put forward.

“It was just amazing that you could tell that place that they were coming from was a place of love for the kids and that they really wanted to win it for their philanthropy,” Ferreira said.

Gould said he feels like OA and DG had a strong sense of unified passion in Songfest 2024.

“This is not a chair victory … this is a Delta Gamma, One Army victory,” Gould said. “They’re the reason that show is what it is. We just had an idea, they brought it to life and seeing that taught me a lot about what other people can do if they really want to get something done.”

Last Saturday was the last time biomedical engineering senior Matthew Dawson will be performing in Songfest — but he said he learned vital lessons from the competition. He said he learned that people have a choice whether or not to care about something but the answer should be caring about something larger than oneself. 

“Not every men’s org, not every fraternity, you know, has enough guys that are willing to commit to something or hold each other accountable to doing something great,” Dawson said. “ … To some men [dancing] feels emasculating, which I think is total baloney because the reality is, if you care about something a lot and you put a lot of work into it, whether it pays off or not, that’s as man as it gets.”

Songfest is hosted by Chi-Omega, Chi-O, and members of the DG and OA act said they are grateful to them for making the event possible. There are seven total DG and OA chairs who created the performance: James Cochran, Tyler Frey, Alex Gould, Emily Ferreira, Ryan Elmer, Amelia Hancock and Kendall Wood. Gould said it couldn’t have been done without a single one of his other co-chairs.

“It was a huge challenge putting it on,” Gould said. “But beyond the chairs, we had 120 people who were willing to put in so many hours of work, blood, sweat and tears into it. I mean, it’s easy for us to talk because we’re the ones who stand in the center of the circle and tell them what they need to do. But this isn’t, once again, our victory. It’s theirs. I’m just super, super thankful to have the opportunity to be a part of it.”