Club D
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Club D (originally "Club Derwent") is an event run by the JCRC of Derwent College at the University of York, UK. It was created by Jon Upton and Leon Walton, Social Secretaries of the 1996/97 Derwent JCRC when the college was first 'locked-off' so that different music could be provided in different rooms within the college. The original format had 'cheese' in the main dining room and 'indie' in the Lower JCR.
Following the refurbishment of Derwent College in summer 1998, the event now takes place in the bar-dining room area of Derwent College and is normally held three times per term. The event has a license which usually allows alcoholic drinks to be served up to 1.00am, with the event normally closing around 1.30am to 2.00am.
The event is famous at the university for its unashamed choice of cheese and chart music and rarely digresses from this style of music[1]. Each Club D has a theme, chosen by Derwent JCRC Entertainment Officers (currently Liam"SP"Baker, Moe"Bam Bam"Hashim, Matt"Bad Lad"Barker and Sian"Shane'o"Thomas). Recent themes have included St Patrick's Day, Christmas, Back to School', Table Tennis and Heaven and Hell [2].
For several years now Club D has proved to be very popular amongst students, often selling out early in the evening. This is partly due to innovative and comprehensive press and publicity (P+P) efforts in the events first year, masterminded by Helen Woolnough and Clair Wyer. As such, the high ticket sales have formed a major part in making Derwent College JCRC one of the wealthiest colleges at the university.
To celebrate the 40th Birthday of Derwent College, the founding college of the University of York, in October 2005 a special Club D was held for the culmination of celebratory events. It was renamed for the night Club Decades, the theme being anything representative of the five decades Derwent College had seen [3].
The Club D format has been shamelessly copied by Vanbrugh College's Planet V and Halifax College's Xtra.
[edit] Big D
The final Club D of any academic year is known as Big D, and is on an altogether larger scale, encompassing the use of several lecture rooms and significant outdoor space for extra music rooms, special guests, extra bars and several food outlets and other activities.
The original event of this style, Derwent '98 (D98) was organised by a sub-committee of the Derwent JCRC, Co-Chaired by Helen Woolnough and Jonathan Duff (then Chair and Vice-Chair of the committee) with big name acts organised by social secretaries Paul Sparrow and John McLean. Barbara Kay was responsible for making sandwiches and upsetting the Juggling Society. It was the biggest event on campus in a decade with the first 'big name' Shed Seven since the Boomtown Rats played Central Hall and confirmed Derwent's reputation as the greatest college on campus.
Big D is the largest JCRC run event in the colleges, with a capacity of 1200 people 2005[4]. Big D also differs from a general Club D, in that Big D is a charity event. In 2004 over £4000 was raised for charity. The 2005 event, held in June was in aid of Amnesty International, Friends of Antara UK and Tenteleni [5]. The Big D name was coined in 2001 by Cinematography Society founder Tom Dowler, after it became unwieldy to continue the previous naming convention, i.e. "D98", "D99", "D2K".
