In June, over 90,000 country music fans from across the globe gathered in Nashville for CMA Fest, a four-day festival from the Country Music Association that brings together the genre’s biggest stars.
But what attendees saw during the event — like headliners Luke Bryan and Miranda Lambert and Instagram-friendly photo backdrops — was only the final product after months of planning.
Part of the behind-the-scenes work for the 2023 CMA Fest was done by Olivia Guihan, a junior at Northeastern University who was a co-op for the Country Music Association and helped plan CMA Fest 2023.
Over six months, she received a crash course in the things most don’t consider when they’re singing their hearts out at a festival. For example, when designing the layout of one of the green rooms, Guihan wanted to put lamps in the tent to brighten it up. The only…