The Mills Scrabble Club moved beyond the game board on Feb. 18 when it hosted the first of two Wizard Rock shows in the Student Union. Tonks! and Chocolate in the Library, two Bay Area bands, rocked a small group of Harry Potter fans at 6 pm.
According to the Mugglenet Web site, it is a music genre where the musicians sing about Harry Potter. Basically, it’s musical fan fiction.
“Wizard Rock is the most awesome music ever,” said junior Christie Roberts, Scrabble Club president and member of the newly formed Chocolate in the Library “I had to start the band. Who wouldn’t want to start a band?”
Roberts and her friend Maria Chistiakova, a junior at the University of California Berkeley, performed for the first time that evening. The two created one original song, “Fudge Disgraces the Name of Chocolate,” but the rest of their repertoire is filled with Potter parodies set to famous tunes.
Popular characters like Professor Severus Snape and Professor Dumbledore were ribbed, but the fan favorite was a song about Pigwidgeon, the mail owl of Ron Weasley, Harry Potter’s best friend.
Roberts and Chistiakova shuffled and tap-danced as they sang the parody to the tune of “Big Spender.”
“It was so funny,” said Sophomore Jennifer Taylor, who bounced in her seat and did the wave throughout the song.
Senior Diana Marling had one thing to say about Chocolate in the Library’s routines: “It was marvelously nerdy!”
Next came Tonks! – yes, the exclamation point is pronounced – made up of two female musicians who are seniors at Sir Francis Drake High.
Singer Megan O’Heffernan and guitarist Alyssa Moore kept the Pottermania going with their blend of tongue-in-cheek tunes, folk songs and ballads.
Most songs were sung from their namesake’s point of view, including “Don’t Call Me Nymphadora.” It is about Tonks, a character introduced in the fourth book, hating her dainty first name.
Lynn Gutstadt, O’Heffernan’s mom, thinks that Tonks is an appropriate subject to sing about on this campus because “Tonks would be a Mills woman. She’s smart and independent.”
Other numbers included an ode to the Slytherin men. These boys are dark and dangerous and their house mascot is a snake.
Slytherin, one of the four dormitories at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry, often divides Harry Potter and his peers.
O’Heffernan sang, begging others to take Gryffindors, members of Harry Potter’s dormitory, like George or Fred Weasley, because “I’m going to charm a snake in my bed. Those steamy, smoldering Slytherin men.”
Taylor said that she sympathized with this song: “I’m a big fan of Slytherin boys; they are all quite attractive.”
Band merchandise was spread out on two tables near the exits.
Chocolate in the Library offered chocolate-themed items like cupcakes and bookmarks with chocolate hearts attached to them.
Tonks! sold knitted house-themed scarves and hats. Both groups sold their CDs after the show. “You can buy a CD and take us home with you,” O’Heffernan said, waving at her table, and then paused. “Not the real us, just the CD.”
The next Wizard Rock event will be held March 3 at 6:30 p.m. in the Student Union and will feature the Whomping Willows.
“These are more experienced bands who have been touring, so having a good size crowd around will make those more awesome,” Roberts said.
