Ten local techies stole the stage at the Hard Rock Café Wednesday night, spitting their best beats and belting out pop songs to the delight of the audience of fellow entrepreneurs and friends.
The occasion marked the second-ever Techies Got Talent, an event designed to showcase the latent skills of those within Boston's innovation community, all in one laid back, beer-filled evening. In "American Idol" style, three startup celebrity judges — Sarah Hodges of Intelligent.ly and Smarterer; Atlas Venture Partner Fred Destin; and Streetwise Media's Greg Gomer — served as the talent show's honorable Randy, Simon and Paula.
This year, all proceeds from tickets and drink sales went toward TUGG's portfolio nonprofit Music & Youth, whose mission is to make music accessible to youth in underserved communities — a fitting and relatable charity for the event's stack of performances.
From an acoustic, homespun poppy medley sung on one foot to an accapella version of Miley's infamous "Wrecking Ball," many of the acts displayed impressive, as well as diverse, musical talent. The last act, a violin and guitar duo, played a crowd-pleasing Top 40 mashup, slightly reminiscent of the quasi-famous MBTA Taylor Swift violinists. Earlier in the evening, a beatboxer dropped such fresh beats that judges Hodges and Destin couldn't help but beeline to the dance floor to bust some moves (but really, all three judges were up on their feet the entire night).
The evening's slate also included Chinese yo-yo, a hilarious "Bostlandia" video dubbed "Save an Entrepreneur" and a silly standup comedy sketch. The winning performance of this year's Techies Got Talent, however, went to arguably the most unique act of the evening, Lia Cefalu of HubSpot and her self-scribed rap. Clad in galactic jeans and sporting neon-bright kicks, Cefalu jumped around the stage delivering such legit, witty rhymes that, when giving feedback post-performance, Hodges threw one of Cefalu's lyrics right back at her, calling the petite blonde rapper "hot like Siracha."
Cefalu accepted her win with a short and sweet speech that I imagine rung true to many entrepreneurs in the room. "Stop being afraid. I've been afraid for so many years, just go do it...What an effing rush," shared Cefalu, of both working up the courage to get up on stage and taking chances in life.
All in all, the event — created by Harvey Simmons of EverTrue; Kelly Rice of Kinvey; Kelly McDonald of Fashion Project; and Matt DiStefano of The Grommet — was a smashing success, uniting Boston's tech community and, given the atmosphere of the beer-bearing audience, raising a fair amount of funds for Music and Youth.
Check out some of the Techies Got Talent performances below:
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