Most of us go a little stir crazy if we can’t leave our house after a couple of days. Imagine if you had to stay there for three months.
But that’s exactly what Fredonia senior Steve Moses signed up for — eagerly.
The self-proclaimed lifelong fan of the hit CBS reality TV show, “Big Brother,” jumped at his chance to be on the program, even though it meant having to take a semester off from Fredonia, where he’s majoring in Sound Recording Technology with a concentration in Music Performance (Brass). Now, after 40 episodes of strategizing, analyzing, competing and aligning, the 22-year-old Moses can relax, smile — and go outside — knowing that he’s fulfilled his dreams, and then some.
On Wednesday night, Mr. Moses was crowned the champion of Big Brother Season 17, which carries with it a grand prize of $500,000 in addition to the fame and “alumni” status that many of the show’s cast members have enjoyed throughout the years.
The news was met with a roar from the crowd of students, faculty and staff who gathered inside Fredonia’s Williams Center to cheer on the Gouverneur, N.Y., native. The group, donning t-shirts, hats and other Fredonia “swag” — just as Moses has throughout the show — waved signs of support, including the Twitter-trending “#trombonists,” which Moses has made popular during his run.
Moses has created quite a buzz across campus over the past three months as people have learned of his story. A transfer student from Cornell University, he left Cornell’s College of Engineering to come to Fredonia because he missed having music in his life.
“I love listening to, playing, mixing, and recording music. Some of my happiest moments [at Fredonia] are when I'm playing in trombone choir and we make this solid wall of sound after building up lots of tension over the course of the piece,” Moses said in his online contestant profile at the start of the show. “I get these goose bumps down my spine that I don't get from anything except for music. Music, when played right, can be a really deep and fulfilling emotional adventure.”
Moses’ infatuation for Big Brother was intense, as he stated in a Sept. 9 online post to the show’s website following his winning a “Head of Household” competition, which meant he was safe from the next “eviction” vote.
“Every 10-year-old dreams about what they want to do when they grow up,” Moses explained. “Most dream about becoming an astronaut, the president, or a professional athlete. I, being the strange child that I was, had two of those dreams — work for Walt Disney Imagineering, and become an official Big Brother Houseguest.”
Moses can now check one of those goals off his list…and if the last three months are any indication of his talents, the Walt Disney Company might want to set up an interview with him soon.
