Musically Minded Charity Comes Saturday To OC

Classical Action To Host Aids Benefit Concert

When I was younger, I loved going to Broadway shows. A moment that always stuck out for me was at the very end of the performance, after bows had been taken and the applause had begun to die down. A member of the cast would step forward and thank the audience for their attendance. Then they would explain to the audience that money was being collected in the lobby for the charity group Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

The group raises money for those in the professional theatrical community living with HIV/AIDS. Until 1993, the organization only targeted those in the theater community. This all changed in 1993 with a simple idea from a man named Charles Hamlen.

In 1993, Charles Hamlen was working in the field of artist management. Hamlen was losing his lover to AIDS and needed a conduit to channel his pain into a more constructive area. Using his connections in the music world, Hamlen created the charity group Classical Action: Artists Performing Against AIDS. Together with Broadway Cares, Classical Action has been able to raise over $25 million to distribute to the needy and to various care givers around the country.

Since 1993, Classical Action has made big news in the relatively close-knit community of classical music. Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS is its parent company; Classical Action raises money to support musicians in need of health care funding as well as funding for services across the country.

What better way to raise money than to let the classical community speak for itself? Through a clever series of fund-raisers called house concerts, Classical Action has brought some of the worldıs best musicians into the living rooms of donors.

Just last December, a house concert took place in New York City with the pianist Evgeny Kissin. Other performers who have donated their services in this manner have included famed violinist Joshua Bell, flautist James Galway, the stunning violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, and the wonderful opera singers Cecilia Bartoli and Thomas Hampson. This Saturday, the Conservatory continues this auspicious series with a concert of its very own.

Classical Action/Oberlin is the only collegiate branch of Hamlenıs organization. The Oberlin Branch of the organization is maintained by a triumvarate of Conservatory students: Junior Rick Sanford, a composition major; senior Gloria Kim, a double-degree piano performance and Arts Administration major; and sophomore Hudie Broughton, apercussion performance major.

Sanford said, ³We have been planning our first AIDS benefit concert here at Oberlin with the support of the staff of Classical Action and a number of experienced faculty members and administrators in Oberlin. Classical Action/Oberlin was chartered as an official student organization last May.²

The concert looks to be a blend of the sophisticated, with music by Stravinsky, Luciano Berio and George Crumb on the program. The concert will bring back alumni of the Conservatory and will also feature current students. ³In organizing this concert,² Sanford wrote, ³we have found that most people are very happy to volunteer their services ‹ not only did the artists donate their talents, but a number of other Oberlin College and Conservatory departments have supported the event.²

Hamlen looked toward Oberlin in branching out to the collegiate community, and Oberlin will certainly show its support for his most worthy of causes. For more information, go to www.classicalaction.org as well as the Broadway Cares website www.bcefa.org.

Classical Action/Oberlin will hold its house concert on Saturday,

Sept. 23 in Warner Concert Hall. Tickets are $10 and available from CTS and the Wilder desk. The concert begins at 8 p.m.