Three Weeks From Today - Barn Raising at B.U. Singing Boston Strong

After months of planning, we are seeing the finish line of Greg Gordon's Boston Marathon Fundraiser Singing Boston Strong: An Evening of A Cappella to Benefit Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital.



In 2011, I arranged an a cappella fundraiser at BU's Morse Auditorium. In his opening remarks, Dean Elmore commented about how, in the old days, neighbors would come together as a community for barn raising: (from Wikipedia)

A barn raising, also historically called a "raising bee" or "rearing" in the U.K., describes a collective action of a community, in which a barn for one of the members is built or rebuilt collectively by members of the community. Barn raising was particularly common in 18th- and 19th-century rural North America. A barn was a necessary structure for any farmer, for example for storage of cereals and hay and keeping of animals. Yet a barn was also a large and costly structure, the assembly of which required more labor than a typical family could provide. Barn raising addressed the need by enlisting members of the community, unpaid, to assist in the building of their neighbors' barns. Because each member was entitled to recruit others for help, the favor would eventually return to each participant.

He said we tend to lose that sense of community; of coming together for a common cause but he pointed out how we did just that at our Music for Miracles Concert.

This year's concert to benefit Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital will be filled with many emotions. We are going to have a moment of silence for Lu Lingzi, the BU grad student, who tragically lost her life on 4/15/13. There are seven runners who were given numbers to run in memory of Lu Lingzi and are raising money for the Lu Lingzi Scholarship Fund.

We will be anticipating the anniversary of the bombings yet to quote Leonard Bernstein:



We will be celebrating that we can come together to sing Boston Strong and to raise money for Spaulding Rehab where so many of the bombing survivors were able to find their strength and put their lives back together.

Terpsichore, BU's premier all female a cappella group will be hosting:


The Dear Abbeys are once again lending their vitality and voices:



Tufts premiere all a cappella group, The Jackson Jills are coming back to BU to sing Boston Strong:



Boston University's In Achord placed 3rd in the 2014 ICCA Quarter Finals:



And when I put out the call for a post collegiate group to round out the program, I was overwhelmed by the response of groups wanting to be a part of the concert. Bostonality was the first to reply and I'm so excited that they will be performing on 4/4. They are not on Youtube - yet but check out their sound on their website.

So three weeks from today we'll do it old school at B.U. for Greg's Boston Marathon run, for Spaulding Rehab, to honor and celebrate all that we have been through this past year and to look forward to Boston Marathon Monday 4/21/14.