Community Event: Concert Across America to End Gun Violence

It’s said that this could be the Woodstock of 2016. (Mike Weisser, Huffington Post, 8.23.16).

On Sept. 25, 2016, the Concert Across America to End Gun Violence will happen at over 150 sites across the country. Portland’s event will be a free concert from noon to 3 pm at Congress Square Park. The Portland event is being sponsored by the Phoenix Chorale, Portland’s social justice choir. “It is right in line with our mission to change the world through song” comments Dr. Deirdre McClure, Artistic Director.

Concert coordinator Betsey Remage-Healey observes that “we’ve had such a string of recent gun tragedies from Orlando to St. Paul to Baton Rouge to Dallas. The Concert is a chance to honor the dead and energize the living. And in Maine, the cool thing is that we can do something in November with the background check referendum on the ballot.”

In addition to the Phoenix Chorale, performers will include Lyle Divinsky, Gina Allibrio, Wes Covey, Ronda Dale and Portland’s immigrant girls’ choir, Pihcintu. The concert will be introduced by Mayor Ethan Strimling, with additional remarks by the mother of a gun murder victim, Judi Richardson, and Nick Wilson, Executive Director of the Maine Gun Safety Coalition.

The event is co- sponsored by the Maine Gun Safety Coalition, Maine Moms Demand Action, Remembering Darien and the Friends of Congress Square Park.

Big names are signing on to events in Brooklyn and LA including Jackson Browne, Rosanne Cash, Marc Cohn. Don Felder, Ed Begley Jr., Kenny Loggins, Ryan Cabrera and Sabian Kale.

For more information about the national event, visit concertacrossamerica.org ; also visit the Portland event page at www.facebook.com/CAAportlandme/.