Skip to footer

'Boston Strong' concert, featuring Aerosmith, others, will benefit victims fund

Tickets go on sale May 6 for an event featuring New Kids on the Block, James Taylor, Aerosmith, and other performers with Boston roots. Proceeds from the May 30 Boston Strong concert will go to the One Fund Boston, set up for victims of the marathon bombings.

|
Wade Payne/AP/File
James Taylor at the Country Music Hall of Fame Inductions in Nashville, Tenn., in October 2012. Mr. Taylor, Aerosmith, and Jimmy Buffett are among the scheduled performers for a Boston Marathon benefit concert May 30.

Tickets go on sale Monday for a benefit concert that enlists stars ranging from Aerosmith to Carole King in support of victims of the Boston Marathon bombings.

The concert, scheduled for May 30 in Boston’s TD Garden arena, will benefit the One Fund Boston, a charity set up after the April 15 marathon attacks to benefit people who were injured or who lost family members.

“I find myself searching for words today,” said Donnie Wahlberg of New Kids on the Block, the group that kick-started the event, in announcing the concert Friday. “We all feel compelled to fight back, to step up” after the attacks in his home city. “As artists, this is our way to do it.”

“Hopefully this event will not only raise money, but spirits as well,” he added.

Organizers said the performers will include (in alphabetical order) Aerosmith, Jason Aldean, Boston, Jimmy Buffett, Extreme, Godsmack, The J. Geils Band, Carole King, New Kids on the Block, and James Taylor. Comedians Dane Cook and Steven Wright will also appear.

Tickets, priced from $35 to $285, go on sale at 10 a.m. Monday on LiveNation.com and Ticketmaster.com.

The concert bolsters efforts that have gathered momentum in Boston since the bombings to support victims and to put strength and love – not fear or despair – at the forefront of public thought.

The One Fund Boston has raised more than $28 million to date for victims.

US military veterans who survived explosions abroad have visited marathon-day victims who lost limbs.

Local songwriter James Taylor has already performed at one attack-related event, the memorial service for Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus police officer Sean Collier, believed to have been shot by one of the marathon bombers.

Neil Diamond thrilled Red Sox fans with a live rendition of “Sweet Caroline” on the team’s first home game after the attacks.

Next week, One Fund overseer Kenneth Feinberg will release a tentative proposal on how funds should be distributed to victims, and then hear public comments on the plan. Money will go out to victims by June 30.

Donations were slated to be accepted through Labor Day, but Mr. Feinberg said Friday there is a possibility the fund could eventually assume a "permanent, ongoing role in providing communitywide assistance," The Associated Press reported.

The fund was organized by local corporations and political leaders immediately after the attacks. The explosions near the race’s finish line killed three people and injured more than 260.

The May 30 concert borrows its title from a motto that has emerged in the city since the bombings: “Boston Strong: An Evening of Support and Celebration.”

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to 'Boston Strong' concert, featuring Aerosmith, others, will benefit victims fund
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2013/0504/Boston-Strong-concert-featuring-Aerosmith-others-will-benefit-victims-fund
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe