Coastal Carolina University will present an Ebola Benefit Concert featuring the Sierra Leone Refugee All Stars at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, March 24, in Wheelwright Auditorium.
The Coastal Inspirational Ambassadors (the gospel choir) and CCU’s Teal Temptation dance group will also perform. The event will help raise funds for Ebola relief efforts in Sierra Leone. General admission is $10.
Sierra Leone’s Refugee All Stars is its homeland’s most widely celebrated musical export. For the past 10 years, the band has been touring the world performing their joyful sounds, singing for peace, solidarity and mutual respect on some of the world’s most prestigious stages.
After the release of the critically acclaimed film that documented the band’s inception in refugee camps during the Sierra Leone’s civil war, the group has appeared on “Oprah” and performed with Aerosmith, Dispatch and Ziggy Marley.
The band now returns to the U.S., refugees once more, this time due to the Ebola crisis. When the virus took hold in Sierra Leone, members of the group incorporated fundraising into their summer tour and sent their own tour funds home to help their families survive in an economy that has come to a near-full stop.
Co-sponsors of the concert are the following CCU departments and organizations: the College of Science; Eta Sigma Gamma, the health promotion honor society; Multicultural Student Services; the Office of International Programs and Services; Office of Student Life; Social Justice Research Initiative; and Women in Philanthropy and Leadership.
On Thursday, March 26, at 4 p.m. in the James J. Johnson Auditorium, CCU health science professor Fredanna M’Cormack McGough will discuss the ethical ramifications of the Ebola crisis.
A Coastal Education Fund has been set up to receive tax-deductible donations from the community that will go to “Doctors without Borders” and will help fund the shipping of medical and education supplies to “Social Workers Sierra Leone.”
Wheelwright Auditorium is located at 108 Spadoni Park Circle in Conway.
Tickets cost $10 for adults; $8 for senior citizens, alumni and CCU faculty/staff; and $5 for CCU students.
For tickets, call the Wheelwright Box Office at 843-349-ARTS (2787). The box office is open Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.