Arts & Entertainment

First Music for Humanity Concert Slated for Saturday

Musicians will play at Outdoors store in East Hampton to raise money for scholarship fund.

By Andrew Lenoir.

This Saturday, Music For Humanity will hold its first free public performance night at the Outdoors store in East Hampton.

Barry Adelman co-founded Music For Humanity in 2005, but has been running Outdoors, first in Amagansett and now in East Hampton, since 1997. According to him, Outdoors pays the bills, but Music For Humanity is his real calling.

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Though Music For Humanity began its work in Campbell Hall, NY, the organization offers music scholarships for promising young talents on the East End, as well. Last year, East Hampton High School graduate and violinist Maxfield Panish received a $2,500 scholarship to help him afford his tuition at the Manhattan School of Music. 

Adelman, who has contemplated changing his name to Music-Seed in the vein of Johnny Appleseed, wants to see his organization’s scope extend beyond providing scholarships and spreading music, to become something like a Red Cross that uses music to help and heal. 

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“Whenever there’s a disaster in the world, they ask musicians to get together to raise money,” Adelman said, citing events like BandAid or this fall’s Hurricane Sandy relief concert. “Somehow, there’s never enough money to take care of everyone when the disaster happens,” he said, adding the mission of his organization is to engage in “one big continuous fundraiser” to be able to help those in need whenever necessary. 

A singer-songwriter himself, Adelman said,“What I’ve discovered over the years is that there are 100,000 great musicians out there who struggle to make a living and many of them don’t. They’d love to share their music and this gives them an outlet to do this. We have a free event and we ask for donations which we use to give scholarships to music students.”

On Saturday, three local guitarists, Glenn Feit Sr., Job Potter (also an East Hampton Democratic nominee for town board), and Michael Weiskopf, will all play short sets from 7:30 to 10 p.m. The concert will be free of charge, but donations would be greatly appreciated. “Those who can afford to, please give,” Adelman said, “It’s tax deductible.”

At present eight local students have all applied for scholarships from a fund Adelman estimates contains around $5,000 to $6,000 dollars. It saddens him to think about potential talents he will not be able to help, he said.

In his efforts in Campbell Hall, Music For Humanity has held 41 free music events over the last three and a half years. On average this raises about $300 a night. This summer in East Hampton, he hopes to hold at least one more music night a month.  

“The Red Cross started out small 150 years ago,” Adelman said, “Imagine where we could be in 150 years.”


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