As part of the multicultural music organisation’s ongoing ‘Adapt, Not Cancel’ project.
Ever since the beginning of COVID-19, The Boite has been running their ‘Adapt, Not Cancel’ series to give gig opportunities to musicians at a time where they’ve lost most if not all of their work.
Across the six months that it’s been running, ‘Adapt, Not Cancel’ has proved to be a huge success welcoming artists to perform from all across the world. Up until early July, the series had garnered 35,000 views online and supported 65 artists and 15 audio and video techs.
The next step in the ‘Adapt, Not Cancel’ evolution sees The Boite introduce a new initiative – its ‘5 concerts for $5’ series. For five gigs in September and October, The Boite has dropped the individual ticket price to $5.
The Melbourne music tastemakers believe that anyone should have the opportunity to engage with art and music, regardless of their financial situation, and so ‘5 concerts for $5’ was born.
“We’ve been doing these online concerts since March 22, and we have made them available through social media and through our networks of supporters and members, many of whom would have planned to attend live events with The Boite over the course of the year,” The Boite Programming Director Therese Virtue says.
“Then, as the COVID restrictions went on and became more severe, we began wondering if there were people who were unable to access our events because of the ticket prices – so many people have lost jobs, or are on very limited incomes, so we decided to make an opportunity for everyone to attend regardless of income.”
The ‘5 concerts for $5’ series will commence with a performance from multi-award-winning jazz-inspired collective Zulya & The Children of the Underground Trio from 4pm on Sunday September 20. Then on Sunday October 4, two of Australia’s finest mandolin players, Luke Plumb and Stephen Lalor, will come together to perform a special show.
Following that, the Melbourne Shakuhachi Festival concert will take place on Sunday October 11 before Melbourne recorder player Ryan Williams will team up with Japan-based Miyama McQueen-Tokita for special event titled Unknown Mirrors on Sunday October 18.
The final event in the series will see Persian-Australia singer Shirin Majd perform a collection of love songs. Majd sings in Farsi, Turkish, Spanish and English, so this is sure to be an intriguing show.
The Boite’s ‘5 concerts for $5’ series kicks off on Sunday September 20 and runs until Sunday October 18. For more info and to grab tickets, head here.
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