Haiti Benefit Concert Raises $37,000

Over 1,000 students and members of the Harvard community congregated in Sanders Theatre on Friday for the Harvard for Haiti Benefit Concert, which raised roughly $37,000 for relief efforts and advocated for long-term assistance to the earthquake-devastated Caribbean nation.

The event—which was organized by students and supported by the Office for the Arts at Harvard—will donate all proceeds from the concert to Partners in Health. Partners, co-founded in 1987 by then-Harvard Medical School student and now-Harvard professor Paul Farmer, has been operating community health clinics in Haiti for over two decades.

“We will stand with the Haitian population,” Farmer said in a recorded video statement shot from Haiti.

Farmer, who has helped to coordinate international medical relief efforts as the United Nations Deputy Special Envoy to Haiti, thanked the Harvard community for its efforts and called Haiti “our oldest neighbor.”

Harvard undergraduates began to mobilize a task force and plan the benefit concert shortly after the earthquake struck Haiti on Jan. 12.

Harvard faculty helped support student efforts by subsidizing production costs.

“The Harvard community has so many talented student performers, and a concert would allow us to draw from those varied artistic talents to make a united relief effort,” said B.A. Sillah ’12, executive producer for the event.

The sold-out relief concert featured original dance and musical compositions by Harvard students. Performances included a show by the Drummers of the Pan-African Dance and Music Ensemble, a dance by the Caribbean Club Dance Troupe to the beat of Haitian-born singer Wyclef Jean, and a rendition of Maya Angelou’s poem “Still I Rise” from the Kuumba Singers of Harvard College.

University President Drew G. Faust also delivered an opening address, and College Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds offered a closing reflection.

Speakers at the event praised Harvard’s active and quick response to the Haiti crisis

But they also emphasized the importance of providing long-term relief and reconstruction aid.

“How can we claim compassion fatigue if we never show consumption fatigue?” asked Sebastian Velez, assistant resident dean of Kirkland House and a speaker at the concert.

Velez recounted how he and four Harvard students delivered immediate relief to Haiti after the earthquake in the form of food and medical supplies.

In an effort to foster continued involvement and awareness among Harvard students, the Student Alliance For Global Health at Harvard brought together 22 global health and development-related groups from across campus in the basement of the Cambridge Queen’s Head pub after the concert.

“The goal was to use the high energy at Harvard about helping Haiti and show students how they can get involved in long-term projects,” said SAGHAH Board speaker Michael B. Hadley.

Ryan C. Juntado ’11, who attended the concert, said he had “never seen anything like this before” in his three years at Harvard.

“Harvard for Haiti is a good example of what Harvard students can do when they come together about a cause they are passionate about,” Juntado said.

—Staff writer Meredith C. Baker can be reached at meredith.baker@college.harvard.edu.