Helping the healing
Brad W. Gary/ Columbia Basin Herald<br>Chris Adair, left, and Joe Carpentier perform as part of the band IdleFill during Saturday's tsunami relief concert at the Wallenstien theater.
Bands, crowds gather to raise money for tsunami survivors
MOSES LAKE — Music fans packed the Wallenstien Theater at Big Bend Community College Saturday night, coming out for a cause to help people in need halfway across the world.
Saturday was "Help the Healing," a Grant County concert to bring help to survivors of the recent tsunami disaster in southeast Asia. Area musicians Michelle Payne, IdleFill and Soul Theory all performed to help those in need.
Andrew Southwick of IdleFill told the crowds that the tsunami was a sad and terrible thing, but added that Saturday's event was to help those who survived the disaster.
"When we're helping the healing," Southwick told the crowd, "we're helping the living."
Saturday's event started with a slide show, showing the audience the magnitude of the devastation from the tsunami and the toll it took on southeast Asia. The music then started with Michelle Payne, followed by IdleFill and later, Soul Theory.
"Help the Healing" was organized in part by Noon Moon Coffeehouse owners Greg and Adrienne Strickland, and all proceeds made Saturday went to UNICEF Southeast Asia Tsunami Relief Fund.
Greg Strickland said that a lot of work is still to be done in tsunami-impacted countries, and said Saturday's concert was a way to help those who those who were left behind.
"I think anything anybody can do to help is really a good thing," Strickland said.
It was the work of four or five key players that brought "Help the Healing" together, Strickland said. He added that many different groups came together to make the evening work.
"You just can't not be affected by what's going on over there," he said of the disaster.
Strickland said he was very encouraged by the turnout to Saturday's event, which was also being broadcast on KDRM and KBSN by live remote.
"I'm just really touched that everyone came out to support this," Strickland said.
In addition to the concert, T-shirts were also sold to benefit tsunami victims. Greg Strickland said that the "Help the Healing" event raised well over $1,000 in tsunami aid.
He also said that contributions can be made until Wednesday at the Moses Lake branch of US Bank at 201 E. Third. Contributions can be made to the "Help the Healing Fund," care of the Noon Moon Coffeehouse.