Last night at the Maroon 5 concert, ONE volunteers from Minneapolis, Minnesota signed up 721 new members — we totally rocked it out! We had a powerhouse of volunteers, and about half were college students, a couple high school students and a handful of our everyday volunteers. We covered the entire Target Center, and not one out of the 5,500 people that attended last night’s concert did not see a ONE volunteer trying to get people to commit their voices to help the world’s poorest people!
Ry Cummings, the opening musician, came up to our table after his performance and thanked us for all the AMAZING work that we have been doing for the world’s poorest people. We then got a sticker on him and a band in his hand and we took a group picture. He thanked us and asked all of the screaming girls that were around us to sign up to fight for the against poverty before getting a picture with him.
Maroon 5 gave us a shout out from stage, telling everyone about how great we were and that we are doing amazing work. We had a great night and really showed how AWESOME ONE Twin Cities volunteers are!
Thursday night’s Maroon 5 concert provided ONE Fort Worth and Dallas, Texas members with another great opportunity to share success stories around extreme poverty and preventable diseases. Thank you, Maroon 5!
ONE members with Maroon 5 in Texas
Thousands of inquiring concert-goers gave ONE members the opportunity to share the fact that smart, life-saving U.S. investments in vaccinations, clean water and agriculture have transformed communities in impoverished places in Africa, especially when resources are directed at women and girls. Communities daunted by a long vicious cycle of poverty have become healthy, stable and productive nations – just like our Bill and Melinda Gates spoke about this week during our Living Proof Project presentation in London.
Raised in North Texas, I can personally attest to the passion, caring hearts and engaging minds of residents. So, it wasn’t surprising how engaging our attendees were with our ONE members during the show. But recruiting more than 400 new ONE members once again demonstrates the determination of ONE members to raise more voices.
Fort Worth and Dallas ONE members are phenomenal advocates in their communities. They are building relationships with their churches, schools and elected leaders to inform everyone of the incredible progress the world has made in saving millions of lives. In fact, we recently had a meeting with Congresswoman Kay Granger from Fort Worth, where she took time to talk about ONE’s international life saving efforts, and even tape a special message for ONE members.
Stay tuned for more stories from the road and from ONE members everywhere!
We were absolutely thrilled to see each member of Maroon 5 perform live on the “Today” show in our ONE shirts. If you missed it, it’s not a big deal — we’ve got a clip right here from today’s show:
ONE is hitting the campaign trail to find out where candidates stand on extreme poverty. Stay tuned for more updates like these from our field team and organizers on the road.
You could feel the excitement in the air as fans anxiously waited in line to see Maroon 5 perform live in Indianapolis, Indiana.
The band stopped off at the historic Murat Theater to promote their upcoming album “Hands All Over,” and was gracious enough to invite ONE to tag along.
ONE volunteers handing out goodies and signing up new members
Maroon 5 keyboardist Jesse Carmichael greeting ONE supporters in the audience
The volunteers and I set up a table in the lobby so we could talk to people about ONE Vote 2010’s efforts to provide food, clean water and lifesaving vaccines to the world’s poorest.
We handed out more than 400 ONE T-shirts, bands, buttons and pamphlets, and signed up 180 new supporters to join ONE in the fight against extreme poverty and preventable disease.
In addition to a great turnout and strong fan support, our successful event was made even sweeter — we got a chance to hang out with the band.
When we spoke with the guys -– including lead singer Adam Levine –- we introduced them to ONE Vote’s issues, thanked them for their support and presented them with ONE bands.
With more than 24,000 ONE members in Indiana, the Hoosier State is leading the bipartisan grassroots effort to help those living on less than $1.25 a day.
Be sure to connect with other ONE Vote 2010 Indiana members on Facebook and Twitter.
Alterna-rockers and longtime ONE supporters Daughtry have been doing some major representing for ONE this past week — and we wanted to take the chance to thank them here on the ONE blog.
Although the band has a seriously crazy schedule filled with press interviews, TV appearances, gigs and all the trappings of fame and stardom, they’ve always found the time to express their commitment to ending extreme poverty and preventable disease.
And this week, celebrity gossip blog PopEater came out with an awesome multimedia story on a day in the life of Daughtry. Scrolling through the video and photos, we were absolutely psyched to see that lead vocalist Chris Daughtry sported a ONE band throughout the day.
Take a look at the videos and if you have the chance, send a Tweet to Daughtry and thank ‘em for supporting ONE.
Please welcome Joel Griffith, who’s working with our US Community Partnerships team this summer. Joel—a graduate student at Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, California—will be contributing to the ONE blog on occasion. Welcome, Joel!
Great music, great coffee…for a great purpose. Last Thursday night, ONE hosted award winning American singer-songwriter Anna Gilbert for a concert at Ebenezers Coffeehouse in downtown Washington, DC. Anna—a long-time ONE friend and supporter—and her talented band (including her husband Koa) entertained the crowd with some beautiful songs and inspiring words, encouraging everyone to use their voice to speak out against global poverty.
While in town, Anna and her husband also met with their congressmen from Oregon (where she was born and raised) and Senator Inouye from Hawaii (where he husband is from) to thank them for their work and to encourage their continued support on critical issues of extreme poverty and disease. Before heading back to the West Coast, Anna Gilbert made a special message about her trip exclusivley for ONE members, so make sure to check it out below.
To hear more of Anna’s music and to see where she’ll be playing next (including Hawaii on July 31 and August 1, visit http://www.myspace.com/annagilbert.
Today ONE’s President and CEO David Lane is featured on The Daily Beast’s “Buzz Board”– a feature in which they solicit recommendations in music, movies, and the arts. For David’s piece, he chose to write about Freshlyground:
Formed in 2002 in South Africa, Freshlyground is made up of seven diverse musicians from South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, fronted by the diminutive yet dynamic Zolani Mahola. Beyond reaching superstardom across Africa, Freshlyground has sold out several tours in Europe and last year toured North America for the first time, making the band one of a handful of South African acts to have a successful career both internationally and at home. Their success is largely due to their widely-appealing, easy-to-like sound: a feel-good fusion of rock, jazz and Afro-pop.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
