Street Music Week: Solving Hunger through Music

Published On: June 15th, 2021Categories: Community Support, Post

Man playing guitar and singing

Street Music Week in Appleton is once again raising funds to feed local families.

Musicians are playing music on College Avenue and online this week as an opportunity for people to donate and hear some good tunes during their lunch hours. Singer and songwriter Christopher Gold will play this Thursday on the Heid Music Facebook live stream from 11 – 11:30 a.m. and in person from noon – 1 p.m. This will be his first time playing live music again since the pandemic started.

Last year before the pandemic, Christopher and his wife decided to collect peanut butter and jelly at his shows for the Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin PB&J Challenge. “That was all my wife. She thought that if we were going to have this crowd, let’s see if we can use the crowd to accomplish a good thing. So, she started encouraging people to bring peanut butter and jelly.”

When asked why he enjoys taking part in Street Music Week, Christopher said, “I think that if you’re going to be part of a community, there’s a responsibility to that. You have to be giving as much back as you take out. Appleton has been very supportive of me, so if I get a chance to play some music for a good cause, I try to do that as often as I can.”

Christopher also understands all the work that goes into solving hunger. “I think that’s kind of the cool thing about a lot of the events that Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin does is that… the event accomplishes both goals. In that, it goes to great efforts to solve the actual problem, but it also goes to great efforts to raise awareness of the problem. It’s one of the most fixable problems that we face. If you do the research into how much food there is in this country, and then you learn how many people are living food-insecure lives, it’s just unacceptable.”

We thank Christopher for his commitment to solving the unacceptable problem of food insecurity in his community. We are excited that Street Music Week will be the kick-off to his re-entry into live music, and we hope you come out to College Avenue or tune in on Facebook to hear him play.

In the eight years of Street Music Week, over $35,000 has been raised. Every $1 raised provides three meals for those in need. Help us reach Heid Music’s $7,500 goal this year!

Klink Equipment and Vollrath Foodservice are sponsors of this year’s Heid Music Street Music Week.

For more information on the event or on donating, click here.