"The music industry around the world has been brutally suffering, ever since the COVID-19 pandemic began. Many international artists have been participating in fundraising charity concerts via online. In our country, however, I think we have marginalised the performance and compromised the quality in terms of online musical performances - and that we believe, changes tonight," Rafa exclusively spoke to UNB.
As one of the four participating stars of Bangladesh music scene in this special live musical performance, Rafa believes that online is the new medium at least for a year or more during the absence of live crowd-based musical events - and so the professional artists should focus on more enriched and quality performances for the audience of online, something that the organisers of this special charity concert heavily emphasized on.
"After being motivated for this noble cause by Shafquat Rabbee Anik bhai from USA, when we got united for the concert - our main focus was to provide an exceptional musical performance in terms of quality. Performers in the West are doing a number of quality concerts in this crucial time, which could not been possible without adequate and advanced technological support", Rafa emphasized on the necessity of proper assistance behind quality performances.
"From the beginning, we kept that mindset that we will maintain the highest possible quality, something that can be useful even for the future arrangements like this - and for the last couple of days we have worked extensively so that we can provide an overall better experience to our audiences at home, as they are donating for a noble cause in this charity concert. Our audience comes first and they deserve the best", Rafa thanked the organizers, audience and donors.
Regarding the problems music artists are facing in terms of online performances, Rafa believes that Internet Service Providers (ISP) have major roles to play in this situation. "As both the artist and audience are using internet as the medium, I believe the ISP companies can surely lend a hand of support in terms of sponsorship or at least with stable assurance of their service - something that came to aid performers in the West."
The concert, hosted by Zunaed Rabbani and Juneyna Kabir, will be broadcast live from the official Facebook page of 'Music Against Hunger' at 10 pm on Saturday. Rafa and Tahsan will participate in the concert on Saturday night while Minar and Topu will participate on the second and last night on Sunday.
Aiming to help the pandemic affected people who are financially devastated by the Coronavirus scourge, the fundraising concert is an opportunity to donate towards vulnerable families in Bangladesh and session musicians whose livelihoods have been severely affected by Covid-19, stated the event organizers.
Food items will be distributed to the needy people in different districts of the country through the fundraising concert. According to the organizers, the Public Health Foundation of Bangladesh will distribute the collected money. Financial assistance can be sent to the Public Health Foundation of Bangladesh's Prime Bank account number 2503116000594.
Voluntary organization Dhroopad will be accepting and distributing all the concert proceeds collected from outside Bangladesh. International donors can donate to the campaign through PayPal at [email protected]
Close-up and Bioscope and ABC Radio are co-sponsoring the concert online. Further information will be available at Music For Hunger’s event page at Facebook and https://choloshobai.com/campaign/music-against-hunger/.
Online streaming platform Bioscope will also stream the concert at the app and private FM Radio station ABC Radio will broadcast the concert at their Facebook page at the same time.