Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Grade 4 Singers meet Mr Damisch

About a year ago, I (Jim)  was contacted by Mr. Damisch through a mutual friend, John Furguson with American Voices.  Mr. Furguson has been sharing American culture in developing and war-torn countries for over 17 years by providing training, workshops and performances by professionals in the fields of art, music, dance, and theatre.  www.americanvoices.org

Mr. Damisch told me he was planning to be in Cambodia as part of a world tour he was doing in July 2012.  He offered to do a concert, free of charge, to benefit the Spitler Foundation.  It turns out Mr. Damisch, a lawyer from Chicago, has been doing concert tours for many years, paying all his own expenses, in hopes of bringing American culture and peace to countries around the world.  We could not resist the offer!



We began to correspond and fashioned a program that would work for the Spitler Foundation.
Jule (our German volunteer) and I went to some of the 5 star hotels to see if any would help co-sponsor this event.  The Sofitel Angkor Resort jumped at the chance.  Fabrice Ducry, the General Manager, is a strong supporter of the arts and cultural events and felt the idea of a benefit performance, in the middle of low season, would be a ‘win win’ for all involved. 
We decided the scale the performance should be small, since there would be so few tourists in town.  We’d depend mainly on the local Khmer residents and the ex-pat community.
Instead of using a ballroom, which might end up with 20-30 people (depressing!), we chose the luxurious lounge room which seated about 50 people in very comfy leather chairs with tables.  We promoted the event as a ‘salon style’ performance with food and drink available to the patron, mimicking a popular 19th century style of classical entertainment where homes were turned into mini concert venues and performers did their programs in the salon.

The hotel offered to do a little reception prior to the event, which we thought was great!  We made posters and also posted the event on the Siem Reap ex-pat page of Facebook.  Within a week, the venue was almost fully booked!  The turn out from the ex-pat community was incredible! By the night of the performance we had over 65-70 committed to attend.  A full house!

Our expectation was that July 13th would be an otherwise ‘dead’ time in Siem Reap.  But it turned out Siem Reap was a hotbed of activity that night!  The ASEAN Conference got booked into the hotel next to the Sofitel.  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was to be there, along with Prime Ministers from several Asian Countries.  The Sofitel also ended up hosting a big conference for Asian Women’s Rights and Equality (400 pax).  The Raffles Hotel down the road was hosting a major diplomatic event, and the Hotel Sokha was hosting Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, and a large delegation for meetings and festivities!
Traffic and the police presence was an awesome sight indeed.
Oh, and Spitler Foundation was hosting “A Classical Evening” with Mark Damisch at the Sofitel Resort!

Of course, the most special part of the evening was during the reception.  A select group of 4th Graders entertained the crowd with 3 songs they learned during English classes.  Special thanks to Nick Thorne for introducing these ditties to the kids. [Ditties?  This is choral singing of the highest quality!  Nick - Ed.]  The 16 children who performed had received nice clean tee shirts (Angry Bird)….for the show and really looked sharp.  And their performance was spectacular!  The crowd LOVED them.



It was a truly successful evening.  Although we did not press hard for donations, we did secure about $300 from the event.  Mark Damisch was a unique performer and his daughter Alexandra played a Chopin piece and led a sing along at the end with everyone joining in on the chorus of “All You Need I Love” by the Beatles.


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