Company also launches “Get an Epiphone, Gibson Gives an Epiphone” to provide guitars for music students
(Image credit: Erik Voake/CBS via Getty Images)
Gibson has partnered with Playing For Change to air the Peace Through Music: A Global Event for Social Justice concert , which is streaming in its entirety on demand via Gibson TV through December 31 in celebration of the annual Human Rights Day.
Produced by Playing For Change and Blackbird Presents, the event features more than 200 musicians, including Keith Richards, Robbie Robertson, Gary Clark Jr., Jack Johnson, Brandi Carlile with Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready, Carlos Santana and Cindy Blackman Santana, Run the Jewels with Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme and many more.
Show highlights include Gary Clark Jr.’s performance of This Land, Santana’s Oye Como Va with Uruguayan percussionist Rubén Rada and Tito Puente Jr. and Carlile and McCready’s cover of Bob Dylan’s The Times They Are A-Changin’.
There are also special remarks from Amina Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, and from Epsy Campbell Barr, First Vice President of Costa Rica. In addition, Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, will offer a message to empower the world to seek freedom and justice, end all forms of discrimination and protect everyone’s rights.
“For over 100 years we have been inspiring, supporting and engaging with musicians across all generations, genres and nations, but it feels like the world needs music now more than ever to bring us together,” said Gibson president and CEO James “JC” Curleigh. “The opportunity for us to partner with Playing For Change will create a compelling music movement around the world.”
To celebrate the partnership with Playing For Change, Gibson has also launched the first-ever “Get an Epiphone, Gibson Gives an Epiphone” campaign, which provides brand-new Epiphone guitars to Playing For Change Foundation music students.
Through December 31, Gibson will match every Epiphone guitar purchased and place a brand-new Epiphone Starling acoustic guitar – due for official release in the spring of 2021 – with a student in need (up to 200).
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(Image credit: Epiphone)
Additionally, Gibson also recently auctioned a one-off “Peace Through Music” Dove acoustic custom guitar to benefit the Playing For Change Foundation.
More information on the Get an Epiphone, Gibson Gives an Epiphone campaign can be found at Epiphone.
And to watch the Peace Through Music concert in full, head to YouTube.
Rich is the co-author of the best-selling Nöthin' But a Good Time: The Uncensored History of the '80s Hard Rock Explosion. He is also a recording and performing musician, and a former editor of Guitar World magazine and executive editor of Guitar Aficionado magazine. He has authored several additional books, among them Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck, the companion to the documentary of the same name.
