The One World Concert is set to take place on Tuesday, October 9, at Syracuse University’s Carrier Dome in New York. The concert features a wide-range of musical talent, and is being billed as an “historic celebration of peace, music, and common ground.”
The stellar lineup includes Dave Matthews, Counting Crows, Cyndi Lauper, Nas, A.R. Rahman, Natasha Bedingfield, and American Idol Season 11 winner, Phillip Phillips. In total, 24 musical acts are scheduled to perform. Legendary record producer Phil Ramone will serve as music producer for the One World Concert and Whoopi Goldberg will be the event’s emcee. NBC News correspondent Ann Curry is also set to make an appearance as the moderator for two panel discussions, one on the Arab Spring and the other on “shifting global consciousness towards peace.”
The concert follows a two-day forum of peace presided over by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, the spiritual leader and head-of-state for Tibet. The landmark event, called “Common Ground for Peace,” will be held at the university on October 8 and 9. According to the event’s official website, the forum will “bring together international thought leaders, the SU campus and the greater Syracuse community in critical conversations about how to shift global consciousness toward matters of peace.” Several high-profile individuals are scheduled to participate in discussion panels alongside the Dalai Lama. These include human rights advocate Martin Luther King III, former U.N. ambassador Andrew Young, and director of the Moral Courage Project at New York University, Irshad Manji .
The forum and the concert are sponsored and produced by the One World Community Foundation. This group was recently established by SU Trustee Samuel Nappi and his wife, Carol, in the hopes of spreading the belief that “peace is a deliberately achieved state that people throughout the world must constantly maintain.” This event is the Foundation’s first public endeavor, and the Nappis invite everyone to participate, regardless of their racial, religious, or cultural background.
The One World Concert will be recorded for later television broadcast, and will feature an original song written and performed for the Dalai Lama. According to the official website, the event “is expected to be one of the largest gatherings of international artists ever to travel to the region.” Lama Tenzin Dhonden, personal peace emissary for His Holiness the Dalai Lama, stated that the concert will be a “remarkable and historic event” because of the “diversity of great artists sharing their message of peace, love, and compassion with His Holiness the Dalai Lama.”
A presale for tickets to the concert was opened to full-time students of Syracuse University and SUNY-ESF on September 7, and a public presale opened the following day. General ticket sales will begin on September 10 at 10 a.m.
Ticket proceeds from the One World Concert will help advance international relief efforts and fund a new scholarship in the name of Bassel Al Shahade. Al Shahade was a SU graduate killed earlier this year while filming a documentary on the violence in his native Syria.