The Kumbaya Foundation, established in 1992, raised over a million dollars for the care of people living with AIDS and HIV. What began as a gathering of Canadian musicians lead by singer Molly Johnson, grew into an annual festival of music, art, education and compassion that made a powerful impact on Canadians. From 1992 to 1995 Kumbaya was broadcast live by MuchMusic, and featured Canada's very best talent from Rush to the Tragically Hip, from Barenaked Ladies to Sarah McLachlan. In its inaugural, history making years at the Ontario Place Forum and the Molson Amphitheatre, Kumbaya's proud sponsors were Health Canada, Molson Breweries, Much Music and The House of Blues.

Now more than a decade later, the AIDS virus continues to spread world-wide, but particularly in Africa. 40 million people worldwide. 26 million in Africa - mostly young women who are dying at such a rate that more than half of some African countries children - 14 million in all -- are now orphans. Most affected have no access to treatment and, even for those "lucky" enough to get the drugs. There is NO CURE. In Canada, the rate of infection continues to rise alarmingly, nearly doubling in the last decade.

Complacency and misinformation make the need for Kumbaya more relevant and important than ever. By speaking directly to the next generation, Kumbaya once again rises to the growing need and hosts a musical event to raise AIDS awareness. Kumbaya lends a powerful voice to the international community, demonstrating that Canada cares passionately about the AIDS epidemic. All fundraising efforts will benefit outstanding groups working for the cause, including the Stephen Lewis Foundation, War Child Canada and the Teresa Group.

The Kumbaya 2006 team includes veteran activists June Callwood, Denise Donlon and Molly Johnson, along with Shelley Ambrose, Anna Ross, Mark Smith, Pegi Cecconi, Velma Barkwell, Kathy Cochrane, Don Simpson, Carolyn V. Mill, Health Canada, Chum Group, House of Blues and many others who will help get the message heard. www.kumbaya.ca

Stay tuned for another Kumbaya Festival in the future

In the meantime, please give to
The Stephen Lewis Foundation

Casey House

kumbaya.ca

Molly Johnson: Kumbaya founder, AIDS fighter

By Kerry Doole for www.socan.ca

It's totally fitting that Molly Johnson's first stop after her recent interview with SOCAN was a Toronto church, where she would rehearse songs to sing at a funeral for the relative of a musician friend.Johnson has been a virtual poster girl for charitable work and generous behaviour on the local and national music scenes for the past two decades. Her career as a jazz/pop singer and songwriter has never been healthier, and she's now become a rising star in France. Despite an increasingly active international schedule, Johnson remains committed to a wide range of work for a large number of charities.Her name is most closely linked to AIDS-related causes and events, and these are still closest to her heart. As a fixture on Toronto's Queen Street West music and art scene since the mid-'80s, Johnson witnessed numerous friends and colleagues fall prey to the epidemic, and she was quick to join the fight against it.Johnson was a key supporter of author/activist June Callwood's efforts to establish the city's first AIDS hospice, Casey House, in 1988. As she realised the desperate need for increased public awareness of the disease as well as funds to assist the afflicted, Johnson launched the Kumbaya festival.Her personal charisma and powers of persuasion resulted in an overwhelming response from fellow musicians and celebrities from other fields. Starting in 1992, this star-studded annual festival of music, art, education and compassion was televised nationally by MuchMusic, raising both large sums of money and public consciousness in the process."Kumbaya was a beautifully organic thing," Johnson recalls. "It took a lot of phone calls, but it raised a million and a half [dollars] for people living with AIDS. I'm hoping that it also educated a certain community to AIDS and the fact that it was not just a gay disease. I still think that's important."Johnson was a recent performer at the Nov 29, 2004, UrbanAIDS concert in Toronto, one designed to raise awareness, funding and support for millions of women and children around the globe suffering from HIV/AIDS. A great admirer of Stephen Lewis, United Nations Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, she expresses a desire to visit Africa with Lewis.Molly's mile-wide charitable streak may well be implanted in her DNA. "I come from a family of do-gooders, so I come by it historically," she explains with a chuckle. "My dad was active in the civil rights movement in the U.S. and aboriginal rights up here, and my mother did a lot of things in Africa. She was one of the founders of [aid organization] CUSO and she then went on to found a group called MATCH International. It partners small groups of women here with women in developing nations."Putting her celebrity status to positive use is important to Johnson. "It [her charity work] helps deflect from the fame of it all. It gets a little tiresome to talk about Molly, Molly. This gives me something else to talk about and for people to look at. I am struggling to use the word 'fame,' but if I can shine that light off me for a bit and do something positive, that is a good way to use it."Other causes and organizations to have benefited greatly from Johnson's support include the Children's Wish Foundation, Daily Bread Food Bank, UNESCO, Canadian Feed The Children, the Centre for Addiction & Mental Health Foundation, and Doctors Without Borders.Molly explains that the phone of her manager, SRO's Peggi Cecconi, overheats with "calls from the millions of people asking me to do stuff. Now Peggi sees how much I turn down, but she still calls me 'a bleeding heart!' Before making a decision on what I can do, I look on my calendar and see if there's too much or not enough Molly that month. I also keep in the back of my mind something Jim Cuddy once told me, that we have to be careful we don't do the government's job by being constantly fundraising."

Johnson still says yes very often. Such work does not directly impact her songwriting, she stresses. "A French journalist recently said, 'Why not write a song about AIDS?' Well, I'd sooner write a great pop song, make a million bucks and use that to help fight AIDS!"

Mon, October 4, 2004

Giving back is Molly's way

By Nicholas Davis -- Toronto Sun
When Toronto singer-songwriter Molly Johnson was a little girl sitting at the supper table, her mother used to use a not-so-subtle form of persuasion to get her to eat her vegetables. "You know when your mother would say, 'Eat your vegetables because people are starving in Africa?' " quips Johnson. "My mother would say 'eat your vegetables' and then she would show you graphs, charts and even have Africans at the supper table to drive the point home." CUSO volunteer
Johnson's mother was able to provide the added touch to the vegetable analogy because she was a CUSO volunteer. CUSO is a Canadian-based international development organization. They send volunteers to Third World countries including some in Africa, where Johnson's mother spent some time helping those less fortunate than herself. Johnson's father was also a social activist. He and his wife were heavily involved in the civil rights movement in the United States before they moved to Toronto. He also did a lot of work with First Nations people. "Imagine that, a black man from Philadelphia who had an affinity to help First Nations people in Canada," says Johnson. "I always found that interesting." It was more than interesting for Johnson and her sister Taborah and brother Clark. Their parents were role models who instilled in them a sense of giving back to others. Something that Molly has done so often and willingly throughout her career that last week she was honoured with the Roy Thomson Hall Award of Recognition. The award is given out by the Toronto Arts Foundation. It recognizes creative, performing, administrative, volunteer or philanthropic contributions to Toronto's musical life. In addition to being an accomplished singer and songwriter, Johnson is also an arts activist and humanitarian to the Nth degree. But she's most proud of her work with the Kumbaya Foundation. It began in 1992 as a get-together with Johnson and her friends from the Canadian music business. But Kumbaya grew into an annual festival of music, art and education that raised close to $1 million for people living with HIV and AIDS. $10,000 prize "It was a real sense of accomplishment," says Johnson. "It just goes to show what people can do if they really put their minds to something." The Roy Thomson Hall Award of Recognition comes with a $10,000 cash prize. The first thing Johnson did after receiving the award was donate half of the prize money back to the Toronto Arts Council, the organization that gave her the award. "The Toronto Arts Council has done so much for the arts in this city that I felt it was important to give them something for all they have given others like me," says Johnson. Johnson's next humanitarian effort involves getting young people off the streets and out of the malls. As a mother of two small children, this is something Johnson feels really needs to be addressed. "One of Mayor David Miller's initiatives is to put together a community safety panel with a focus on youth," says Johnson. "If you want to make communities safe, you have to keep young people occupied. We need to reactivate our community centres. Get young people involved in things other than hanging around. "One of the ways this can happen is by running programs at community centres and having artists run them. These are the things kids need to keep busy and off the streets." The Toronto Arts Foundation Awards were handed out last Monday at Toronto City Hall. The awards are presented every two years to artists, creators, administrators and volunteers in recognition of their outstanding contributions to arts and culture in the city of Toronto.

Other winners were Sky Gilbert (Margo Bindhardt Award), Marshall Pynkoski (Muriel Sherrin Award), Djanet Sears (William Kilbourn Award) and Itah Sadu (Marilyn Lastman Award).