Forget Red Rocks—how about a mountain music festival on Mt Kilimanjaro? The trail to Machu Picchu in the Andes? The top of the Empire State Building? Everest base camp? Meet the Love, Hope, Strength Foundation (LHSF), a nonprofit on a mission to produce the highest concerts on Earth for the higher purpose of funding cancer centers throughout the world.
The next concert, Pikes Peak Rocks, will be held June 27, 2009, atop the eponymous Colorado mountain. One-hundred registered cancer survivors and supporters have pledged $1,000 each to trek to the top of the 14er and see the show. “The hike symbolizes the climb back from cancer that millions of people are going through every day,” explains director Shannon Foley. “Spectators are invited and encouraged to join us at the top.”
Denver-based LHSF was co-founded in 2007 by leukemia survivors Mike Peters of the Welsh rock band The Alarm and James Chippendale, president of CSI Entertainment. Musicians from every corner of the globe have joined LHSF, including high-school bands, Nepalese folk singers, rock n’ roll legends such as members of The Cult, The Stray Cats, Gin Blossoms, The Fixx, Candlebox, Seether, The Smithereens, Everclear and many more. It’s one concert where you can actually tell your parents you got high.
For more information about Pike’s Peak Rocks, go to www.lovehopestrength.org/site/ppr-home. LHSF has not yet announced the headline act for the Pikes Peak show.
