Voices in the Park: Sarah McLachlan leads out stars at Stanley Park

Anyone who was in Stanley Park on Saturday evening probably heard voices.

No, not voices in their head, but Voices in the Park, a benefit concert for the Sarah McLachlan School of Music.

“This is going to be a great day of music and I’d love to see it continue,” said event producer Paul Runnals earlier in the day, noting the Brockton Point site is a venue he hoped to continue using for events similar to the one spearheaded by Sarah McLachlan.

McLachlan, the Vancouver musician and advocate, performed Saturday at Stanley Park’s Brockton Fields for the fundraiser, which sold out all its reserved seating and chalets prior to the event and was steadily tracking toward an anticipated 11,000 general admission tickets sold.

The event, which also featured Bryan Adams, Stevie Nicks, Hey Ocean! and the ever comedic Jann Arden, was also the largest concert to take place in Stanley Park and the first ticketed event to use the Brockton Fields site.

All proceeds from the concert went to funding McLachlan’s school, which provides free music training and programs for socially challenged and at-risk Vancouver youth.

McLachlan’s long-time friend, former U.S. President Bill Clinton, flew in from New York especially to lend his support for the benefit.

Clinton kept his speech to less than five minutes and made no mention of the Democratic National Convention, where he spoke earlier this month in support of President Barack Obama.

Instead, Clinton said he was there for McLachlan, who had often come to his support at various points throughout the last two decades. He praised the musician for her work with youth and music education.

“I think it is very unlikely that I would have ever become president had I not been in school music from the time I was nine to the time I was 17,” Clinton shared with the crowd.

“It taught me discipline and creativity. It made me see the world in different ways. It made me understand things in different ways.

“You are literally, by contributing here, increasing the capacity of young Canadians to learn, to grow, to live their dreams.”

It was a cause that friends Kelsey Plumb and Marisa Varley were more than happy to support.

The women, both 25, were attending the concert with their two younger siblings, Plumb’s sister Hannah and Varley’s brother Keegan – both of whom are diagnosed with Down syndrome.

The quartet were able to enjoy the concert thanks to Kids Up Front Vancouver, an organization that distributes free event tickets to challenged youth, providing them with opportunities they might never have received – similar to McLachlan’s cause.

“It’s a great idea,” Plumb said. “We definitely need more music in Vancouver for young people.”

For others like Kelly Wolfe and her two friends, it was a chance to leave the husbands and kids at home and enjoy a ladies’ night out.

While Wolfe admitted she was there for Canadian icon Adams, the trio wasn’t there just to fawn over musical acts.

“These artists coming together to make the world a little better? That’s what we’re really here for,” Wolfe said.