Rising country music band The Dungarees hit the stage at 8 a.m. Sharp Wednesday morning, where they will perform a 24-hour music marathon until Thursday morning.
The 24-hour Gig-A-Thon fundraiser being held at Yellowhead Brewery is in support of the Alberta Cancer Foundation. The band said the marathon will be like playing 24 sets in one day.
Watch Below: Kendra Slugoski talked to guitarist Kiron Jhass about the unique event.
“I wasn’t sure how they were going to pull this off, “admitted Natasha Pearson with the Alberta Cancer Foundation. “But now that I hear it, see all this happening, I think they are going to do a fantastic job.”
READ MORE: ‘It’s not just about the makeup’: Support program empowers women going through cancer treatment
Funds raised will go towards the Alberta Cancer Foundation’s patient financial assistance program. It gives money to patients needing help with expenses such as travel, food and childcare during their cancer treatments.
“It’s really great because it helps patients support things like their mortgage or transportation costs, parking costs at the hospital. Even extra medications that they might need to have covered,” Pearson explained.
“It does go a long way in helping patients focus on recovery rather than some of those financial stressors that can come along.”
Watch Below: Kendra Slugoski talked to Natasha Pearson with the Alberta Cancer Foundation as the band takes the stage.
“We wanted to do something that was going to make an impact, something people would notice and something big, “explained guitarist Kiron Jhass, ” So this is what came up with.”
The band will be performing requests from cancer patients themselves.
READ MORE: Now home and healthy, Alberta family reflects on ‘darkest time’ of their life
“We wanted to, besides play music, bring something of the patient involvement into this,” said Jhass, who is also a registered nurse in the surgical unit at Edmonton’s Cross Cancer Institute.
The department rolled out a program called “Let’s Talk”: an effort to inject more humanism in health care by getting to know patients outside of the hospital framework.
“The idea is that we want to get to know the patients, what they might be doing outside of work. A little bit about themselves in addition to just the impersonal sort of medical history,” Jhass explained.
“So part of that, we were just asking them what songs they like. What kind of music do they like to listen to? And we’re incorporating that as much as we can into our playlist.”
There are plenty of country and classic rock requests on the playlist. To hear the music for yourselves, donate and enjoy a pint while you’re at it, drop by Yellowhead Brewery (10229 – 105 St.). You can also donate online.