The Belmont community is giving back this weekend — and turning up the music.
Music to Feed People, a free community concert, will be held Saturday, Sept. 12 to benefit the Belmont Food Pantry, Belmont Helps, and the community fridge being built at First Church in Belmont.
The concert will feature performances by the Monster Band, founded by Belmont resident Kevin Sheehan 15 years ago, and will include musicians who have performed with Peter Wolf of the J. Geils Band, Peter Parcek, the Brubeck family, Alanis Morissette, and “Tina: The Tina Turner Musical.” There will also be performances by Belmont High School students.
“We wanted to address food insecurity, which is becoming increasingly a dire and acute problem,” Sheehan told The Voice. “…the power to music in combination with a mission that’s extant and pretty obvious to most folks has really brought the community together.”
Christine Dunn, a member of the band, said the group usually gets together once a year to perform at Belmont Porchfest. However, with this year’s date change, Monster Band was unable to perform.
“We wanted to create something that would benefit the community, and so when Kevin and I were talking about it, we thought this is a good time to give this a try,” Dunn said.
This will be the first fundraiser for the community fridge, according to Amber Porter, who is working to bring the fridge to Belmont. She estimated the fridge and shed will cost upwards of $10,000 to get off the ground, noting organizers are in the “final planning stages.”
“It’s really uniting all of these different food insecurity programs in our local community, and planning a really fun time,” Porter said.
In addition to the music, the event will have face painting and a stand from Farmer Tim’s Vegetables, a Dudley-based farm. The farm stand will donate 10% of its proceeds to the concert. There will also be ice cream from Rancatore’s and barbecue from Blue Ribbon BBQ for sale. People are invited to bring bags of nonperishable goods for donations to the concert.
“We’re just so excited that they could bring, you know, music lovers there for a great cause,” said Amy Kirsch, co-founder and co-chair of Belmont Helps.
The concert is being sponsored by Anne Mahon Realty and the Hope Collaborative, a nonprofit founded by Sheehan that seeks to empower kids and teenagers around the world and teach them leadership skills.
“Music to Feed People” will run from 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. at 14 Clark St., with a rain date of Sept. 13. Parking is available at the All Saints’ Episcopal Church lot.
“Our hope is that people enjoy themselves and come together for this great cause, and that we can grow it and we can do it again next year,” Dunn said.