Pink Sari songwriting competition reaches its crescendo with nine competitors
Pink Sari Project has been using innovative ideas to target the Indian and Sri Lankan community to raise awareness about breast screening and mammograms. It has also done a very successful Portrait in Pink of survivors of breast cancer in the community, fashion parade and lunch in the park. And now the excitement is building up for everyone as nine songwriters and musicians in the community are competing for the Pink Sari songwriting competition. The nine contestants will be competing on October 19.
The top 9 singer/songwriters who will be performing on the day are Sumi Krishnan, Gary Luck, Priyanka Pinto, Rekha Shashikanth, Anu Shivaram, Deepa Srinivasan, Daniel Vijayakumar, Russell Vincent and Sheyana Wijesingha.
The Top 9 compositions will be professional recorded and pressed onto a CD for distribution. The Top 3 winners will receive some great prizes including a first prize of return economy airfare to India or Sri Lanka, as well as cash prizes.
Pink Sari Melodies Concert will be hosted by talented storyteller, poet and artist Sukhjit Kaur Khalsa. She recently took to stage and became finalist in Australia’s Got Talent 2016 as she wowed the audience with her honesty and brilliant performance. In 2014, Ms Khalsa performed spoken word to a wider audience at the Australian Poetry Slam Competition, which spiralled into a YouTube Channel titled ”˜Contemporary Kaur.’
The concert promises to be afternoon of inspirational music and songs by outstanding artists united in sharing their talents to raise awareness about how breast screening can save lives.
Pink Sari Melodies Concert on Saturday, 19th October at the Auburn Town Hall, will celebrate the winners of the Pink Sari Project National Songwriting Competition and recognise the success of community efforts to increase breast cancer screening in women from Indian and Sri Lankan backgrounds.
The award winning Pink Sari Project is a community initiative launched in 2014 aimed at raising breast screening rates amongst Indian and Sri Lankan communities. Women from these communities have one of the lowest screening rates in NSW. This campaign is led by the NSW Multicultural Health Communication Service (MHCS) in partnership with the NSW Refugee Health Service, University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and BreastScreen NSW with funding from the Cancer Institute NSW.
The Pink Sari Project National Songwriting competition was developed by MHCS as an innovative, creative and exciting way to promote the key messages about the importance of breast screening to Indian and Sri Lankan communities as well as to other language groups – through the power of songs.
Ms Meenakshi Chopra, President of Pink Sari Project Inc. said the songwriting competition was a creative way of engaging the community to promote key messages about the importance of breast screening in the Indian and Sri Lankan communities. It is also a great way for songwriters and musicians to have more exposure about their music, and as well as be involved in the project to encouraging women in their lives and in the community to get regular mammograms.
“We encouraged musical artists to get their creative juices flowing and help raise awareness about the importance for breast screening for all women from all culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and spread the messages that could save the lives of our loved ones” added Ms Chopra.
The songwriting competition was open to amateur and professional songwriters and musician from all cultural backgrounds across Australia. The theme for the competition is ”˜The women in my life’ and the words ”˜pink sari’ had to be included in the compositions. The competition also included a free songwriting workshop at the Australian Institute of Music (AIM) to help aspiring songwriters to craft their compositions.
After two years, the Pink Sari Project has achieved positive results with overwhelming support from the Indian and Sri Lankan community in NSW. Research from Cancer Institute NSW reported that by June 2015, the number of breast screens for women from Indian and Sri Lankan backgrounds had increased by 8% over the previous year, with numbers continuing to rise. The initiative has also received recognition by winning prestigious national and international awards.
The Pink Sari Melodies Concert will be the perfect way to celebrate all the wonderful achievements of the Pink Sari Project and thank everyone who has supported the campaign.
Visit the Pink Sari Project website: www.pinksariproject.org
Join the conversation on www.facebook.com/thepinksariproject
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