DALLAS (SMU) – The Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University, in conjunction with SMU-in-Legacy and the new Dallas-based choir “Resounding Harmony,” is launching a three-week campaign that includes a food drive and two benefit concerts to raise funds and food supplies for the North Texas Food Bank. The entire project was the brainchild of Tim Seelig. The campaign is in partnership with the Food Bank’s three-year “Close the Gap” initiative, which hopes to eliminate the 29-million-meal-a-year shortfall in the number of meals available for needy families below the poverty line.   The Food Bank’s goal is to provide 50 million meals a year by 2011. 

Meadows is spearheading two simultaneous initiatives: a virtual food drive and a traditional canned food drive.  The virtual food drive, which will be held from Nov.. 8-24, allows students, faculty, staff and friends to donate online at http://vad.aidmatrix.org. The North Texas Food Bank is able to purchase five meals for every $1 donated.  In addition, Meadows students will collect canned food from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. each day from Nov.. 15-24 in the Bob Hope Theatre lobby inside the Owen Arts Center.

In addition, two benefit concerts will be held featuring the new, 160-voice Resounding Harmony choir, directed by Seelig. Resounding Harmony will donate at least 50 percent of the proceeds from each concert directly to the North Texas Food Bank (NFTB) and Crossroads Community Services, which is the largest organization distributing food from the NTFB. Their inaugural concert, titled “Grateful,” will be held at 7:30 p.m. on Monday, Nov.. 17, at St. Andrew United Methodist Church in Plano. The concert, which will also feature the Children’s Choirs of St.. Andrew, is sponsored by St. Andrew, SMU-in-Legacy and the Annette Caldwell Simmons School of Education and Human Development at SMU.

The second concert, which culminates the food drive at SMU, will be held at 8 p.m. on Monday, Nov.. 24 in the Caruth Auditorium of the Owen Arts Center. It will feature the Meadows Chorale and Meadows Concert Choir performing with Resounding Harmony.

Tickets to each concert are $25 per person and are available at www.resoundingharmony.org or by calling Sandy Huneke at 817-913-9978. For all future concerts presented by the SMU choirs, donations to NTFB will be requested in lieu of an admission charge.

 “Thanks to the Meadows School-led partnership, we will be able to bring a greater voice to important issues as we work to close the gap on hunger,” said Jan Pruitt, CEO of North Texas Food Bank. “The partnership advances the North Texas Food Bank’s three-year Close the Gap initiative to unite the community in addressing the overwhelming need in North Texas.” 

The food drive unites the Meadows School with additional partners such as Clear Channel Radio, Art for Peace & Justice and Hotel Lumen. The goal is to raise at least $5,000 in monetary contributions and 1,000 pounds of food. 

 “We are proud to be hosting a concert for the chorus and to support the North Texas Food Bank and Crossroads Community Services,” said José Bowen, Dean of the Meadows School of the Arts.  “This is art that matters and echoes one of our primary messages to our student artists: they bring the creativity and commitment, and we help them turn that into action and impact.”

For more information about the Close the Gap on Hunger food drive, please visit the North Texas Food Bank website at ntfb.org.  For additional information regarding SMU’s food drive contact Chantala Smith at [email protected].