Concert of hope and peace

Evening Chronicle (Newcastle, England), Sept 11, 2008

SIMULTANEUOUS concerts on both sides of the Atlantic were due to be held today to mark the anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks.

After performances featuring musicians who lost loved ones in the atrocity, audiences in London and New York were expected to join the artists in a rendition of John Lennon and Paul McCartney's classic Let It Be.

More than 200 free concerts have been organised across the world on the seventh anniversary of the attacks.

Almost 3,000 people, including 67 Britons, were killed when terrorists hijacked aircraft and flew them into New York's World Trade Centre and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.

London's concert was due to take place in Grosvenor Square at the same time as performers take to the stage in the British Memorial Garden in Hanover Square, New York.

Performers in London include Coventry singer/songwriter Rob Halligan, whose father died in the World Trade Centre.

Singer Kris Buckle, the London Welsh Chorale and the South African opera singer Siphiwo Ntshebe were also on the bill.

The annual concerts were the brainchild of New York businesswoman Hakuro Smith, who in 2002 decided to try to turn September 11 from a day of anguish into a day of music.

She said: "The September Concert is not a memorial event. It's an opportunity for people to come together once a year and be united in hopes for peace. Music has the magical power to do that."

On Monday, the president of a project to build a national US memorial to those who died in the attacks said that it must be open by the 10th anniversary.

In New York, Joe Daniels said it was essential for the memorial and museum, which will be on the site of the World Trade Centre towers in New York, to be opened by September 11, 2011.

Mr Daniels said more than EUR350m had been raised for the national memorial and museum.

CAPTION(S):

BEACON: The Tribute Light illuminates the sky over the World Trade Center site, scene of the 9/11 terrorist attack