CREDIT: LLIAM BUCKLEY
Students are hard at work getting prepared to host the Share the Land (STL) concert at the London Music Hall on Feb. 7. This is the seventh year the event will go on.

Second year students of Fanshawe's Music Industry Arts (MIA) program are hard at work getting ready for their annual Share the Land (STL) charity concert happening at the London Music Hall on Feb. 7.

This exciting night of music, which honours musicians from across Canada, is in its seventh year of running and this year is gearing up to be one of the biggest productions yet.

Students and faculty of the MIA program shared their stories of how the concert began and the challenges and rewards this year has held for them.

The first run of this concert was in 2012. It began as a discussion in a class lecture that Professor Mike Roth was giving.

“I was talking about how a charity concert could give [musicians] an opportunity to reach a larger audience,” Roth said. After asking what type of concert MIA would run, one student suggested that one be done in memory of the late, great Jack Richardson, an icon in the Canadian Music Industry and former Professor for the MIA program.

“I said, ‘that's a great idea. Let's do it',” Roth said.

The show had a very humble beginning, being run in London's Aeolian Hall and featuring only twelve acts after no more than a month of rehearsals.

Despite its simple nature, the show was a hit.

“It turned into such a great night that it's become an annual event,” Roth said.

Since then, the show has happened every year and grown exponentially, with preparation now beginning as early as one's first year in the program.

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of the STL concert is that it is entirely student run with very little involvement of the MIA staff.

At the beginning of the school year, Roth puts together a creative team of managers, artists, repertoire representatives, tech support, stage hands, a marketing team and business team who then meet every week, audition acts and take care of all aspects of putting on an epic show. “It's a team effort and to see people work together, towards something that takes so much work, and have it succeed is really rewarding,” Roth said.

The concert is different from others in that it features over twenty different acts from MIA students, performing one song each. The music is all creative covers of songs by Canadian artists, done in such a way that they are hardly recognizable to the original version.

“It's so cool to just see how everyone comes together. It's a very unique group of people but it all works really, really well,” general stage manager, Jenna Bjornson said.

This uniqueness has made the show extremely popular, completely selling out in its past two years of production.

In order to accommodate the constantly growing fan base, the concert moved venues this year from Aeolian Hall to the prestigious London Music Hall, upping the ante to make this year unlike any other.

The STL team couldn't have picked a better year to do so, as the number of talented acts that have come forward to play has been overwhelming.

“In past years they've tried to make sure they have enough acts to play, this year we have an abundance… of amazing musicians and amazing acts,” Alex Emrich, STL music director, said. “The hard part is that we have to find a way within the two sets of the show to combine all those talents most efficiently [and] show the skills that everyone has.”

Though faced with the challenges of the college faculty strike in the early stages of this year's production, the students were not deterred in the slightest.

Much to the delight of their teachers, the creative team continued meeting regularly, sans professors, in order to keep things moving forward at a steady pace.

“When I came back from the strike I was really surprised,” Roth said. “People are working a lot harder because of the strike.”

One aspect that makes this event such a noble cause is that all the profits raised from it go to the Canadian Heart and Stroke Foundation.

The concert is also one way that students are able to celebrate the legacy of Jack Richardson, who impacted the music industry and Fanshawe College immensely over the course of his life.

“There isn't a producer or an artist that doesn't owe a big debt to Jack Richardson and it's so great that we can remind everybody every year,” Roth said.

Doors open at 6 p.m. for this exciting, memorable night at The London Music Hall on Feb. 7, while music starts at 7 p.m. Those interested in picking up tickets can buy them through the London Music Hall box office at bit.ly/ShareTheLand or get a student deal at the Biz Booth. For more information go to Facebook.com/ShareTheLandFanshawe.