The History

It was through much difficulties and challenges that ‘A Nation In Concert’ was conceived in 2005. Our volunteer, Daniel Tung, had intended to organize a competition where people with disabilities submit poetry or lyrics and volunteers compose the music to go with it. However, our attempt to organize such a competition in partnership with another organization was met with many difficulties. After our initial engagement with the disabled people community, our founding producer, Jerry Siah, decided to expand the concept to allow people with disabilities to showcase their talents in whatever ways possible: be it singing, dancing or performing! With this, A Nation In Concert was born.

There were no background and visual references of what the concert was all about. Everyone got involved on the vision of putting up a good show to showcase the talents of people with disabilities. We wanted to change the view of the public towards disabled people. Usually, beneficiaries in most charity shows are presented in manner to milk sympathy and donations. In contrast, we want our disabled performers to be empowered and be joyful on stage. Our disabled performers are volunteers themselves raising funds for charities. Our missions are 3 folds: Empowerment, Enrichment and Education.

Award-winning playwright, Desmond Sim, and renounced Director, Jonathan Lim, were roped into the project. It was a struggle to market the concert due to the lack of funds and that it was done for the first time. Many people were skeptical and did not want to see disabled people perform. However, our friends and families supported us by faith and we staged our inaugural concert on 13th August 2005 at the grand concert hall of Singapore’s premier performing arts centre – the Esplanade. 9 theatre practitioners joined over a hundred performers from the Handicaps Welfare Association, Singapore Association for the Deaf, Singapore Association of the Visually Handicapped and the Association for Persons with Special Needs (Katong School, Chao Yang School and Tanglin School) to put up their best for our inaugural show. At the end of the show, the audience was swept off their feet.

Many were touched and inspired, and wanted us to re-stage the concert for more people to watch. After a failed attempt to re-stage the show in 2006 for an opening ceremony of a major community project, we managed to pull ourselves together to re-stage the concert on 9th September 2006 at the Esplanade Concert Hall.

Through our first 2 shows in 2005 and 2006, we channeled over $240,000 to the participating charities, and touched the hearts of over 4,500 audiences. We believe that every individual in our society is made differently, and has diverse and unique experiences and abilities. Despite this, we could still make spaces and give opportunities for all people to develop themselves to their fullest potential. Putting our differences aside, we could still work towards a common good, build an inclusive society for all and celebrate our diversity.

On 11th and 12th Oct 2008, we will be staging our 3rd show with a brand new script titled “A Nation In Concert 2008: Wish Upon a Sea Star” at the Victoria Theatre. In line with our missions, we initiated Singapore’s first open-water certified diving course in August 2008 in partnership with Ocean Ambassador. We launched 4 limited edition ANIC t-shirts designed by creative talents in partnership with our celebrities performers to spread the message of hope, love, acceptance and empowerment.

There are hundreds of volunteers, including the celebrity cast, creative talents, people with disabilities, professionals as well as common people, involved in the productions. These are our unsung hero who sacrificed their weekends and evenings to work behind the scene or perform on stage. We hope that A Nation In Concert would continue to inspire everyone to transcend ourselves for greater works, to pursue a more meaningful life and to make a difference in our society.