Sheffield's Christmas Single For City's Homeless
Howard Lake | 13 December 2006 | Newswire
Helen Gray has teamed up with Sheffield Cathedral Choir this Christmas to release their unique version of the much loved carol In the bleak mid-winter†and raise much needed cash for The Archer Project – a local charity providing support and meals for the city’s homeless.
With over 1200 copies on sale locally at outlets such as HMV, High Street and Meadowhall and Virgin on Fargate for £3.99 and available to order from www.wfo-group.com (where you can also download the mp3 file and hear a sample of the song) the single is a perfect stocking filler and a great way to help people locally that are unable to celebrate Christmas this year.
The CD features the main single In the bleak mid-winter†arranged in a Celtic/Pop style, featuring Helen on lead vocal, the boys, girls and men of the choir, African drums and Paul Quinn of Saxon on Lead Guitar. Also included on the CD is the radio edit of the single and dance mix of Heaven and Earth. The enhanced CD also includes a CD-rom music video.
Singer/songwriter Helen Gray, said: The Archer Project is such an important charity and one that really does need the support of local people. It costs £280,000 a year to run the project and to provide services that would not otherwise exist. It’s these vulnerable people that are often forgotten at this time of year as we are all busy celebrating. Buying the CD helps them and gets you some lovely, uplifting Christmas music to help you relax during this busy time. It’s a new arrangement on a traditional song that everyone knows and loves. Everyone involved really enjoyed making it and the support so far has been amazing, we just hope this continues right up to Christmas.â€
Notes to Editors
The Cathedral Breakfast and Archer Project offers food and a base to homeless people, from this base, partner organisations work with homeless people to try to break the cycle of deprivation.
The CBA has been awarded the Queen’s Jubilee award for its work.
The Projects give practical support to help homeless people change their lives. They offer:
• free breakfast (from 600-700 breakfasts per month)
• lunch at reduced rate of 50p (around 500 lunches per month)
• education: numeracy, literacy and life-skills
• a lounge area where people can sit and chat with friends
• showers
• a laundry
• a nurse (1 day a week)
• a dentist (1 day a week)
• food parcels for asylum seekers
• needle exchange
• a postal address for giros.
For further information on the Archer Project visit www.sheffield-cathedral.co.uk or for information on the single visit www.wfo-group.com
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.