Award Win
Chris Maher wins a Sean Moore Community Award!
Musical Youth Foundation Founder & CEO Chris Maher has been awarded a Sean Moore Community Award for his tireless work helping at-risk young people reach their full potential through music education.
Chris was nominated for the award by the team at St. Andrews Community Centre which has been benefiting from the Musical Youth Foundation ‘guitars for kids’ programme, and more recently the launch of a vocal singing group, since 2009.
The Awards Ceremony took place last Thursday in Clanna Gael Fontenoys in Ringsend. Unfortunately Chris was unable to attend the ceremony due to a prior commitment speaking at the launch of ‘Vocal Chords by Maeve O’Sullivan’ – a book of poetry which is promising 30% of profits from the sale of the book will go to the Musical Youth Foundation.
On the night Chris’ award was collected on his behalf by Susan Menton of St Andrew’s Community Centre who said: “We are for ever grateful to Chris for believing in his dream for young people and believing in us to achieve this programme of music.”
Chris said of his award: “It comes as a complete surprise to even be nominated let alone chosen as a recipient. The award comes at a very difficult time for the Musical Youth Foundation as we fight to keep the project alive in a climate of budget cuts and crippling austerity. We receive no government funding, despite the huge long-term savings our programme delivers to the state. We are therefor wholly reliant on the support of members of the public to ensure we can continue to impact at-risk young people.”
Chris went on to say; “It (the award) will certainly help to drive me forward, determined to source the financial support required to continue helping at-risk young people in Ireland. Over the last 4 years we’ve proven that the Musical Youth Foundation can deliver on its promise to help at-risk young people reach their full potential through music education. We’ve shown that we are responsible when it comes to our financial operations – you won’t find any big pay packets at the MYF. Our annual accounts are available on our website for all to see, and always will be.” (You can view the latest MYF accounts here!)
The Sean Moore Community Awards for ‘exceptional community service’, were first launched in 1988 to recognise those making an exceptional contribution in their local community.
Last November with support from StubHub (an ebay company) the Musical Youth Foundation released a short video which tells the story of Daryl Ward and the impact music education has had on him so far. If you haven’t already watched the inspiring video now is your chance…