Not even the poor weather stopped over 300 people turning out to support MAD Productions 6th Annual Charity Concert last Wednesday evening at the Xcel Centre.
Once again the Management of the Xcel Centre showed their commitment to the concerts by offering the use of the centre free of charge for the event. Joan Clark Publicity and Marketing Officer for Mad Productions offered a big thank you to the management of the centre for their continued support.
She said “ I don’t think there is anywhere else on the town big enough to host this event which is gaining popularity and getting bigger each year. The Mad Production Team recognised the work carried out locally and chose two charitable organisations “Xcel Local” and Great Aycliffe Community Aid Partnership. (GACAP).
The £1750 raised was divided between the two charities. Rachael Mawston who heads up Xcel Local said the team work in the community, meeting families’ needs with clothing, food, furniture, school uniforms, Christmas presents and so much more.
Syd Howarth founder of GACAP thanked MAD Productions for their generosity. He explained that GACAP was launched earlier in the year. Its focus was helping groups within the Community by providing a one stop shop for professionals and people in need to refer to. A directory was being designed for distribution shortly listing all of the partners who were signed up as partners. Sonia Scott President and Founder of MAD Productions said she was amazed at the way the 40 strong MAD Productions Community Choir had managed to present such a professional performance considering they had only been singing together for around 5 months.
She thanked each one of them and Evelyn Lodge who had trained them. Evelyn said she was so proud as many of them had never sung in a choir before. Apart from thanking MAD Productions she also thanked Xcel singers and dancers and MAD Production dancers for all they had done to make the event so memorable.
Sonia thanked the Mayor of Great Aycliffe Wendy Hilary for drawing the raffle plus all the people who had kindly donated the raffle prizes for the event. She also wanted to thank everyone who had contributed to the event including the technical team, the compere Duncan Sharpe, those meeting and greeting and and of course the people of Aycliffe for continuing to support the event.
