It quickly became standing room only at Sons of Kent — you just needed to find a place to stand.
After a three-year pandemic hiatus, the community packed the Chatham brewery on Dec. 28 support the Holiday Jam for Hunger.
With admission by donation, the event featured local bands Brittney and the Boys, 40 Hours Over, The Dave Trinca Xperience and headlining act Kings of the North.
Roughly $4,000 was raised, which will go to Hope House – Mental Health Network and Chatham Outreach for Hunger.
“We were hoping that folks would remember the hunger jam and come back out to support us, and we were not disappointed,” organizer Alysson Storey said the next day.
The annual concert, which began in 2004, was held in person for the first time since 2019. Virtual events took place in 2020 and 2021 due to COVID-19 gathering restrictions.
Storey said she was grateful for each of the 15 musicians who donated their time and talents.
She confirmed the amount raised was the “highest total yet.”
Storey, who is also a Chatham councilor, thanked everyone who came out to not only support the event but donate to the cause of addressing food insecurity in Chatham-Kent.
“For an event that started almost 20 years ago as a small jam session with friends from high school raising a few hundred dollars for local causes, to a standing room only event with several bands and hundreds of people, it just shows what a supportive and generous community we live in,” she said.
“When our fellow citizens need help, our community steps up, every time.”