The Boston University Filipino Student Association made noise this weekend at its fourth annual “Rock the Homes” concert.
About 80 students and alumni from all over the Boston area gathered in Morse Auditorium on Saturday night to help raise money for the organization Gawad Kalinga.
The organization aids Third World countries all around the world by building farms and houses and revitalizing communities, according to its website.
Event coordinator and School of Management junior Tim Ramos said he views Rock for Homes as an important event for raising money to aid the Philippines and promoting awareness to younger generations.
“It’s very rare for culture groups to have a show like this,” Ramos said.
The concert benefited communities in the Philippines and also helped bring people from all different cultures together, Ramos said.
Saturday’s benefit raised a total of $851 through ticket sales, though Ramos said he expects to collect even more.
“We have yet to go through the other donations which were sent from alumni, family and friends who couldn’t make it to the show,” he said.
The show featured 13 different musical performances ranging from a cappella group In Achord, to Luca and the Ambassadors, a band made-up of Berklee College of Music students.
The lineup also included world-touring pop-rock band Will Makar &’ the Red Line and BUFSA members performing Pandanggo, a Filipino folk dance.
This year, Ramos said the musical performances were longer and there was an opportunity to meet and greet performers the end of the show.
Members of the band Luca and the Ambassadors said they were thrilled to have the opportunity to play at a concert for a cause such as Gawda Kalinga’s.
“For someone to not have a home is a big problem,” said front man Luca Buccellatti.
It makes matters worse when there are so many people with such extravagant homes who ignore cries for help from impoverished countries such as the Philippines, Buccellatti added.
In the past, BUFSA has raised more than $6,000 to aid communities in the Philippines, Ramos said.
BUFSA has about 80 members within BU’s student population, Ramos said.
Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation sophomore Chantelle Pineda, who performed the Filipino National Anthem and an acoustic duet, said she attended Rock for Homes for her first time this year.
“I was really welcomed from the start,” she said about joining BUFSA last year. “As cheesy as it sounds, they became my family.”
Pineda said when she visited the Philippines this past summer, it was tough to see the impoverished cities and people going home to a house with no walls after spending the day trying to sell products at the market.
“Unless you’ve actually been there and seen it, you doing know how bad it is,” she said.
BUFSA’s vice president Auburn Santo, a College of Arts and Sciences junior, said she hopes to get a group together to travel to the Philippines in order to get first-hand experience with helping the communities by building homes.
The group also hopes to create their own BU community in the Philippines, Santo said.
Ramos said that this year’s Rock for Homes was probably the biggest in four years.
“We sold 88 tickets initially, though people coming from previous engagements, amounted to an additional 23 members in the audience by the end of the show,” Ramos said.
“It’s great to see the passion of charities and in students, and their passion for music,” Ramos said.
BUFSA will have its next benefit show in the spring, which will include musical and dance performances, he said.
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