'Stand Up' and Support Bon Jovi and Friends
Stars Come Out to Support Inaugural Charity Event

Posted by Mike Tunnicliffe in Ad Age Songs For Soap on 02.07.08 @ 02:03 PM

On Feb. 12, Bon Jovi will launch the inaugural Stand Up For a Cure performance series in support of lung cancer research at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. The band's concert, due to take place at New York's Hammerstein Ballroom, will be dedicated to Bon Jovi guitarist Richie Sambora's father, Adam Sambora, who passed away last year from lung cancer.

According to Billboard.biz, the upcoming benefit concert has already raised $1 million and will be sponsored by CityView Racquet Club, with AEG Live donating production help. That money will be used to fund three mobile hospice units -- named after Sambora's father -- that will service low-income neighborhoods in New York.

Jerry Seinfeld, ex-Beach Boy Brian Wilson, acclaimed Italian "Operatic-Pop" singer Andrea Bocelli and others will also perform in various New York City venues throughout 2008 for Stand Up for a Cure. These will include a stand-up performance from Seinfeld on June 2 at the WaMu Theater at Madison Square Garden, a concert with Wilson and special guests at the Hammerstein Ballroom on July 11 and a Bocelli performance later in the year. The organizers are still looking for other artists to support the initiative.

Over the years, Jon Bon Jovi, owner of Arena Football League team the Philadelphia Soul, has been a visible supporter of charitable groups like Habitat for Humanity, where he is the first Founding Ambassador of the Habitat for Humanity Ambassador program. On several occasions, he's even drawn from his own deep pockets to pay for homes in his adopted home of Philadelphia.