The 26. José Carreras Gala raised over 3,6 million Euros for the fight against leukaemia

The pandemic doesn't stop the joint fight against leukaemia in Germany. Last night, the 26th edition of the José Carreras Gala took place in Leipzig and, even in such hard times, an amount of over 3,6 million Euros has been raised.


https://www.carreras-stiftung.de

An incredible achievement despite the conditions in which what is regarded as Germany's most emotional benefit event and the most important TV highlight on the subject of leukemia had been forced to in this particular year. 

As last year, the Gala has been broadcast live by MDR from 8:15pm local time. The Moderators were Mareile Höppner and Sven Lorig. However,  due to the pandemic restrictions no audience was there, and most of all the leukaemia survivor this Gala is named after was not there. In fact, Josep Carreras attended and moderated the Gala through a live broadcasting from Barcelona through the whole duration of the show. 


A part from him, other guest artists could not attend for the same reasons, like Chris de Burgh who participate with a video message as other artists did including Andrea Bocelli

Jeanette BiedermannHoward CarpendaleBeatrice EgliDavid GarrettLEAAmy MacDonaldKerstin OttMax RaabeSashaRolando Villazón and Stefan Zauner.

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Besides the artistic side, much room has been dedicated to patients who have been struggling against leukemia, mostly kids and some adults too. Each of them proved to be a real model for the way he or she are facing such a hard fight against this disease. Speaking about little children, a very special mention for their parents is well deserved. These stories makes you see life from a new perspective.

Despite each story has been treated with extreme delicacy and humanity, as usual, I am totally sure that everyone missed Josep Carreras a lot, especially his visits to such patients. No matter how humble and human he is, as a viewer you used to look at him like a super hero as soon as he appeared on the screen to join each patient and give them confort and hope. 

If we missed this so much, he must have missed it even more. God knows how much he must have felt sorry and sad for this situation. It was so evident from the expression of his face, but he moderated his Gala with total commitment and dedication for over 3 hours until the end.



I really hope that, despite all this, he is satisfied not only with the result, which is even higher than last year, but also with the words of praise he received by friends and colleagues, like Zubin Mehta, Rolando Villazón, Peter Maffay, Herbert Grönemeyer among others who sent him a special video message to congratulate him on the 25th anniversary of the German Foundation. Some of them even gave their availability for next year's edition.

As regards the result, after about an hour the first temporary update marked:


And at the end of the show the result was:


After the final score was announced, Josep Carreras said: " It was a very emotional and remarkable evening. I'm deeply moved that our loyal audience won't abandon leukemia patients and their families. These donations help keep our big goal: leukemia must be curable. Always and with everyone. We will use every single euro specifically and responsibly for important research, infrastructure and social projects. Thank you for this great help. My special thanks to all the artists who supported us on stage and on the donation phones, as well as the MDR and the entire production team."

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