FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 8.7.05            

ANOTHER ROCKIN' SOLD OUT ESTROJAM!

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ESTROJAM 2005 hitting Chicago September 21st-24th will include musical powerhouses Amy Ray of The Indigo Girls with Jody Bleyle of Team Dresch in support of her new album PROM, Brazilian Girls, Anna Oxygen, The Reputation, The Octopus Project, Numbers Record Release Show, Scream Club, up and comers The Organ from Canada, Alina Simone from NYC and Ukulele group The Uuks of Hazzard.  Also to include Japanese punk band Limited Express (Has Gone?), Sybris, Helen Money, Breakbone Dance Co., Aerial Acrobatics, Burlesque and the 2005 Estrojam B-Girl Battle. 

Estrojam 2005 will be a world-class event forwarding the work of a Nobel Peace Prize Winner and World Hero of Freedom Aung San Suu Kyi.  The US Campaign for Burma to shoot video messages at the border of Burma and Thailand from Burmese women's organizations to the Estrojam audience and organizers.  These video messages will be shown each night of Estrojam.  The US Campaign for Burma is also working on getting Estrojam 2005 broadcast in Burma.

"Aung San Suu Kyi is a modern icon of moral courage." BONO, U2 

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS. The third annual Estrojam festival will take place September 21st-24th, 2005 at The Metro, Bottom Lounge, Chicago Filmmakers, Uncommon Ground and Circuit Night Club. Featured, will be internationally acclaimed musicians, artists, educators, activists, and community leaders in a number of events, including concerts, workshops, panels, visual media displays and a film festival.

Workshops, clinics, and panels to be featured will include break-dancing, street dancing, a DJ Clinic, Women in the Arts & Music Business and a teen workshop focusing on poetry and installation art hosted by Young Chicago Authors. Other workshops will be directed by nationally recognized female leaders in the business such as Stacey Singer of Daemon Records, Misty Mcelroy, Founder and Executive Director of The Rock and Roll Camp For Girls and The Queen of House Music, Screamin Rachael Cain.

The Estrojam organizers realize that people may not view themselves as "artists" or "media makers" because these labels are often connected with class, privilege, and educational opportunities.  They see the arts as a tool for social change by encouraging participants to use them as a way of telling their own stories, especially those not represented in the mainstream.

Women are vastly under-represented in the creative fields and technical aspects of music, art and filmmaking. A very low percentage of women make the music, direct the films, master the sound and lights, produce the recordings, build the sets, and wire the electricity. Estrojam seeks to create spaces where women can cultivate their talents in all creative areas, try out new ideas, develop new skills, share knowledge, and simply put, thrive in a supportive community of women and men who share this vision. Estrojam hopes to inspire women to pick up a guitar, a paintbrush, a power tool, a mic, some drum sticks, a video camera, and an attitude that anything is possible.

Each year, a portion of Estrojam profits are donated to powerful women and women's not-for-profit organizations related to the arts, education, social change, human rights, non-violence and women's health. In 2005 Estrojam will benefit the fight for social change through non-violent methods by donating a portion of 2005 profits to the U.S. Campaign for Burma, supporting imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi and the people of Burma's non-violent struggle for freedom and democracy, as well as the Chicago Abused Women Coalition.

Aung San Suu Kyi (pronounced Aung Sawn Sue Chee) is one of the world's most renowned freedom fighters and advocates of non-violence. Burma is ruled by one of the world's most brutal military regimes, which uses torture, murder, rape and forced labor to maintain its power. Over one million Burmese have fled the country as refugees. Suu Kyi has been imprisoned by this regime, as well as put on house arrest multiple times, over the past 15 years and is currently under house arrest indefinitely. In 1988 this same regime killed up to 10,000 demonstrators for human rights in Burma students, women, children, and others in a matter of months. Suu Kyi has won numerous international awards, including the Nobel Peace Prize, Sakharov Prize from the European Parliament, United States Presidential Medal of Freedom, and Jawaharlal Nehru Award from India. She has called on people around the world to join the struggle for freedom in Burma saying, "Please, use your liberty to promote ours." At present, Aung San Suu Kyi is the world's only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize recipient.

Having our artists help to raise funds for Aung San Suu Kyi is such a fit.  She is the most renowned female leader active in the international political scene today. She is internationally respected and recognized by such dignitaries as the Dalai Lama, Oscar Arias, Bishop Desmond Tutu, and Betty Williams all of whom tried to visit her in prison in 1992 and were barred from entering the country. Human rights activists around the world organized media campaigns and demonstrations to observe her fiftieth birthday on June 19th, 1995 and to call for her release. Ten years later she is about to spend her 60th birthday in prison. 
Estrojam, a burgeoning musical forum forwarding the voice of female world leaders is honoring her life of non-violent social change with event proceeds going to The US Campaign for Burma,  a group dedicated to empowering Aung San Suu Kyi and bringing about an end to the military dictatorship. Through public education, leadership development initiatives, conferences, and advocacy campaigns at local, national and international levels, USCB works to empower Americans and exiles to promote freedom, democracy, and human rights and raise awareness about egregious human rights violations.  They have recently organized a CD compilation to benefit ASSK with Ani Difranco, Paul McCartney, R.E.M., Damien Rice, Eric Clapton, Peter Gabriel, Natalie Merchant, Sting and U2.
www.uscampaignforburma.org
www.dassk.com

Estrojam will be supporting non-violence locally through the Chicago Abused Women Coalition (CAWC).  CAWC is committed to ending domestic violence. Using a self-help, empowerment approach, they provide a shelter for women and children, and counseling, advocacy, and a 24-hour hotline for people affected by domestic violence. They work for social change through education, service collaboration, and institutional advocacy. www.cawc.org

Estrojam affiliates and fan communities are amped to have the 2005 lineup in support of the cause.  There is something really powerful about these communities being brought together at a benefit for one of the foremost female leaders of our time. Other famous players in years past have included Bahamadia, Catpower, Pretty Girls Make Graves, The Gossip, Wanda Jackson, Concrete Blonde, Northern State, Kaki King, Kinnie Starr, Theo from the Lunachicks and Staceyann Chin who have played to sold out crowds at Estrojam.

Estrojam 2005 sponsors include: Ms. Magazine, Today's Chicago Woman, Transit TV, UR Chicago, Windy City Media Group, Bust Magazine, Bitch Magazine, Rockrgrl, WLUW, The Inns at Lincoln Park, Orbitz, Southwest Airlines, and a donation from the Chicago Reader.