“Another Smiling Face” invites to festival

The second festival for disabled children “Another Smiling Face” that involves pop music singers from Moldova and abroad will take place at the Chisinau Summer Theater on September 26, Info-Prim Neo reports. The festival brings together singers and disabled children who perform on stage together. The artists involved in the project are not remunerated. In a news conference, the festival's artistic director Victoria Dobrogeanu said the participants in the festival include Adrian Ursu, Mariana Mihaila, Pavel Parfenii, Tudor Ungureanu, Serge Kuzencoff, Norwegian singer Tanita Thomassen, of the governmental channel EmpoTV, whose staff is mainly composed of disabled persons, and the bands Fenomen 1 and Snails. The aim of the project is to create conditions for equal access to education, participation and development for children with disabilities. About 700 children will take part in the festival, including from orphanages and children's homes, said Victoria Dobrogeanu. Asmund Brovig, the initiator of the project, voiced hope the schools from Transnistria and from other settlements that could not be contacted will accept the invitation and will participate in the event. The project in Moldova was launched in 2003.