Serious Request
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Serious Request is a project by Dutch radio station 3FM in which they collect money for projects of the Red Cross. Three dj's live in a house of glass for six days (5 days in 2004) located at the Neude in Utrecht without anything to eat in this whole period. In the meanwhile they play songs requested by people who listen to the radio and those who take time to visit the house. With the requests the listeners donate a certain amount of money that is reliable for the person(s) in question. Furthermore lots of notible Dutch people are helping the project outside the house. There is also an auction held every year. The project was held for the first time in 2004 and has been held every year since and takes place during the week prior to Christmas. Each year one track is adopted by the DJ's as the goed gevoel plaat (good feelings track). These tracks are seen as the unofficial theme songs and were not chosen before the project started, but were automatically created as the week progressed.
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[edit] Request on Tour 2003
'Request on Tour' was pre edition of Serious Request. In the final three days of 2003 a "Request bus" was touring through the country to collect money for Villa Pardoes (a holiday resort for children with a death threathening desease which is part of the Efteling) by playing requested songs in exchange for money. €16,000 was collected in this year.
[edit] Serious Request 2004 ('Jouw druppel op een gloeiende plaat')
Star DJ's Rob Stenders and Ruud de Wild left 3FM during 2004. They were replaced by Giel Beelen and Wouter van der Goes. To fill in the gap coordinator Florent Luyckx started looking for an alternate programming schedule. Due to this switch he said the radio station was vulnerable, specially in December. When the Beslan school hostage crisis ended the radio station decided to do something for the casualties and their relatives. However the humanity organization related to the crisis told them they did not need any money. When the station contacted the Red Cross they were told that there is many help needed in subject that not always get into the news, like the situation in Darfur. This became the first theme for the Serious Request project. Between 20 and 24 December 2004 the first Serious Request edition took place.[1]. Wouter van der Goes, Claudia de Breij and Giel Beelen were the DJ's that were living in the house, where they were making a radio program for five days, 24 hours a day without eating anything to be loyal to those in Darfur. In total €916,000 was collected and the show was awarded the Marconi Award 2004-2005 for best radio show of the year. This years theme song was Galvanize of the Chemical Brothers.
[edit] Serious Request 2005 ('Red een kind in Congo')
Between 19 and 24 December 2005 another house of glass was built at the Neude in Utrecht.[2]. This time those inside the house were Giel Beelen, Gerard Ekdom and Wouter van der Goes. They were collecting money for children in the Republic of Congo, resulting in a total amount of €2,203,549 with €1,000,000 of this donated by the Dutch government. The show was awarded the "Gouden Radio-Oortje" 2006 for best radio show of the year. The theme song for 2005 was Multiply by Jamie Lidell.
[edit] Daily scores
| day | collected | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 19 December | € 53,573 |
| 2 | 20 December | € 137,877 |
| 3 | 21 December | € 251,281 |
| 4 | 22 December | € 414,552 |
| 6 | 24 December | € 2,203,549 |
[edit] Serious Request 2006 ('30 miljoen landmijnen, daar kun je niet omheen')
In 2006 the project was held for the third consecutive time. Like the other years a house of glass was built at the Neude in Utrecht.[3]. This time the project collected money for casualties of land mines in the world. Giel Beelen, Gerard Ekdom and Sander Lantinga were elected by the listeners to live in the house from 19 to 24 December 2006.
Prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende closed the door on 19 December, which started the project. He told the DJ's and the listeners that the Dutch government will donate another €1,000,000 to the project, like they did in 2005, but only when the Dutch people collects at least as much money.[4]
[edit] Election
Between 4 en 8 December 2006 listeners to 3FM were able to vote for their favorite DJ's to enter the house on the 3FM website. They were able to vote for Giel Beelen, Gerard Ekdom, Claudia de Breij, Paul Rabbering, Coen Swijnenberg, Sander Lantinga and Michiel Veenstra. Eventually Giel Beelen, Gerard Ekdom and Sander Lantinga were elected.
[edit] Daily scores
| day | time | collected | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 19 December | 4:30 pm | € 61,481 |
| 2 | 20 December | 4:30 pm | € 189,935 |
| 3 | 21 December | 4:30 pm | € 353,405 |
| 4 | 22 December | 4:30 pm | € 687,151 |
| 6 | 24 December | 5:50 pm | € 2,648,495 |
- Total amount including a € 1,000,000 donation by the Dutch government
[edit] Music for Life (Studio Brussel)
Apart from 3FM also the Belgian radio station Studio Brussel helped in the same project. It was the first time they were participating in the project. The DJ's of both radio stations contacted each other every now and then. In Belgium another house of glass was built in the city of Leuven and the DJ's that lived in there were Peter Van de Veire, Tomas De Soete and Christophe Lambrecht. Their total after six days was € 2,419,426, with € 200,000 from the Flemish government and a double up from Federal government, which brought the total for both projects at € 5,067,921
[edit] Sponsor walk
To collect even more money for the project a sponsor walk was organized. DJ Claudia de Breij walked together with her sidekick Hildedepilde (Hilde Brontsema) from the Belgian house to the Dutch house. Otto-Jan Ham of Studio Brussel did the same, but in the opposite direction. During the distance of 211 km listeners could sponsor the walk by donating per kilometre, but could also offer them a place to stay the night or something to eat. Both runners left the houses in the morning of 19 December and arrived at their locations in the afternoon of 24 December. Claudia de Breij collected € 31,511 during her sponsor walk.
[edit] Theme song
Chelsea Dagger by the Fratellis was unofficially named the theme song of the project by the DJ's. The song became popular in no-time and in the night of Saturday 23 to Sunday 24 December the song was massively requested and played six times within a four hour time span.
[edit] References
- ^ Actiesite Serious Request 2004, 3fm.nl
- ^ Actiesite Serious Request 2005, 3fm.nl
- ^ Actiesite Serious Request 2006, 3fm.nl
- ^ NOS-bericht Balkenende geeft aftrap Glazen Huis, nos.nl
