Music will again serve as a healing force when the 13th annual benefit for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital will be held at 6 p.m. Aug. 6 at the Georgia Mountains Center.

This year features a great line up of well-known musical talent including Karen Peck and New River, The Perrys, The Down East Boys, The Kingsmen and CS&K.

There is no admission charge but instead a love offering will be taken, with all proceeds to benefit St. Jude
Children's Hospital.

The event, which has grown in attendance each year, has raised more than $265,000 over the last 12 years and has become one of the largest musical events in the area.

The annual singing began as a benefit for the hospital by Gainesville natives Stanley and Peggy Pierce, who lost their son, Craig, to leukemia at an early age. Craig was a patient at St Jude's.

The Pierces say the concert is their way of thanking the community while supporting St. Jude so the hospital may continue researching treatment, cures and assisting families of children afflicted by this disease.

St. Jude is headquartered in Memphis, with a research hospital on Peachtree Dunwoody Road in Atlanta. It is the only pediatric cancer research center where families never pay for treatment that is not covered by insurance and no family is ever denied treatment because of their inability to pay.

The survival rate for the most common type of childhood cancer has dramatically increased in the last few years to better than 90 percent, much of it as a result of St. Jude's research and treatment.

Pierce hopes to raise enough money this year to top the $300,000 mark for total money raised for this great charity.

For more information, call Stanley Pierce at 770-540-9085.