The Human Rights Concerts is the collective name informally used to describe the series of 28 rock concerts presented worldwide 1986-1998 to raise funds for – and awareness of - the Nobel Peace Prize

Nobel Peace Prize

The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes bequeathed by the Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel.-Background:According to Nobel's will, the Peace Prize shall be awarded to the person who...

-winning human rights

Human rights

Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

 organization Amnesty International

Amnesty International

Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...

.

The series featured many of the world’s leading contemporary musicians including:

Bands: U2

U2

U2 are an Irish rock band from Dublin. Formed in 1976, the group consists of Bono , The Edge , Adam Clayton , and Larry Mullen, Jr. . U2's early sound was rooted in post-punk but eventually grew to incorporate influences from many genres of popular music...

, The Police

The Police

The Police were an English rock band formed in London in 1977. For the vast majority of their history, the band consisted of Sting , Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland...

, Bruce Springsteen

Bruce Springsteen

Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...

 & the E Street Band

E Street Band

The E Street Band has been rock musician Bruce Springsteen's primary backing band since 1972.The band has also recorded with a wide range of other artists including Bob Dylan, Meat Loaf, Bonnie Tyler, Air Supply, Dire Straits, David Bowie, Peter Gabriel, Stevie Nicks, Tom Morello, Sting, Ian...

, Radiohead

Radiohead

Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke , Jonny Greenwood , Ed O'Brien , Colin Greenwood and Phil Selway .Radiohead released their debut single "Creep" in 1992...

, Led Zeppelin

Led Zeppelin

Led Zeppelin were an English rock band, active in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. Formed in 1968, they consisted of guitarist Jimmy Page, singer Robert Plant, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham...

's Robert Plant

Robert Plant

Robert Anthony Plant, CBE is an English singer and songwriter best known as the vocalist and lyricist of the iconic rock band Led Zeppelin. He has also had a successful solo career...

 & Jimmy Page

Jimmy Page

James Patrick "Jimmy" Page, OBE is an English multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and record producer. He began his career as a studio session guitarist in London and was subsequently a member of The Yardbirds from 1966 to 1968, after which he founded the English rock band Led Zeppelin.Jimmy Page...

, The Neville Brothers

The Neville Brothers

The Neville Brothers, an American R&B and soul group, was formed in 1977 in New Orleans, Louisiana.-History:The group notion started in 1976, when the four brothers of the Neville family, Art , Charles , Aaron , and Cyril The Neville Brothers, an American R&B and soul group, was formed in 1977 in...

, The Hooters

The Hooters

The Hooters is an American rock band from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. By combining a mix of rock and roll, reggae, ska and folk music, The Hooters first gained major commercial success in the United States in the mid 1980s due to heavy radio and MTV airplay of several songs including "All You...

, New Kids On The Block

New Kids on the Block

New Kids on the Block are an American boy band from Boston, Massachusetts, assembled in 1984 by producer Maurice Starr. The band currently consists of brothers Jordan and Jonathan Knight, Joey McIntyre, Donnie Wahlberg, and Danny Wood.New Kids on the Block enjoyed success in the late 1980s and...

, Third World

Third World (band)

Third World is a Jamaican reggae band formed in 1973. Their sound is influenced by soul, funk and disco.-History:Third World started when keyboard player Michael "Ibo" Cooper and guitarist Stephen "Cat" Coore, who had originally played in The Alley Cats then Inner Circle, subsequently left to form...

Solo Artists: Sting, Bruce Springsteen

Bruce Springsteen

Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss," is an American singer-songwriter who records and tours with the E Street Band...

, Peter Gabriel

Peter Gabriel

Peter Brian Gabriel is an English singer, musician, and songwriter who rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career...

, Jackson Browne

Jackson Browne

Jackson Browne is an American singer-songwriter and musician who has sold over 17 million albums in the United States alone....

, Lou Reed

Lou Reed

Lewis Allan "Lou" Reed is an American rock musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is best known as guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter of The Velvet Underground, and for his successful solo career, which has spanned several decades...

, Bryan Adams

Bryan Adams

Bryan Adams, is a Canadian rock singer-songwriter, guitarist, bassist, producer, actor and photographer. Adams has won dozens of awards and nominations, including 20 Juno Awards among 56 nominations. He has also received 15 Grammy Award nominations including a win for Best Song Written...

, Joan Baez

Joan Baez

Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....

, Wynton Marsalis

Wynton Marsalis

Wynton Learson Marsalis is a trumpeter, composer, bandleader, music educator, and Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. Marsalis has promoted the appreciation of classical and jazz music often to young audiences...

, Sinéad O'Connor

Sinéad O'Connor

Sinéad Marie Bernadette O'Connor is an Irish singer-songwriter. She rose to fame in the late 1980s with her debut album The Lion and the Cobra and achieved worldwide success in 1990 with a cover of the song "Nothing Compares 2 U"....

, Alanis Morissette

Alanis Morissette

Alanis Nadine Morissette is a Canadian-American singer-songwriter, guitarist, record producer, and actress. She has won 16 Juno Awards and seven Grammy Awards, was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards and also shortlisted for an Academy Award nomination...

, Shania Twain

Shania Twain

Shania Twain, OC is a Canadian country pop singer-songwriter. Her album The Woman in Me , brought her fame and her 1997 album Come On Over, became the best-selling album of all time by a female musician in any genre, and the best-selling country album of all time. It has sold over 40 million...

, Little Steven

Steven Van Zandt

Steven Van Zandt is an Italian-American musician, songwriter, arranger, record producer, actor, and radio disc jockey, who frequently goes by the stage names Little Steven or Miami Steve...

, Bob Geldof

Bob Geldof

Robert Frederick Zenon "Bob" Geldof, KBE is an Irish singer, songwriter, author, occasional actor and political activist. He rose to prominence as the lead singer of the Irish rock band The Boomtown Rats in the late 1970s and early 1980s alongside the punk rock movement. The band had hits with his...

, Joan Armatrading

Joan Armatrading

Joan Anita Barbara Armatrading, MBE is a British singer, songwriter and guitarist. Armatrading is a three-time Grammy Award-nominee and has been nominated twice for BRIT Awards as Best Female Artist...

, Carlos Santana

Carlos Santana

Carlos Augusto Alves Santana is a Mexican rock guitarist. Santana became famous in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band, Santana, which pioneered rock, salsa and jazz fusion...

, Yoko Ono

Yoko Ono

is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...

, Miles Davis

Miles Davis

Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz musician, trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop, cool jazz,...

, Joni Mitchell

Joni Mitchell

Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...

, Tracy Chapman

Tracy Chapman

Tracy Chapman is an American singer-songwriter, best known for her singles "Fast Car", "Talkin' 'bout a Revolution", "Baby Can I Hold You", "Give Me One Reason" and "Telling Stories". She is a multi-platinum and four-time Grammy Award-winning artist.-Biography:Tracy Chapman was born in Cleveland,...

, Bono

Bono

Paul David Hewson , most commonly known by his stage name Bono , is an Irish singer, musician, and humanitarian best known for being the main vocalist of the Dublin-based rock band U2. Bono was born and raised in Dublin, Ireland, and attended Mount Temple Comprehensive School where he met his...

, Ruben Blades

Rubén Blades

Rubén Blades Bellido de Luna is a Panamanian salsa singer, songwriter, lawyer, actor, Latin jazz musician, and politician, performing musically most often in the Afro-Cuban and Latin jazz genres...

, Fela, Youssou N'Dour

Youssou N'Dour

Youssou N'Dour is a Senegalese singer, percussionist and occasional actor. In 2004, Rolling Stone described him as, in Senegal and much of Africa, "perhaps the most famous singer alive." He helped develop a style of popular music in Senegal, known in the Serer language as mbalax, a type of music...

, k.d. lang

K.D. Lang

Kathryn Dawn Lang, OC , known by her stage name k.d. lang, is a Canadian pop and country singer-songwriter and occasional actress...

, Pat Metheney

The concert series – organized by the US Section of Amnesty - evolved out of the Secret Policeman’s Ball

The Secret Policeman's Balls

The Secret Policeman's Balls is the collective name informally used to describe the long-running series of benefit shows staged in England to raise funds for the human rights organisation Amnesty International...

series of charity galas organized by the UK Section of Amnesty starting in 1976. The British benefit shows had initially been comedy events featuring comedic performers. But from 1979 onwards, the UK shows started to include cameo appearances by some of Britain's most prominent rock musicians - including Pete Townshend

Pete Townshend

Peter Dennis Blandford "Pete" Townshend is an English rock guitarist, vocalist, songwriter and author, known principally as the guitarist and songwriter for the rock group The Who, as well as for his own solo career...

, Sting, Eric Clapton

Eric Clapton

Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...

, Jeff Beck

Jeff Beck

Geoffrey Arnold "Jeff" Beck is an English rock guitarist. He is one of three noted guitarists to have played with The Yardbirds...

, Phil Collins

Phil Collins

Philip David Charles "Phil" Collins, LVO is an English singer-songwriter, drummer, pianist and actor best known as a drummer and vocalist for British progressive rock group Genesis and as a solo artist....

, Bob Geldof

Bob Geldof

Robert Frederick Zenon "Bob" Geldof, KBE is an Irish singer, songwriter, author, occasional actor and political activist. He rose to prominence as the lead singer of the Irish rock band The Boomtown Rats in the late 1970s and early 1980s alongside the punk rock movement. The band had hits with his...

, Donovan

Donovan

Donovan Donovan Donovan (born Donovan Philips Leitch (born 10 May 1946) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Emerging from the British folk scene, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music...

, Peter Gabriel, David Gilmour

David Gilmour

David Jon Gilmour, CBE, D.M. is an English rock musician and multi-instrumentalist who is best known as the guitarist, one of the lead singers and main songwriters in the progressive rock band Pink Floyd. In addition to his work with Pink Floyd, Gilmour has worked as a producer for a variety of...

, Kate Bush

Kate Bush

Kate Bush is an English singer-songwriter, musician and record producer. Her eclectic musical style and idiosyncratic vocal style have made her one of the United Kingdom's most successful solo female performers of the past 30 years.In 1978, at the age of 19, Bush topped the UK Singles Chart...

 and others. The Human Rights Concerts were developed with the intention of building on this new support for Amnesty among musicians and channelling it into a series of rock concerts and tours.

There were four distinctive sets of concerts in the series:

• A Conspiracy of Hope – six concerts in the USA in June 1986

• Human Rights Now! – twenty concerts held worldwide in September–October 1988

• An Embrace Of Hope – one concert in Santiago, Chile in October 1990

• The Struggle Continues... – one concert in Paris, France in December 1998

The Concerts

The A Conspiracy of Hope US tour spanned six concerts over a ten-day period in June 1986 and culminated in an eleven-hour concert at New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

's Giants Stadium

Giants Stadium

Giants Stadium was a multi-purpose stadium, located in East Rutherford, New Jersey, USA, in the Meadowlands Sports Complex. Maximum seating capacity was 80,242. The building itself was 230.5 m long, 180.5 m wide and 44 m high from service level to the top of the seating bowl and 54 m high to...

 that was aired as an all-day Live Aid

Live Aid

Live Aid was a dual-venue concert that was held on 13 July 1985. The event was organized by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure to raise funds for relief of the ongoing Ethiopian famine. Billed as the "global jukebox", the event was held simultaneously in Wembley Stadium in London, England, United Kingdom ...

style broadcast on MTV

MTV

MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....

. Artists who played at all six concerts on the tour were: U2, Sting, Peter Gabriel, Bryan Adams, Lou Reed, Joan Baez and The Neville Brothers. On the first three concerts of the tour, Sting played as a solo artist accompanied by his own band. For the last three concerts of the tour, Sting performed as a member of The Police

The Police

The Police were an English rock band formed in London in 1977. For the vast majority of their history, the band consisted of Sting , Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland...

 who reformed after a two-year hiatus especially for those three Amnesty concerts. (They were the last public performances by The Police for 21 years until their reunion in 2007.) At the grand finale of the tour in Giants Stadium, the touring artists were joined by an eclectic range of other musical performers including: Jackson Browne, Little Steven, Bob Geldof, Joan Armatrading, Carlos Santana, Yoko Ono, Miles Davis, Joni Mitchell, Ruben Blades, Fela, The Hooters and Third World. The Giants Stadium concert was aired once live on MTV, with a live presentation of the final three hours simulcast on the Fox Network. Neither the MTV live presentation nor the Fox Network special have ever been repeated on TV. Neither the Giants Stadium tour finale concert nor any of the preceding five concerts have ever been available in any home video or audio format. http://www.usatoday.com/life/music/news/2007-07-04-live-earth_N.htm?csp=34 http://www.usatoday.com/life/music/news/2007-07-04-live-earth-timeline_N.htm http://www.atu2.com/events/86/conspiracyofhope/ http://www.u2faqs.com/history/b.html

The Human Rights Now! tour was a twenty concert World tour held over a six-week period in September–October 1988. The tour commemorated the 40th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a declaration adopted by the United Nations General Assembly . The Declaration arose directly from the experience of the Second World War and represents the first global expression of rights to which all human beings are inherently entitled...

 that is the virtual manifesto of Amnesty's mission. The tour starred Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, Sting and Peter Gabriel with Tracy Chapman and Youssou N'Dour. Guest musicians who made appearances during the tour included Bono, Joan Baez, k.d. lang and Pat Metheney. The twenty concerts took place in fifteen different countries on five continents (Europe, Asia, Africa, North America and South America). In each country the core artists were augmented at the concert with performances by popular local musicians. A three-hour film documenting the final concert in Buenos Aires together with highlights of the preceding world tour was aired once by HBO in the USA on December 10th 1988 - International Human Rights Day. A shortened version aired once on Channel Four in the UK. Neither the Buenos Aires tour finale concert nor any of the preceding nineteen concerts have ever been available in any home video or audio format. http://www.amnesty.org/en/who-we-are/history http://www.mediastorehouse.com/pictures_500263/amnesty-international-human-rights-now-concert-wembley-london-britain-sep-1988.html

The An Embrace Of Hope concert was a de facto post-script to the Human Rights Now! tour. It took place in Chile - a country that for political reasons it was not possible for the Human Rights Now! tour to visit during the 1988 world tour. Following the end of the Pinochet dictatorship in March 1990, the concert was staged in Santiago in October 1990 as a celebration of Chile's return to democracy. The concert starred Sting, Peter Gabriel, Jackson Browne, Wynton Marsalis, Sinéad O'Connor, Ruben Blades, New Kids On The Block and several South American artists. The concert was televised live in Chile but never shown in the USA. The concert has never been available in any home video or audio format. http://articles.latimes.com/1990-10-11/entertainment/ca-2701_1_amnesty-international http://www.afi.com/silver/new/nowplaying/2009/v6i6/secretpoliceman.aspx

The concert titled The Struggle Continues... took place on December 10, 1998 - the exact 50th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It was presented in Paris, France - the city where the original Declaration had been signed in 1948. The concert starred Bruce Springsteen, Peter Gabriel, Radiohead, Robert Plant & Jimmy Page (of Led Zeppelin), Tracy Chapman, Alanis Morissette and Shania Twain. A three-hour film of the concert was aired once via pay-per-view in the USA in 1999. A live radio broadcast of the concert was transmitted by BBC Radio. http://www.allmovie.com/work/the-paris-concert-for-amnesty-international-the-struggle-continues-perf-177531 http://www.goldstar.com/events/hollywood-ca/the-paris-concert-for-amnesty-international.html The concert has never been available in any audio format.