Talented Tasman musician on world stage

COLIN SMITH/ The Nelson Mail

MUSICAL BREAK: A song written by Tasman musician Aly Cook has been adopted by the World Charity Bank Lottery as the main theme song.

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A song written by Nelson musician Aly Cook has been chosen as the theme music for an online global charity lottery, due to be launched later this year.

Ms Cook's Time for a Change will be the sound of the World Charity Bank's new internet-based lottery to raise funds for charities around the globe.

World Charity Bank Lottery chief executive Geoffrey Hill said a lottery licence had been issued to start trading, and on October 12 this year the bank would launch a €10 million (NZ$22m) first-prize donation lottery. Seventy per cent of profits will be donated to reputable charities worldwide.

Ms Cook, who stood as a candidate for the Tasman District Council in the 2007 local authority elections and is now the marketing assistant for Nelson property developer Alan Trent, has developed an independent music career over the past several years.

She said the song's selection was the kind of break she had dreamed of, and she was honoured it had been chosen.

"I feel like it's a big break musically. It's nice to be in my mid-40s and have something like this happen.

"We've had Susan Boyle, so there's hope for me yet," she said yesterday, referring to the overnight Scottish singing sensation who recently became one of YouTube's biggest stars.

Ms Cook said the connection to the charity lottery came about after meeting Mr Hill in the early 1990s when she toured with the Moscow Circus. "He liked my music, and I was commissioned to write a song. For a Kiwi indie musician to score something like this, it's pretty all right," she said.

Time for a Change was inspired by Ms Cook's notion that people working together could make a difference, and that if everyone "did their bit", the world would be a better place.

The single is due for release on September 9. Ms Cook has been working with Wellington music producer Rob Winch on pre-production of the song, and is currently working with him and media strategist Paul Feenstra on other songs for a new CD. The World Charity Lottery business model aims to initially conduct one lottery a month for the first year, then one lottery a week for the second year.

Tickets in the online lottery are available for purchase from the following websites: www.wcblottery.com and www.worldcharitybank.com. They are priced at €10 (NZ$22) each.

- © Fairfax NZ News