Borders film star Jack Lowden among big names helping raise funds for face-masks for medics

Borders actor Jack Lowden at an award ceremony in London in February. (Photo by Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images)

Organised by television presenter and disc jockey Edith Bowman and given the title For the Love of Scotland, it will be live-streamed over social media next Wednesday, April 22, from 6pm to 9pm.

Proceeds will go to the Masks for Scotland crowdfunding initiative to buy equipment for health workers helping tackle the current coronavirus outbreak.

Dunkirk and Calibre star Lowden, 29, brought up in Oxton, will be joined by other big names including fellow actors James McAvoy, Peter Capaldi, Sam Heughan and Peter Mullan, as well as musicians KT Tunstall, Lauren Mayberry, and Sam McTrusty, with others yet to be announced.

The evening is being billed as offering music, literature, poetry and chats with celebrities, as well as stories from the public about the community spirit seen across Scotland during the first month of the ongoing Covid-19 lockdown.

Fife-born Bowman, 46, said: “As the weeks have been passing, more and more I’ve been working out how I can do something to help.

“After a friend drew my attention to an amazing event in Wales last week, with a number of well-known Welsh faces, I thought ‘I ought to do that’.

“I wanted to create an event that had a purpose, was a way of saying thank-you to all those selfless people putting themselves in danger to help others and celebrate this extraordinary community spirit that we are seeing.

“Jo at Masks For Scotland had just been in touch to ask for my support, and the work that she and her mum Jill are doing is wonderful, so it felt like the perfect fit.

“For the Love Of Scotland will be three hours of people coming together through music, prose, comedy, conversation and thanks, featuring both plenty of well-known faces and members of the public.

“I can’t begin to explain how grateful I am to all the people who are helping us out and giving up their time. Now we just have to do it.”

The Masks for Scotland initiative was launched by Jill Belch, a professor in vascular medicine at Dundee University, to pay for protective kit for front-line medical staff across Scotland.

It is more than a third of the way towards it £200,000 target already, having raised almost £76,000.

Ms Belch added: “The medical teams who protect us must be protected too.

“We know that the bigger the viral load the worse the disease. Day in, day out, these teams are exposed to very high viral loads.

“We must help save their lives, the lives of their families and their patients by providing correct PPE.

“This fund raiser will save lives.”

To donate, go to www.crowdfunder.co.uk/masks-for-scotland

For details of next week’s show, go to www.gigsinscotland.com