World AIDS Day 2015: HIV positive musician Thomas Muchimba Buttenschøn putting on free concert for people who take HIV test

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The 1st of December is World AIDS Day, and millions of people around the world will be wearing red ribbons to raise awareness of the ongoing AIDS pandemic.

Danish singer Thomas Muchimba Buttenschøn, whom was born HIV positive, is doing something truly unique to get people tested for HIV: he’s putting on a concert where, instead of purchasing a ticket, you take an HIV test.

Buttenschøn is putting on the concert for the Muchimba Music Foundation - which he co-founded - in the hope of spreading his message of “positivity through music”.

According to the foundation’s page, Buttenschøn was born in Africa to a Danish father and Zambian mother. In 1985, the year he was born, both parents were diagnosed HIV positive and died in 1994, when he was just 9 years old.

Soon after he discovered a love for music, and 12 years later scored a number one album in Denmark with Fantastic Monday.

The upcoming concert will take place in Buttenschøn’s birth place of Zambia, the “epicenter of the global fight against the spread of HIV and AIDS”. According to Avert in 2012, one in seven adults in the country are living with HIV, with life expectancy standing at 49.4 years.

Along with Buttenschøn, four of Zambia’s leading artists will perform. The hope is concerts like this will spread throughout Africa in subsequent years.

The Muchimba Music Foundation statement reads: “[We are] dedicated to raising awareness through the power of music. Cofounder Thomas Muchimba Buttenschøn has spread his messages of positivity and hope through his pervasive and powerful music.

“Music is a powerful tool. The Muchimba Music Foundation harnesses that power and uses music to enlighten, to empower and to draw people together.”

For more information on World AIDS Day visit here and to donate to The Muchimba Music Foundation visit here.