Galway guitarist raises $250,000 for Ukraine – by putting up his prize Stratocaster

A guitar genius from Oranmore has used his massive online following to raise nearly a quarter of a million euro for charities helping people and animals affected by the Ukrainian invasion.

The day the Russians invaded, Jamie Harrison was sitting with his girlfriend in a nice restaurant in Austria, where he shares an apartment surrounded by expensive guitars.

It didn’t sit right with him, so he decided to reach out to the 35 million viewers of his YouTube channel, the 250,000 subscribers and 40,000 students of his guitar courses, to ask for help.

He put his rare guitar worth at least €7,000 up as a prize for people who donated to an appeal. The more they donated, the more times they entered the draw to win the Fender 1956 Custom Shop Stratocaster, one of his most prized possessions that he spent many years busking to afford.

It has obviously struck a chord in the two months since, as the appeal has accumulated $250,000 (€238,000), mostly in US dollars from his huge American fanbase.

All proceeds will go directly to the Ukrainian Red Cross and the World Food Kitchen, which helps feed people in Yemen, already reeling from its own civil war but now suffering a further food shortage due to the lack of grain from Ukraine.

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