Nomura Donates Musical Instruments to Schools in Tohoku

Nomura Group has supported the Pacific Music Festival (PMF), an international music education festival, for the past 20 years. Along with the PMF, we held a charity concert on August 4, 2011. In addition to instruments purchased with the earnings from PMF charity concerts and donations collected at concert halls, we will donate a total of 30 instruments to elementary and junior high schools in Miyako in Iwate prefecture, Sendai in Miyagi prefecture, and Iwaki in Fukushima prefecture in October and November.

On October 3, we visited Uiso elementary school in Miyako to donate an accordion and five xylophone stands. This school was completely destroyed by the tsunami and is currently borrowing classrooms at a neighboring school. We also sent some instruments to a Taro Daiichi junior high school and Chikei elementary school in Miyako.

The school principal of Uiso said: "Children love music and physical education. It also makes adults happy to see them sing and play in such a cheerful mood." We saw what he meant when we handed out the instruments. The children's eyes lit up and they promised to practice hard for the school concert, which will be held for the first time since the earthquake next month.

Children gather around to try out their new accordion (Uiso elementary school in Miyako)

We want to participate in the prefectural tournament next summer with our new musical instruments," a member of the brass band said with a smile.

On October 7, we visited Yotsukura junior high school in Iwaki, Fukushima. Although the school's musical instruments were not lost in the tsunami, the students and teachers are enduring harsh conditions without enough electricity and have been forced to borrow classrooms at a neighboring school. We donated a tenor sax and a tuba to help cheer them up.

When the tsunami struck, it not only washed away classrooms, but also the precious musical instruments that the children loved so much. Reconstruction efforts have focused on rebuilding schools and ensuring proper transport, which means there hasn't been much time for administrators to think about musical instruments and sports education for the children. We will continue this project and plan to donate musical instruments to Shichigo junior high school in Sendai on October 21 and Ohnoda elementary school in Sendai on November 12. Check here for further updates.

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