Four music teachers in two years... no stability, no consistency. It's difficult to find a good music teacher and when you do, it's necessary to supply them with instruments to empower students. I'm currently finishing up my second year teaching at Freedom Academy and have greatly enjoyed the journey thus far.

I have a cart. It is very blue. On the top of my cart sits a keyboard. A shelf below contains various boomwhackers. And another shelf holds my speaker and several small percussion instruments. I teach an entire unit about the instruments of the orchestra and yet, most of my students will never get to actually hold the instruments they have learned so much about.

The students would be overwhelmed to start a small strings group at school. Many of them have expressed their desire to play "real" instruments some day.

Any donations would be appreciated beyond words... please help me in making some dreams come true. Read more »

We have a wonderfully supportive administration and community, but unfortunately we also have an economically struggling community. A major source of employment closed down this year and subsequently forced a lot of kids who were renting instruments out of band & orchestra. We definitely have the intelligence and the desire to have a fantastic program, we are just lacking quality equipment. The upright basses all have splits and cracks in them and all but one are missing soundposts, and only one has a functioning end-pin. We are also lacking on tenor saxophones which most parents refuse to rent from a music store, however there are tons of kids who want to play these instruments. I can handle most basic repairs on instruments, but our basses and tenor saxes are beyond all conceivable help, they have been in the district for 25+ years. Read more »

Imagine wanting to be in band, but knowing your parents can't afford to get you an instrument. When I do band recruitment, the 1st questions from many students are, "Is band free?" "Does it cost anything to get an instrument?" "I want to be in band, but my family cannot afford to rent or buy an instrument" My students attend a Title 1 public school where most kids qualify for free breakfast and free lunch. Our band program has started to grow thanks to the efforts of generous people who see how important music education is to these children's whole person education. But we are still lacking instruments to fill in the gaps of those who cannot get their own. Making music together is for many of my students the highlight of their school day.

Playing an instrument gives them an opportunity to develop socially, cooperatively and musically. It teaches them how to be responsible young adults. Band students consistently become better readers, better at math and solve problems more quickly than non musicians. Please donate an instrument or money TODAY to help my students grow into well rounded, educated and critical thinkers. THANK YOU!!Read more »

Four music teachers in two years... no stability, no consistency. It's difficulut to find a good music teacher and when you do, it's necessary to supply them with instruments to empower students. I'm currently finishing up my second year teaching at Freedom Academy and have greatly enjoyed the journey thus far.

I have a cart. It is very blue. On the top of my cart sits a keyboard. A shelf below contains various boomwhackers. And another shelf holds my speaker and several small percussion instruments. I teach an entire unit about the instruments of the orchestra and yet, most of my students will never get to actually hold the instruments they have learned so much about.

The students would be overwhelmed to start a small strings group at school. Many of them have expressed their desire to play "real" instruments some day. I have several bells that I'm going to start using to reinforce the concept of music theory with kindergarten, first, and second grade students, but I simply do not have enough to keep the whole class engaged.

Any donations would be appreciated beyond words... please help me in making some dreams come true. Read more »

My students are great! They always come to my class excited to learn no matter what is going on elsewhere. This class makes it possible for the students to disappear into another world for 50 minutes. There are no worries if they are going to eat that night or how they are getting some place. Right now, I am having to turn students away from this opportunity because of the condition of some of the instruments. My students are literally playing on instruments that are 20 years old so it is quite common for me to hear that a piece fell off somewhere. Some students are having to play on instruments that are broken because I don't have the funds to replace all of them. Regardless, my students come to class and make the most of it. I enjoy the smiles on their faces when they finally master a section of the music that they had been struggling on.Read more »

Our program is thriving at Sunset Vista Elementary school! With our growth this year, our instrument pool is running short, even thought we've borrowed inventories of 2 more schools besides our self! We need some lower playing instruments to help beef up our beginning and returning bands this and next year! With rental costs so high for these instruments, we try to supply the students that want to play them an instrument so they have the opportunity to be and play in band for years to come!Read more »

The Tucson High Orchestra program is the largest high-school program in the Tucson area. We have 140 students in three orchestras. Our numbers have grown rapidly in the past five years, and continue to grow. We have more than doubled our orchestra enrollment, but our instrument inventory has not grown with us.

Our orchestra students are unable to take instruments home for practice because we don't have enough to go around. Each instrument donated will go into the hands of a deserving and promising student so that they may practice at home on a quality instrument. With your donation a student will have the opportunity to progress their musicianship and experience all of the benefits that go along. Read more »

Here at QCHS, we have been lucky to have growth in our orchestra program. We started out smaller (36 students), but will continue to grow year by year and we expect the 70 junior high kids to come up to our level in the next year! I am so excited to see the growth of our program and see our students get excited about orchestra! However, like many districts we have seen cuts in our school's budget. Although we fund-raise throughout the school year, we have a difficult time keeping up with the demand for instruments. In the past, we have had 2 students sharing 1 cello in class and each of them would only get to play for half the period due to not having enough instruments. However, we raised funds to get another cello working and have remedied the problem in that class. Unfortunately though, with our growing numbers we will soon have this problem next school year as well since we will be going from 5 cello players to 7 cello players in our orchestra. The year after that, we are expecting 10 cello players! If you can donate an instrument to our program-it would make a huge difference for our program and for a student and enable them to participate fully in the entirety of the class. Read more »

Our school is located in a very low-income neighborhood. Very few students can afford to rent an instrument. This year I recruited 92 students from 5th through 8th grade. The school has only 25 instruments, not counting a few percussion instruments. I organized a rental night with a rental company and invited parents so they could rent instruments for their kids. Out of 30 parents that showed up, only 10 could afford the rental fee. The school provides the 25 instruments that we have available to the students that are more needed; this is done through a raffle, and for a fee of one dollar. I received a note from a single parent asking me to please wait until she could come up with the dollar. Since I wanted the student to start playing his trumpet I told him and another student that I would pay it for them and that they could pay me later. At the present moment instead of having 92 students my program has a total of 43 students. There are so many talented students in my school that are hungry to play a musical instrument and yet they have been hindered from the process of developing their talent due to the lack of instruments in the school.
I respectfully urge you to please take into consideration the needs of these students and the positive impact that having them as members of a musical band can bring into their social lives as well as academically. You are also welcome to visit with us and meet with us and see for yourself our needs.
Thank you,
Emilio O. Gonzalez
Band teacher at Cash Elementary School
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The instrumental music students at Lake Havasu High School would greatly appreciate help with beefing up our instrument inventory. Lake Havasu City is located about 3 hours west of Phoenix and about 2 ½ hours south of Las Vegas so we do not have any music stores nearby. Most of the students at our school participate in the free or reduced lunch program.
First of all, our band room is not designed, acoustically or dimensionally, to be a band room. Several years ago, for unknown reasons to me, the former, beautiful, tiered, large band room was paved over to make a storage room for community as well as high school theater sets. This should demonstrate the school district’s past discouragement for the music program.
Secondly, most of the instruments that my students are using are from a few decades ago and many of the cases are coming apart. When cases deteriorate, obviously, the instruments dry-up and require extensive repair and eventually are in bad shape overall. We currently need two piccolos (we have one, but it doesn't work because it is warped and curved!), two 4-valve euphoniums, two sousaphone cases, three trumpets. We also need 3 full-sized cellos, and two full-sized violas. Our euphoniums are from the 1970s before our current school district existed (instruments are labeled Mohave county school district.) Our sousaphone cases are literally held together by bungee cords, and the chip board has been broken through to reveal the insulation in the cases.
Last week a custodian informed me that there were several string instruments stored in a small room located above the auditorium where the air filters and air conditioning unit is located. I went up there with him to find a plethora of ¾ sized violas and ¾ sized cellos of which we had zero previously. The string instruments we do have were made in 1960, and they actually sound great! The problem is that they are mostly ¾ size which is difficult for most high school students to play.
The bass drum carriers for our marching band are in such terrible shape that they actually cause bruises and physical injuries to the students. We ordered 4 new ones this year, but those new ones do not fit anyone with a large body frame. Two of our larger drummers needed to once again use the old style of carrier which was painful for them to use.
Sadly, I have had to turn away some students from our orchestra program because I did not have a school instrument for them to play, and their families were not able to afford the rent from the distributor we use. Fortunately, we do have some support with community members, clubs, and businesses to help us, but the cost of new instruments are so high that the money we do get is used quickly. The former band director used money to travel and compete with the students, but he did not invest any money towards instruments, instrument repair, nor music stands (which are also falling apart.) Using the money we (students, families, and I) have raised on purchasing more instruments that are gently used rather than a smaller number of instruments that are new would be a wise investment for us because we need so many. The students have been eager and determined to help with fundraising to improve our program even though some will be graduating soon. They are excited about leaving a positive legacy behind and supporting the program that helped them so much.
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Students from Foothills Elementary will be coming to Whispering Wind Academy due to the closure of the Foothills Elementary campus. In anticipation of this, I am looking to stock up on instruments we do not have so that we can provide for these incoming students who may not be able to afford to rent instruments.
We only have 1 violin, and it is a full size, so this doesn't help those smaller beginner students who would like to play violin but cannot rent. This is what I would like to work on getting for Whispering Wind at this time. If you are able to help us get a smaller violin we would greatly appreciate it! Read more »