Guest Blogger: Kyoko Taguchi, BYSO Board Member

This week we are excited to have Kyoko Taguchi, from the BYSO Board of Directors, join us with a guest blog entry!

We asked Kyoko to share with us her thoughts on music from an international perspective.

The Power of Music: Kyoko & Takumi's Experience:

"My son (8 yrs. old) is a happy third grader. He loves math, recess, and playing the violin in the BYSO Premiere Orchestra. Last Sunday he played the violin at our church to raise funds to help prepare dinner for the organization, Tent City. He prepared a sign asking for donation with his Crayola crayons, and played some Bach, Vivaldi, Veracini, and Kreisler for about an hour. That afternoon he raised $195.00, which was more than enough to prepare two dinners for the 95 people of Tent City. He said he was "extremely happy and thankful."

We moved from Tokyo in March 2006. My son was five years old then and didn’t know any English. When his “captain kid” week came in school, he was asked to give a presentation about himself. The only thing he could do was to play Handel’s “Bourree” with his tiny 1/8 violin in front of his kindergarten class. Since then, music has been a very special friend for him. When he turned 6, he wanted to join BYSO and make more friends through music -- he was in ESL then. He couldn’t even sight-read yet, and for the first three months he cried every night being unable to connect what he heard and what he saw. However, to my surrise, he never wanted to quit. Probably, he instinctively knew that music was helping him keep his self-esteem through the major transition between two countries, cultures, and languages. He now corrects my “funny English” and reads the sheet music without my help. Honestly it’s not too easy for me as a working mom to take him to rehearsals every Mondays by 6:30pm, but his happy bright face after rehearsals tells me how precious the experience he is having at BYSO is, and makes me so grateful to the wonderful people who make BYSO such an extraordinary place."

Thank you to Kyoko and Takumi, for sharing what an important role music plays in your lives. We are grateful to have Takumi in Premiere and Kyoko on the Board!

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How does music impact you? Got a story to share? Email your blog ideas to marketing@byso.org