The Saitama Prefectural Kumagaya Girls’ High School Wind Band’s 40th Annual Concert was successfully held on 4 May. I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude to everyone who attended and supported us. Thank you very much!
Looking back, it turned out to be a two-and-a-half-hour concert packed with everything the students wanted to express on stage. Even during the final run-through a week prior, new choreographed movements were still being added (I was the only one panicking!), and on the day of the performance, props we had never seen before appeared. The show kept evolving right up to the moment of the concert.
Perhaps because so much was packed in, there were a few minor mistakes in the performance, but those are valuable learning experiences for high school students. Despite being a band that usually rehearses only around 10 hours a week, the students pulled off a full-length concert featuring 20 pieces. I’m truly proud of them from the bottom of my heart. It was such a joy to run alongside them through such an exciting journey.
For the third-year students, this concert marked an early farewell. Remarkably, all 16 of them, who joined the band at the same time, finished their journey together without anyone dropping out. Incredible! Of course, it’s bittersweet that we won’t be spending the upcoming band competition together. But at the same time, I’ve come to feel that this path—giving their all as seniors and ending their time with a final concert—is a beautiful way to bring their band life to a close.
I’m confident they’ve had a fulfilling and vibrant high school life, and I sincerely hope the remaining 10 months and the days after their graduation will be just as bright.
From here on, the baton passes to our new team of first and second-year students. The first term will fly by in a flash, and we’ll give it everything we’ve got!
Postscript
After the concert, as I was quietly flipping through the programme at home, I came across something that deeply moved me. During a run-through in early April, I heard a student MC say, “Please refer to the lyrics in the programme…” I told the students in charge that lyrics are also copyrighted, and that distributing them requires applying for permission and paying a small fee. We never discussed it again, so I was astonished to discover they had actually gone ahead and completed the JASRAC licensing process. Seeing a handwritten JASRAC licence number printed in a concert programme—it must be one of the rarest sights in the Japanese music scene!
