FUKUSHIMA--When the 62 students of the Adachi High School brass band took the stage in their school uniforms for a music festival earlier this month at the Fukushima city concert hall, three girls wearing white shirts and black pants joined them.
FUKUSHIMA--When the 62 students of the Adachi High School brass band took the stage in their school uniforms for a music festival earlier this month at the Fukushima city concert hall, three girls wearing white shirts and black pants joined them.
The three Namie High School students had thought their brass band days were behind them after they were forced to evacuate following the Great East Japan Earthquake and had to leave their instruments.
Their thoughts were with their former brass band members now at other schools, but they were also grateful to their new classmates for allowing them to take part in the music festival. On June 1, it was also the first time two of the students were able to play their instruments in two-and-a-half months.
Their school, Namie High, is located about 10 kilometers from the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, and the area is now a no-entry zone.
Namie High students began classes in May after the end of the Golden Week of national holidays by using rooms at Adachi High in Nihonmatsu, Fukushima Prefecture, about 50 kilometers west of Namie.
There were nine members in Namie High's brass band, but with students transferring out in line with their evacuation, the only members remaining were two second-year students, Mami Sanpei, 16, and Ikumi Sato, 16. The third student, Shiho Kanno, 15, entered high school from April and had been practicing with the Adachi High brass band.
However, Sanpei and Sato had not touched their instruments in months.
Yukie Kudo, adviser to the Adachi High brass band, invited Sanpei and Sato to join the Adachi High band as representatives of Namie High.
Kudo felt playing the instruments would be good for the two girls and would also encourage other Namie High students.
However, the two were hesitant at first.
"I was very unstable psychologically because I felt I would be a burden on everyone at Adachi High," Sato said.
Sanpei added, "It will cost money to buy the tools needed to take care of the instruments. I could not become a burden on my parents at a time like this."
Sanpei also thought of her father who is working at the Fukushima No. 1 plant trying to bring the situation there under control.
She thought that she should sacrifice what she enjoyed doing.
What led her to change her mind was something her mother, Junko, 43, said.
"Since this is something you can only do now, why don't you try it?" Junko told her daughter.
Sanpei said, "While my mother encouraged me to do it, I really wanted to play the instrument again."
Sato added, "I felt like I wanted to try it after Kudo invited us so earnestly."
The two took part in practices from two days before the music festival.
The Adachi High brass band played a song by the Carpenters as well as a medley of songs by AKB48.
Sanpei played the clarinet, Sato the trumpet and Kanno the tuba.
After the 10-minute performance, the three left the stage and thanked the band members of Adachi High.
The three thanked the band members for welcoming them despite the problems that they caused. While the three were talking, their eyes filled with tears.
Sanpei said of the experience, "Without our former classmates, I felt a large sense of loneliness. But, I was able to forget all the sad things while I was playing. I want to continue with my music by doing whatever it takes, be it part-time work or something else."
She now wants to return to Namie High some day and retrieve the instruments that had to be left behind.