Waimea Students are Tuning Up!

I MADE HEADLINE NEWS!

OK maybe I'm being dramatic. But today in the West Hawaii Today Newspaper, an article about my new string program was published. And I'm not being dramatic by saying the article is an ENTIRE page with big colored pictures and font! I don't think our 6.8 earthquake of 2006 made such large font size!
About a year ago, a close family friend and wonderful Doctor Shay Bintliff gave me a 3/4 sized child's violin. She told me looking at the violin was too painful for her, because the violin was supposed to go to her only grandchild Ileiana who passed away at age 11 from cancer. She instructed me to give the violin away to a child needing violin lessons. But I knew deep down the violin was too special and meaningful to simply give away. The violin has been displayed in my music studio for the past year, drawing lots of attention and questions from my students. It made me too sad to tell them the story behind the violin, so instead I decided to turn the violin into something positive.
With the 4-6th grade classes at Waimea Country school, I decided to start the Ileiana Orchestra Project. I am temporarily loaning seven of my personal violins to the class and teaching them to play violin. At the end of the year, the goal is to have the students perform for benefit auctions, fund raisers, and galas in attempt to raise money, scholarships, grants, and donations towards a school orchestra. When the school raises enough money to invest in an orchestra or band for the school, Ileiana's Orchestra Project will continue the same goal and method in other neighboring schools on the Big Island of Hawaii. In the master dream to create a Waimea Youth Symphony.

Please click HERE to read the featured newspaper article!