Spring Rain Music Foundation:
My name is Michael. I am from Denmark. The main goal of this foundation is to share the blessings you received.
So who am I? Music have always been a big part of my life. As a 2 year old, I convinced my aunt and uncle to let me use their only radio because "I never fall asleep without music".
Doing my life, I have played a lot of different instruments. Guitar, bass, piano, organ, xylophone, saxophone, flute, trumpet, and drums – just to mention a few. My main instrument is a bass. I love playing bass. Right now, I play bass in a local church team and a local folk band. I love that so much. I can’t imagine what it would be like, not being able to play any instruments.
This brings me to the goal of this foundation. I have seen places around the world, where they didn’t have any instruments at all. I have seen brilliant musicians, not being able to practice because they couldn’t afford an instrument. Every time I see that, it breaks my heart. How can somebody who loves music as much as I do, not have the tools they need to play?
That is the reason I would like to create this Charity Foundation. I want to be help provide instruments for those that can’t afford them.
There are several ways of do that.
- Build new instruments. Building an instrument takes around 8-10 months and you need parts.
- People donate used or unwanted instruments. Anybody who has an instrument they don’t need or don’t want, can be donated. Even defective instruments can either be repaired or taken apart used for parts. I have taken a neck off an acoustic that I am using on another one.
- I sell a few instruments. It can be restored or home built instrument. There is a need for money to do this. Shipping cost and customs fees alone can be expensive for instruments but also for parts.
- Sometimes there is also a need for sound gear. When I was in Dublin, I found a couple of instruments and bass amplifies and passed them on to teenagers learning to play. Through the years I have noticed that sometimes there is a need for sound gear – like mixers and so on – so I have found that, and passed that on to churches, schools and music schools and so on.
The need for this is much bigger than I expected. I have connections in Denmark that fx 3-4 times pr. year travel to Romania. So far, they have brought 12 guitars to people in Romania but they need a lot more. I also know of three other places (Lithuania, Poland, and Kenya) that really needs instruments like yesterday. This is both for music schools and for churches that need instruments. Last year alone, I donated 3 acoustic guitars to a school for Autism, and 3 guitars to a music school for kids, and 1 guitar to a church.
My biggest challenge in this is my health. I have muscular dystrophy as well as a colon illness and asthma. This means that I sometimes cant work at all. I am retired on disability. That being said, as mentioned, I still managed to restore and donate 7 guitars last year.
The muscular dystrophy will put me in a wheelchair at some point. So every day is a struggle, but its a good kind of struggle. I just try to do what I can to help bring the right instrument into the right hands.
Michael