In a small Kentucky town hit hard in recent years by shuttered coal mines, the joy of music is experiencing a rebirth. | Photo gallery | Video

Credit an effort by a Central Illinois group nearly 500 miles away with being - literally - instrumental in making that happen.

Karen Daudelin, a member of the Missions Committee at Wesley United Methodist Church in Bloomington, visited the Red Bird Mission School in Beverly, Ky., in October 2006. "Some of the needs were obvious," she said, but she also discovered the need for band instruments.

"We have no money for purchasing instruments," said the school's music teacher and director, Mark Smallwood, who leads the fifth-sixth grade band, the high school band, two choirs and the jazz/pep band.

"I do all the repairs on the instruments we are using," Smallwood said. "We have instruments, but a lot of them don't play. We repair them as long as we can." The students rent the instruments for $20 per year to help with the cost of upkeep.

Daudelin talked to other missions committee members at the church, including Illinois State University Associate Professor of Horn Joe Neisler. He contacted other churches in the United Methodist Church's Illinois Great Rivers Conference and about 30 instruments were donated. But they needed repairs; some needed new cases.

Neisler contacted Carl Thacker, Illinois State University's instrument repair technician and owner of Carl's Pro Band Instrument Repair in Bloomington. Thacker and his son, Travis, volunteered to clean and repair all instruments for the mission project.

"It means a lot to us to be able to help the kids," Thacker said. "Hopefully this will help the kids learn to be better people. Musicians are generally better in school."

The National Association of Band Instrument Repair Technicians, a locally based organization of which Thacker is a member, donated a tuba.

The project wound up May 14, when Wesley UMC mission team members loaded 27 refurbished instruments into a church van and set off at 6:30 a.m. to deliver them. The group arrived 12 hours later, just in time for the final concert of the school year by Red Bird's school band.

Said Daudelin, former president of United Way in McLean County, "All my life I raised money for United Way. What was lacking was real hands-on experiences. Handing someone a pair of shoes who has no shoes… it's more than giving money or time. It's a sense of fellowship that is hard to duplicate."

"When band director Mark Smallwood said 'I love you' to the kids, he really meant it. That is really inspiring. You want to help someone like that," added Daudelin.

Smallwood was grateful for the instruments the school received.

"Getting instruments into the hands of these kids means a lot. You never know how music could affect a student or what impact it might have on a musically gifted child," Smallwood said.