Thank you, Mr Holland...

As the Mr Holland's Opus Foundation approaches its 30th birthday, Michael Beek explores the charity's impact and the composer behind it

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At the end of the film Mr. Holland's Opus, Glenn Holland (Richard Dreyfuss), an elementary school music teacher for 30 years, finds his subject cut from the curriculum along with the rest of the arts programme. Holland never wanted to be a teacher – he wanted to compose but, to paraphrase John Lennon, life happened while he was making other plans. He grows to love his role, though, and inspires generations to appreciate and play music. While the audience wipes its tears as Mr Holland is given an emotional farewell – including a surprise performance of the symphony he's been working on for decades but has never heard – it can rest in the knowledge that this is fiction. But then again...

The provision for music education in American schools in the early-to-mid-1990s really was under threat; arts programmes were being reduced and even eliminated as budgets tightened at both state and local levels. Music was fast becoming a 'nice to have', a neglected corner of the curriculum, and the late composer Michael Kamen witnessed it firsthand.

Kamen was working on the soundtrack for Mr. Holland's Opus when he paid a visit to his old school in New York; while there, a place of many happy memories, he was shown a cupboard full of broken instruments and it had an impact.