For ZUMIX, the Walk for Music and the Arts represents the perfect blend of our core values:

 Youth
 Music
 Community
 Excellence

Created as a response to the need for high-quality music programming in out schools and communities, the Walk for Music attracts organizations from throughout the Greater Boston area for an afternoon of music, celebration, and community in the Fenway. We hope that you will walk with us, sponsor a youth, or organize a team to help reach our goal of $30,000.

ZUMIX’s mission is empowered youth who use music to make strong, positive change in their lives, their communities and the world. Founded in 1991 in response to the worst year of violence in Boston’s history, ZUMIX has served thousands of under-served youth and families from East Boston and surrounding communities, providing safe-space, enhancing quality of life, inspiring participants to pursue higher education, and using the arts to help define East Boston as more than just an airport. ZUMIX currently serves about 900 youth per year through after-school programming and in-school partnerships.

This excerpt from a letter written by a ZUMIX participant beautifully sums up the impact of our organization:

Ever since I can remember, I have been infatuated by music. Everything about it was beautiful to me. […] When I started singing, I noticed it was a huge release for me. Whenever I was feeling stressed or buried under a mountain of emotions, I could sing a song that described how I was feeling and I would feel under control and ready to face the world. From that moment on, I realized that music and singing were my way of expressing myself.

As I got older, I watched everyone around me struggle with what they wanted and what kind of person they wanted to be. Those questions bother me as well sometimes. {…}Going [to ZUMIX] has helped me grow into the strong, driven person that I am today. I truly found myself when I found Zumix. The teachers are great and I began to figure out the answer to those questions that every teenager has at times. I continued to learn more things about who and what I was born to be, and learn new things every time I go there!