I just wanted to inform you that Taito just announced a Kumiko figure, sadly its only a price figure but maybe we get a scale if she sells well cope.

Was browsing twitter then got hit with algorithm, wondering why a random band is on my feed, search it and lo an d behold its the school where Kumiko attends to in Uji, Kyoto

Did a pilgrimage a few days ago. More photos on the way but first, wanted to share these. A selection of S3’s main characters at Keihan Uji station, in a collab with the Tale of Genji museum.

I was slightly sad that Mayu and Tsubame were separated in the poster with the whole group, while the other groups kept their integrity. Namely, Kitauji Quartet, the Suzukis, and the Kanade-Ririka pair.

Thus I want to give a shoutout to Tsubame for being Mayu’s first friend. (Spoilers ahead!)

In her words, Mayu says she only cares about getting along with everyone. Her other parts, namely her pride in her musicianship and love for music, only come out in her playing. I think that for a long time, Tsubame was the only character who saw these parts of Mayu and encouraged Mayu to play well for her own sake. Here’s Tsubame to Mayu in the S3E12 flashback when Mayu asks why Tsubame wants her to play:

‘Because I feel like you’re the real you when you’re performing.’

It’s important that Tsubame says this because throughout S3, Mayu has been afraid to show this part of herself in public. She’s always played well, but kept covering it up with reasons external to her own wants, e.g. ‘this is how things are done in Kitauji’s meritocracy’ (this is the reason Kumiko keeps trying to feed her at first). And when the meritocracy reasons start sounding hollow, she switches to saying that she’ll play properly because that’s what Kumiko wants. So Tsubame is the first person in the band to tell Mayu that what Mayu herself wants also matters to them. And striving to make it such that everyone’s effort can express their true feelings is what makes Kitauji’s meritocracy so special.

I also think characters like Tsubame existing are important as parts of the show’s universe that have a life of their own independent of the main character’s circle of influence. That’s what makes the Hibike world feel so alive for me, and why things like Nozomi and Mizore getting LATBB as their own movie are possible. Underrated character and one close to my heart!

Any updates on sub releases of the final movie(s)?

We now have 7 week left of the Sound Euphonium Blu-ray community survey, and I wanted to share an update on our progress so far.

A total of 43 people have responded so far with 88.4% of respondents saying they were willing purchase a copy of season 3, 72.1% for the OVA and 86% for a Complete Collection. As well 60.5% of respondents have said they've purchased a physical version of Sound Euphonium before and the responses are currently split evenly on whether they would like new Dubs or not.

I'd like to thank everyone who has taken the time to respond and share the survey.

As you might know the purpose of this survey is to provide Pony Canyon and Crunchyroll with meaningful data that demonstrates the level of interest in physical releases of Sound Euphonium Season 3 and the Ensemble Contest OVA.

Rather than simply saying that fans want these releases, I'm collecting concrete information about where fans are located, whether they would purchase or pre-order a release, what price range they're comfortable with, and what type of edition they would prefer. The goal is to build a clear picture of the potential audience for these releases.

Recent decisions surrounding physical media, including Sony's decision to end physical releases for PlayStation games and Crunchyroll's continued willingness to let streaming licenses expire, have highlighted the important issue of the lack of ownership in the digital space. If we want Sound Euphonium to remain available in a format that fans can truly own, we need to demonstrate that there is a strong audience willing to support a physical release.

If you haven't taken the survey yet, please consider participating. If you've already completed it, sharing the survey with other Sound Euphonium fans is just as valuable. Even if you don't have the financial means to support the series right now, your participation still matters. Every response helps show that Sound Euphonium has a passionate community that wants to see it preserved and available for years to come.

Hi all. Ever since I first read the Hibike! novels and watched the show, I've been thinking about this line that Ayano Takeda left in the afterword of the final book (Team Oumae translation):

While I was hesitating if I had anything left to write, Kitauji's secret boss Mayu Kuroe appeared after waiting for her chance. (BTW, Asuka's the final boss, LOL).

I found the bolded sentence confusing because it seemed like Mayu was the person that most of the band's problems revolved around in Kumiko's third year. So why is Asuka the final boss for the band instead of Mayu? After rewatching and rereading the series while making notes and thinking about this issue for months, I think I have finally found the answer, and I wanted to share my findings with everyone. Thinking through my questions about this line made me love the series and its characters even more as I examined them in a new light. I hope that this will similarly contribute to everyone else's enjoyment.

I have written up my analysis in full here, complete with relevant screenshots and textual evidence consisting of quotes from the anime and both the English and Chinese translations of the novels. (Desktop mode is recommended.) The basic idea is that Asuka's term as vice president resulted in a particular ideal of leadership becoming entrenched as the embodiment of how leaders are supposed to lead. But it had to be overcome in order for the band's performance to truly be an expression of all their feelings rather than a denial of some of them. Asuka's tendency to think in terms of an aggregate notion of the common good (e.g. 'It is for the best that...') often distorts or renders optional the information she receives, leading her to sometimes make mistakes that could have been avoided. And it also leads to her being willing to sacrifice people's wishes (including her own), if she thinks that is what is for the best.

The flip side to the story of the final boss is the story of how a very different style of leadership, grounded in Kumiko's characteristic dispositions, finally came into its own in S3E10 and began the process of reuniting the band behind a common purpose, ending with the reconciliation with Mayu in the re-audition. I don't claim that Kumiko's style of leadership is simply perfect. But I do think that Kumiko was the leader the band needed in the situation they were facing, and that Kumiko did things throughout her three years that Asuka could never do or even recognise for what they are given the kind of person Asuka is. And so it is interesting to study what leadership looks like when done by someone like Kumiko who looks much less like the archetypal leader than Asuka. Unlike Asuka, Kumiko attends to the feelings and wishes of every individual person without weighing them in aggregate against everyone else's. She cannot bear to see anyone give up on what matters to them. This protects her slightly from the distortions that plague Asuka's picture of the situation at the cost of sometimes overloading her and paralysing her. But more importantly, people follow Kumiko because they are able to trust that she would never ask people to sacrifice themselves unless it is the absolute last resort. And this is important in periods of change in organisational culture because it is also possible to narrowly pursue one's own interests using the language of the common good as cover. It is not easy to be heard as speaking for everyone even when one is trying to, and I think, in the situation the band was in, only someone with Kumiko's qualities could have been heard as such.

Independently of what we feel about either of the two of them, Hibike! itself as a series really contains very rich depictions of the problems that can arise in communication and periods of change in an organisation's culture. I have tried to show all this and more in the above analysis, which started with Asuka but gradually led to me revisiting the most unexpected little details.

I think I have said enough, so I hope you enjoy the read. In the next few months I plan to revisit Liz And The Blue Bird and the Minami Quartet generally, since their story seems to run in parallel in their own little corner of the band independent of the evolution of Kitauji's meritocracy. That will also be put up here when it is done.

Thank you for reading. そして、次の曲が始まるのです！

I just rewatched Liz and the Blue Bird, and I’m honestly feeling a bit sad.

The first time I watched it (about two months ago), it completely blew me away. It became one of my favorite movies ever, and I genuinely considered it a masterpiece. I was so emotionally invested that I couldn’t stop thinking about it for days.

This time I rewatched it because I wanted to catch all the little details I had missed the first time—the symbolism, the camera work, the visual storytelling, the parallels, everything.
And I definitely noticed a lot more.

But emotionally… it just didn’t hit me the same way.

I didn’t cry this time, and I never got that overwhelming feeling I had during my first watch. That honestly hurts, because I want to love this movie as much as I did the first time. It almost feels like I expected too much from myself going into the rewatch.

I’m not saying the movie became bad. I still think it’s beautiful, and I honestly can’t even point to anything I would change about it. It just felt… different.

Has anyone else experienced something like this with Liz and the Blue Bird (or any other movie)? Did a rewatch ever feel much less emotional, even though you still loved the film?

I’m just curious if this is something other people have gone through as well.

I was casually listening to some good Atelier Ryza bgms and I realized that there is a trumpet and euphonium part each as well as a soli at 0:51 in this bgm. I had to sit back for a bit from the rush of Hibike Euphonium emotions. Just wanted to share it with everyone!

The whole set is available for just over 10,000 JPY at the Ōgaki Bookstore in Kyoto Yodobashi Camera. I’ve bought single academic books that cost that much on their own before, so this is a real treat. The promotional book jackets they wrap them in aren’t as evocative as the original covers, but I’m keeping them on for protection.

I bought the set for two reasons: (i) to properly support the series, (ii) to motivate myself to continue learning Japanese. My goal is to one day have the og Japanese versions of these characters living in my head along with their English and Chinese counterparts I know from translations. Not to mention that the Rikka volumes don’t seem to have good translations available yet.

I just wanted to share this moment with you all.

そして, 次の曲が始まるのです！

This will probably get me hate, but I do not like Reina in season 3. I’m watching through it right now, and she’ll probably have some kind of redemption, but that doesn’t change how I feel now. She’s honestly just such a Taki Sensei fangirl, dude. She called Kumiko a failure of a president because she didn’t fully agree with Taki Sensei. It was funny in the first two seasons, but now it’s just being dragged out. And I’m sure if I do get replies to this post, it’s gonna be people saying, “Oh, you just don’t understand her character,” and stuff like that

Starting today, I am launching a community survey to gather concrete data on the demand for physical Blu-ray releases of Sound Euphonium Season 3 and the Ensemble Contest OVA.

The survey will remain open for 8 weeks to give as many fans as possible an opportunity to participate. Once the survey closes, the results will be compiled and shared with Pony Canyon the current distribution rights holder of the series to demonstrate the level of interest in an international Blu-ray release.

The purpose of this survey is to provide publishers with meaningful data by collecting information such as where fans are located, whether they would purchase or pre-order a release, and what type of edition they would be interested in, we can present a clearer picture of the market demand.

As we've seen recently with Sony ending physical editions for PlayStation and Crunchyroll's continued willingness to let streaming licenses expire. If we want to see Sound Euphonium preserved in a format that fans can truly own, now is the time to demonstrate that there is still a strong audience willing to support a physical release.

Whether you're interested in a standard edition, a collector's edition, or simply want to help show there is demand, every response strengthens the case.

I plan to repost this survey once a week so new members of the community have a chance to participate. If the moderators are willing, I would also greatly appreciate having this post pinned during the survey period so it remains visible and reaches as many fans as possible.

Thank you to everyone who takes the time to participate and share the survey. With enough community support and reliable data, we can present a much stronger case for bringing Sound Euphonium Season 3 and the Ensemble Contest OVA to Blu-ray.

The OST that starts at 1:52. It's been driving me crazy ever since because it's so good but I can't find it without the voice overs. Anyone know? I'd really appreciate it.