About 70 students from the Tohoku region gave a concert Friday in New York to express their gratitude for U.S. support after the March 2011 disasters.

The students, assembled from five high schools in Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, sang Verdi's "Requiem" accompanied by a choir of around 100 singers from New Jersey at the prestigious Lincoln Center. A similar event was staged last March.

Wakana Yuda, 17, of Asakareimei High School in Fukushima, told the audience after the performance that many of the buildings at her school were damaged by the disasters but that they could continue singing practice because the music room was spared.