Food and transportation
Our first concert was at Kitarokkoudai primary school, about an hour by car from Osaka. The festival manager and tenor singer, Mr Yoshifumi Hata took us for some noodle soup and tempura before the concert. Mr Hata works at the largest japanese university for women with over ten thousand female students. ”I’m in heaven” he said to us. But the next minute he said…”Ten thousand talking teenagers….headache…”
The soprano Tomoko also joined as she had picked us up earlier. Touring in Japan is nice…they provide you with food and a driver almost every day.
Arriving at Kitarokkoudai primary school
When we passed one of the classrooms all the children ran to the window screaming and waving their hands. Great start 🙂 But will they listen to our concert, I thought.
The Melodica man
We were greeted by the head master and her staff with some japanese tea. While having tea we met the melodica player of whom we were to share concert with. He really blew everyone away with his performance, especially the kids. They were screaming and laughing every time he moved or made a noise. (Swedish composer Fabian Svensson would have loved his performance)
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| A fantastic melodica player with 5 different melodicas. |
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| Disciplined children entering the concert venue |
Duello and 600 japanese kids
Time for our part of the concert. We began with Duello by Martin Q Larsson. The moment Patrik jumped on stage with his first chord all the children started a massive applaud. The giggled at our funny noises and laughed when we gave each other the evil eye. (part of the piece) By the end of our performance we taught the kids to say good bye in swedish ”Hej då” and after that they wouldn’t stop shouting ”hej då” when ever they saw us.
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| 600 happy japanese children at Kitarokkoudai primary school |