Adventures in Jamblini
On May 5, which is Children's Day in Japan, there will be a musical for children performed at Capio. The musical is called "Adventures in Jamblini" and the main characters are played by children.
The musical is in Japanese, but if you read the synopsis (see below), it should be fairly easy to understand what is going on. The performance involves acting, singing, and dancing, so it should be fun for both children and adults to watch.
(By the way, a certain regular contributor to TsukuBlog will be appearing the show as "Queen Shule". Look closely at the second page of the pamphlet and you may spot her!)
Event: Adventures in Jamblini
Date: May 5, 2009
Times: 2pm and 5:30pm (two shows)
Place: Tsukuba Capio (map)
Tickets: JHS students and younger: 1300 yen, HS students 1800 yen, Adults 2200 yen
Tickets are available online or by contacting me (Shaney).
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Adventures in Jamblini - Synopsis
The play opens up at a juku (cram school) where parents are being lectured on the importance of having their children enter a good school. At this particular juku, the head teacher has decided to offer "24-hour cram sessions" and the parents decide that they need to send their children to these sessions in order to secure their future.
The kids go to one of these cram sessions and are on their way home when they meet up with one of their friends, Cook. Cook doesn't attend juku, so she has missed her friends over the past 24 hours. She tries to get them to play with her, but everyone is too tired or too busy to comply. She finally convinces one of the kids to start playing janken (rock, paper, scissors) and that finally wakens the need in all the kids to start playing. Janken turns into tag, and soon all of the kids are remembering how much fun it is to play. Finally, the kids come upon an open manhole and decide to explore what is inside.
What the kids don't realize is that on the other side of the manhole is a whole other kingdom, Jamblini! When we first see Jamblini, we meet the Witch and her apprentices. The Witch is a proud, vengeful woman who has placed a spell on the peaceful inhabitants of Jamblini. Time has been stopped in the kingdom and all of its citizens are frozen in time.
However, all is not lost! When the kids come through the manhole, they sing a song that contains a magic word ("waku waku") that breaks the Witch's spell and frees the citizens of Jamblini and their queen, Shule. The Queen and her subjects are very grateful to the children. However, they have to deliver some bad news: the roads in Jamblini are all ONE WAY! So the kids have to travel all the way through the kingdom in order to get back to the manhole and escape.
The Witch is not going to be happy when she learns that the children have broken her spell. She is going to try to stop the kids with all of her powers. Queen Shule decides to help the kids by giving them some "Queen Dust" that will make a victim laugh for 10 minutes straight if exposed to it. She also tells them to call for her magic mice in a BIIIIIIIIIG voice if they need help. The mice are sure to come running!
Armed with the Queen Dust and Shule's advice, the kids go on their way. At first they are reluctant to go, but then they realize that they all have to work together to get back to the manhole. The Witch and her apprentices do indeed have their fun with the children -- trying to freeze them cold and blocking their way with fire -- but the kids do their best to work together to get past these obstacles and (spoiler alert) find their way back home.
The kids -- and their parents -- learn through these adventures that they should not spend all of their time studying. Play time is important too, and the kids can learn many important things through playing with their peers. One of the most important things that kids can learn is how to work together to accomplish their goals and get what they want out of life.
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For more information about the play and Gekidan Kurie Tsukuba, the drama club that is performing the show, please see the club's website (in Japanese) or contact me.
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Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony
The City of Tsukuba, the Tsukuba Cultural Foundation, and the Tsukuba 9th Symphony Steering Committee would like to invite the public to a performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in D. minor, opus 125, known as the "Ode to Joy Choral" to be performed at Nova Hall on Saturday, December 30, 2006. The choral parts will be performed by a community chorus made up of local residents and the 2006 Tsukuba 9th Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Yuichi Takubo. Members of the citizen's chorus rehearsed for about 4 months to stage this inaugural year-end choral concert here in Tsukuba City. In addition to the "Ode to Joy" Symphony, Wolfgang Mozart's Divertimento for string orchestra in D major ("The Salzburg Symphony No. 1"), K. 136 will also be part of the afternoon program, which is set to open its doors at 2pm with the actual performance beginning at 3pm.
General admission tickets are being sold for 1,500 yen at the Tsukuba Cultural Foundation or Tsukuba Shinkou Zaidan located at the rear of the Tsukuba Capio Center (029-851-2886) or at Nova Hall (029-852-5881). For more information, call the Tsukuba Cultural Foundation (029-856-7007).
For those of you out there not flying home for the holidays and who are planning to spend your New Year's Holiday here in Japan, come join us during this holiday season. Make the December 30 choral concert a part of your end-of-the-year celebrations.
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Blast!
Blast is an exciting musical show that focuses on percussion. It is coming to Japan for shows in Tokyo in August and September. (August 3 to 5 at Tokyo Kosei Nenkin Kaikan, August 8 to September 9 at Tokyo Kokusai Forum.) Tickets range from 4000 yen to 11,500 yen. (The cheaper tickets are already sold out for many shows, especially on the weekends.)
More info:
http://www.blasttheshow.com/
http://metropolis.co.jp/tokyo/593/stage.asp (Metropolis article from a previous year)
In Japanese (includes information about how to buy tickets):
http://www.blast-tour.jp/
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Cello and Piano Recitals at Nova Hall
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CELLO RECITAL
Saturday, February 2, 2008
3pm
Nova Hall
Cello: Pieter Wispelwey
Piano: Alexander Melnikov
A seats: 3000 yen
B seats: 2500 yen
C seats: 1500 yen
Program includes:
B. Britten: Cello Sonata in C major, Op.65
L.v. Beethoven: Cello Sonata No.3 in A major, Op. 69
B. Martinu: Variation on a Slovac Folksong
S. Prokofiev: Cello Sonata in C major, Op. 119
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PIANO RECITAL
Sunday, March 9, 2008
3pm
Nova Hall
Piano: Boris Berezovsky
A seats: 3500 yen
B seats: 2500 yen
C seats: 1500 yen
Program includes:
L.V Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 23 in F minor, Op. 57, Appasionata
N. Medtner: from Fairy Tales
R. Schumann: Davidsbundlertanze, Op. 6
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Discount!
You can get a discount if you buy tickets for both concerts at the same time.
A seat: 5500 yen
B seat: 4500 yen
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Tickets
Nova Hall: 029-852-5881
Yamaha Tsukuba Branch: 029-850-0518
Ticket Pia: 0570-02-9990
Internet: http://www.tins.ne.jp/~tsukuba-concert
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Communication SNAFU Leads to Great Musical Find
The sound engineer who has been doing most of our recording recently has very good English. Out of respect for his ability, I ALWAYS use that language when dealing with him, even though we could always switch to Japanese. WHICH language to use with a particular person can be a delicate question when there is more than one possibility since it could be insulting to suddenly change away from the English (or any other language) which a non-native is doing their best to speak and I usually hesitate to do so. I often witness amusing bouts of linguistic sumo in which each speaker tries his/her best to keep the conversation in the OTHER person's language. This is why I used English to make this week's studio booking, even though DATES and TIMES are very fertile territory for misunderstanding. I thought I had made arrangements for Thursday night, but I guess this was only heard as SAZDAY, which as you can understand, is easily confused with SADADAY, or Saturday.
Anyway to make a long story short, Michael Frei, Thomas Mayers and I showed up at the studio only to find out that we had come two days too early. Everyone felt pretty embarrassed. Fortunately, the evening was not wasted. Since we suddenly found ourselves with nothing to do, I remembered that I hadn't been to East of Eden, a small pub which often has live music, in a very long time. I quickly found out that my friends had NEVER been there. In ten minutes we were walking through its front door. Tsukuba is full of surprises, and that night we were VERY happily surprised. Though it was a weeknight, there was a LIVE gig about to start. The proprietress told us that it was two guys from Kyushu who call themselves NO MISS GUITARS, and to get directly to the point, they blew us away. From start to finish these mid-thirtyish Kyushu-Danji kept our rapt attention with their powerful musical presence. With 2 acoustic guitars, harmonica and vocals we were treated to a full and sumptuous range of moods and tone colors, evoking an array of influences as disparate as Django Reinhart and The Violent Femmes. And though they were limited in terms of number of instruments they still made each song sound different. Their mastery of changes in dynamics was especially impressive. This was certainly not background music and I think there was hardly any conversation between audience members throughout the show. All the while, the crowd's gaze was intently fixed on the performance. It made me sad to think how these guys, true artists, have to virtually hobo around the country, passing out a hat (there was no cover charge) while pretty faced, vapid, TARENTO inundate the media and rake in millions. I can't wait to see these guys again and I would highly recommend that you check them out for yourselves. They will be playing at different small livehouse every day or so over the next few days.
Anyone who would like to get a glimpse of a very special Tsukuba sub-culture should head to East of Eden in Azuma. Its clientele is fiercely loyal and consists mostly of acoustic musicians and their friends. If you are a musician yourself I would VERY much recommend going there Sunday evenings for open mic night. Even if you don't play yourself you might still want to hear some of the music that is being written right here in Tsukuba. You WILL be impressed. Also check out their LIVE schedule. Acoustic guitar wizard Okayan is a regular performer.
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