A Kayabuki Concert
For an artist to have ones own concert hall is an extreme luxury. Our Kayabuki Ongaku-do in Hiyoshi-cho, Goma, seats some 300 people and usually is full. We do concerts in spring and in autumn, the most beautiful seasons in Japan. Summers are too hot and winters too cold to have guests.
These concerts have become something like an institution in Western Japan, even the limited express train stops in Goma especially for these events. We have a mailing list of close to 10,000 addresses now, we send the schedule for the next concerts, the program, and once a year some information about what and how we are doing. (send us your address)
In 1999 we had some 6,000 guests making the trip to Goma. There is a feeling of familiarity in the audience, riding the train together, walking through the rice fields together, sitting closely together on o-zabuton (floor pillows), getting to know each other over the years, sitting very close to us and getting to know us and our children through our mailings. A small cup of Ozeki genmai wine with a cookie at intermission, a riceball (o-nigiri), made from our own rice on going home, add to the feeling of closeness between us and the audience.
The programs change every season, often more than half the pieces are first performances for Japan, pieces we find at libraries all over the world. The programs in 1999 were:

In spring: 'Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 250 years', compositions inspired by Goethe's dramas and poems, by Liszt, Schumann, Wagner, Beethoven and Schubert.

In autumn: Brahms' own arrangement of his piano concerto No. 1 in d minor and Anton Dvorak's 'Scenes from Bohemian forest'

In spring 2000 we played a program: 250 years J.S.Bach, with Bach's Passacaglia, 4 fuges from 'The Art of the Fuge', the d minor Toccata, 6 fuges by Schumann, over the name B.A.C.H. and Liszt's Fantasy and Fuge with the same theme, B.A.C.H.
This autumn we did a program with works befitting Halloween, (there are surprisingly many spooky compositions!), The Sorcerers Apprentice, Hamlet by Liszt, Dvoraks' Forest Dove, Chez Petrouschka and many, many songs we could arrange for piano duet.

The SCHEDULE for the NEXT CONCERTS (in the spring of 2001) is:
Performances are at 11 and 3 o'clock on each of these days.
If you plan to attend one of these concerts, please send a return postcard with your address on the return part to
603-8691 Kyoto-shi Kita Yubin Kyoku P.O.Box 24 Kayabuki Ongaku-do stating your first and second choice of date and time. We will then return a confirmation. Hope to see you there soon!

Ozeki Zabuton Concerts >>>
Other Concerts >>>