Me and my wife Laura (who coincidentally runs the social media for the choir!) finally went on our honeymoon to Japan in October. Over a year after we got married!
I must say it’s the most amazing place I’ve ever been. We don’t travel often so it was amazing to have the chance to see such a different culture to ours here in the UK.
Whenever I’ve spoken to people about our trip they always ask, “So did you do anything apart from walking, eating and visiting temples?”
Because it’s true, most of what we did was walk, (a lot!) eat, (an awful lot!) and visit beautiful temples all day. It was difficult not to get what we called ‘beauty blind’ after a few days. I had to keep reminding myself of how amazing the architecture and landscape was, because it’s easy to take it for granted after a few days.
As a choir boy through and through it was difficult not to look for opportunities to experience Japan’s musical culture. Very close to our hotel in Kyoto was Kiyomizu-Dera, a stunning temple. There, we stumbled upon a ceremony celebrating the moon. I think… My Japanese is a little rusty!
At the ceremony was a group playing the Koto – an instrument that looks like a long guitar played horizontally while kneeling on the ground. It was stunning. The delicate sound of the plucking of the strings echoed throughout the temple. I haven’t heard a sound as beautiful as that since the second tenors’ last rehearsal! I read in a museum that Japanese musicians value the “Ma” very highly. The “Ma” is the space between sounds, allowing silence to fill the space rather than trying to fill every gap. A Johns’ Boys memory that came to mind straight was our performance at York Minster earlier in the year, in particular our performance of ‘We Shall Walk Through the Valley’. We sang unaccompanied and allowed the sound to echo through the performance space. It was probably my favourite song we’ve sung in any venue all year.
We travelled on the bullet train to Tokyo (which would have been very useful for the choir to travel up to Edinburgh!). It was incredible how on time the trains are! One day, I’m sure, Transport for Wales will get there. Tokyo was a maze of people, food and light! Everything moved at 100 miles an hour but somehow also had a sense of calm, patience and quiet to it in parts. We ate some exotic stuff! Eel, octopus, pufferfish and of course plenty of tempura! I think we ate enough sushi to feed us lads for a month!
In the capital we came across a music festival dominated by Japanese girl bands! Apart from the extensive choreography, frilly pink dresses, pigtails, makeup and Japanese lyrics, I suppose they were quite similar to Johns’ Boys. It was fascinating to witness a portion of another country’s musical culture.
We really hope to visit Japan again soon. Maybe on an international tour someday? (Wink wink) 😉
