Trombone Recital

A recital by trombonist Barry Webb was held at Tokyo Concerts Lab, on the first floor of AVACO (the Christian Audio-Visual Center), near Yahata Sushi.

It had originally been planned as a memorial recital marking 10 years since the Great East Japan Earthquake, but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and was finally held at this time.

The first piece was “Requiem… Toward Eternal Life” by Katsumi Kain Yokoyama—In Memory of the Victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake.

It was a major work lasting nearly 50 minutes, and the siren sounds, tsunami, and voices of people fleeing in panic produced by the trombone (that is how they sounded to me) brought back memories of that time.

At times, Mr. Webb’s sharp vocalizations were also woven in. I closed my eyes, straightened my back, and listened intently through to the end of this tense requiem.

The second piece was Ryoanji by John Cage.

The percussion by the accompanying percussionist, Sumire Yoshihara, was immensely fascinating.

That was because her instruments were not drums or the like, but pieces of stone, bamboo tubes, and something resembling a bag.

The sound she made using three sticks at once was like that of a mokugyo, the wooden fish drum used in Buddhist chanting.

With Mr. Webb’s trombone entering with bwoh-bwoh interjections, it sounded like a large group of Buddhist monks chanting sutras in unison.

This, too, was a piece that left me feeling spiritually refreshed.

Thank you for letting us hear such precious music.