And we follow the light.

My native and resident country, Japan is a nation of islands. Going abroad used to and remains to have a special connotation for its inhabitants.

I went abroad for the first time when I was 15. I still remember the shock as the airplane descended to Vancouver international airport. I happened to observe what later turned out to be quite an ordinary residential area by Canadian standards. However, at that time, the spacious greens in which the houses, some of them with pools in the backyard, seemed to be a scene from another planet.

Now, when I travel out of and into the Tokyo International airport, the shocks still persist more or less, albeit in a diminished manner. On the other hand, I seem to begin to discern a more universal and global pattern common to all world regions, no matter how different the languages and habitats might appear on the surface.

As time passes, I seem to be more concerned on what is universally human.

I never took a serious interest in nationalism, or in people who advocate it.

As the shock of differences fade away, the light of universality emerges. And we follow the light.

Solace to the soul of a nation

Parsifal is the final opera of Richard Wagner. It seems to be a fitting end to the career of a composer who pursued the theme of Erlosung durch Liebe (redemption through love) for life.

It was fitting that my first experience of the Bayreuth festival came to a conclusion on Saturday with the performance of Parsifal, conducted by Daniele Gatti and directed by Stefan Herheim (Bayreuth Festspiele, 15th August 2009).

During the Vorspiel (overture), the stage curtain was already open, and we saw a woman with long blonde hair dressed in white lying on a bed. Apparently she is in death agony. In Sehnsucht (yearning), she calls for her boy child. The boy, not understanding the nature of maternal emotion, refuses to be hugged by her and goes away into the garden with a bough in his hand.

Soon after the boy left, the mother dies. The doctor declares the death, and puts a sheet over her body. They leave the room, and the dead woman sinks into the bed and disappears.

When the boy returns, the room is empty. He looks at the bed where his mother has been lying. Still not comprehending what has been going on, he faces with unconscious misgivings a platform in the front of the stage which turns out to be an alter en effect throughout the performance. He lays bricks there, apparently forming a wall. However, the wall remains incomplete and in translation.

This brief description of what happens, in outline, during the course of the overture would do justice, I think, to the multitudes of possibilities that a stage director can put into a contemporary Wagner performance.

It was a production with a heavy resonance with the sometimes tragic modern history of Germany, with vivid and unforgettable images. The fact that an opera can bring solace to the soul of a nation by facing its history without any self deception is once again a testimony of the forces of a great piece of art.



Image from Parsifal directed by Stefan Herheim from Wagneropra.net

Booings and bravos

In order for a work of performing art to be maintained in a living condition, it needs to be refreshed in the styles of times. The concerns close to people's heart, the joys and fears of the common man change with the passage of eras. A presentation of a work, no matter how vivid and appropriate within the context of a particular time, tends to fade away in relevance in the face of a new period.

These were the thoughts invoked as I left the theatre after attending the performance of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (Bayreuth Festspiele, on 14th August 2009), conducted by Sebastian Weigle and directed by Katharina Wagner.

Katharina Wagner's Meistersinger premiered in July 2007. It was heavily booed. The fact that people boo certain productions is a testimony that opera is taken very seriously. The production of Der Ring der Nibelungen directed by Patrice Chéreau and conducted by Pierre Boulez, for example, was booed on the first night to such an extent that it became a scandal. The perception of the audience can then go through a dramatic transfiguration. In its final staging in 1980, on the night of Götterdämmerung, Chéreau and Boulez's Ring received 101 curtain calls which lasted for 90 minutes.

It remains to be seen how Katharina's production will be finally received. It is certainly a very interesting production. It is, which is important more than anything else, also very courageous. The fact that the great granddaughter of Richard Wagner is bold enough to try this brand new philosophy of staging is reassuring for the future of the Bayreuth festival.

Katharina herself says thus. “Being booed belongs to the job description of a director.” ( New York times, July 31, 2007)

The progress of the human spirit is a very complex and dynamic process. Booings and bravos are the fuels that propel its procession.



Image from Katharina Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, from Wagneropra.net

Eternal solitude

The performance of Tristan und Isolde, conducted by Peter Schneider and directed by Christoph Marthaler (Bayreuth Festspiele, on 13th August 2009), left a very vivid and stinging aftertaste.

At first, during the 1st and 2nd act, the intentions of Marthaler was not apparent to this observer. The singers kept a very detached stature overall. At the end of the 1st act, for example, apprehending the approach of King Marke the four (Tristan, Isolde, Brangane, and Kurwenal) try to compose themselves by sitting stiff in geometrically arranged chairs.

The contrived and restricted manner in which everyone acted transfigured into significant and moving meaning, as, at the end of the 3rd act, after singing the final words assigned to each, first Kurwenal, then Marke, and finally Brangane turned away from the world, standing in an upright position, face to the wall.

Isolde herself, after singing the beautiful Liebestod alone in the bed that Tristan has been lying, finally lies on the bed, covering her body and face with the white sheet.

So the opera ends with people encapsulated in the isolation of each, distanced from other people, no matter dead or alive. And the love itself, glued by the poignant word "und", is emancipated and lost for ever in the ocean of eternal solitude.



Image from the final act of Marthaler's Tristan und Isolde, from
Wagneropra.net

Tristan und Isolde

On 13th August 2009, I attended a performance at the Bayreuth Festspiele for the first time in my life. It was Tristan und Isolde.

Repetition leads

So I have come to Munich, in translation to Bayreuth.

I have visited Munich many times. Whenever I can, I listen to operas, preferably Wagner, in the National Theatre. Compared to the dense metropolis in other nations, German capitals tend to be more sparsely inhabited, reflecting, perhaps, the character of the German people. Always keeping a proud distance.

Repetition leads to the realization of life's continuity. Visiting a familiar city reminds one of the former times, how you were young, innocent, and ignorant. With age one gets some chunks of wisdom, but the ignorance persists in a different form.

I bought three books on Wagner in the Hauptbahhof. Reading them would give me the much needed opportunity to refresh my German.

Today, I travel to Bayreuth, to meet my long waited fate. I would be listening to Tristan und Isolde. The greatest and most intensely romantic piece of art ever.

And there will be life

Lands in Tokyo, like in any cotemporary city of big lights, are heavily utilized. It was a rare occasion that a space near my house, after the demolition of buildings that occupied the land, was left unattended for the summer.

At first, it looked like a barren land. Soon the weeds began to grow. Now, it is like a jungle of miscellaneous vegetations. Flowers bloom here and there. Butterflies and dragonflies take advantage of the sudden growth of wilderness in the busy cityscape by flying over the green extension.

It is a testimony again that nature, when given sufficient space and time, can take care of itself. It does not require an active intervention on the part of humans. Just let nature go its own way, and there will be life.

I suspect that some essential parts of nature are victimized by our shortsighted meddlings. The unconscious is like the nature, and too much interference by the conscious can disrupt its carefree dynamics.

I take the scene of green apparitions that emerged in the rare open land as a testimony of the importance of autonomy, natural and unconscious.

Expectations

This summer, within a few days, I would be traveling to Bayreuth for the first time in my life.

I will be listening to the performances of Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg, and Parsifal.

Naturally I am filled with great expectations. Wagner was, has been, and is the creative genius of my love, and attending the Bayreuth festival has been one of my dreams.

I am 46 now. To think it took more than 30 years to realize one's wish inspires one with strange emotions.

There are many spiritual creatures lurking in one's expectations. They have their own life forms, timelines for development. Sometimes they bear fruit, and other times perish. To come to something in actuality has nothing to do with the fulfilment of one's expectations. Expectations have their own territory, where Queens and Kings with no parallels in the real world reign in the darkness and mist.

When I am seated in the Festspielhaus in Bayreuth, and the lights go out, as the first notes resound, I will have finally found a restful tomb for all these wonderful creatures that have been lurking in my expectations.

Tears of onceness.

When the onceness of life touches us, tears drop from the eyes.

Yesterday, there was a wedding party. Shinichi Nozawa, a Ph.D student in my laboratory at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, and Emiko Ito, an editor at the publishing house Chikumashobo, were married.

In Japanese wedding festivities, it is customary that the newly-wed couple present flower bouquets to their parents at the end of the party, expressing gratitude.

As the pair approached the parents, they already appeared to be on the verge of crying.

The childhood days when they clung to the knees of their parents. The entrance ceremonies of elementary school. The cherry blossoms. The sports meeting, with parents watching the child run. The graduation of universities. Parents treated by the first salary of life.

All these things, with the inevitable procession of time, surround the couple. Shinichi and Emiko cry. The tears are the crystals of their happiness, the epitome of passage of life.

Here's to the the tears of onceness.



Shinichi and Emiko preparing to present the bouquet.
In Joshui Kaikan party room, Tokyo.