As a matter of longstanding tradition, participants of the Spasskaya Tower International Military Music Festival perform not only within its main evening program, but go beyond it staging concerts for all Muscovites and guests of the capital onstage of the city public venues.
Thus, on Wednesday, August 28, visitors of the Alexander Garden might have found themselves on the concert of theCentral Band of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force, debutant of the 2019 production. It’s been almost 70 years that the band has been providing music accompaniment at the official solemn ceremonies featuring foreign official delegations visiting Japan as well as successfully representing its country abroad. It participated in various international festivals in Republic of Korea, Finland, Great Britain and others.
“It is our first visit to Russia and we’ve brought a very special program here. Above all it symbolizes the unity between Russian and Japanese cultures”, pointed out Colonel Higuti Takahiro, head and conductor of the Central Band of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force.
In the Alexander Garden the band performed both Japanese traditional melodies and Russian music pieces. Thus, they opened the program with Flight of the Bumblebee, an orchestral interlude written by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov for his opera the Tale of Tsar Saltan, and Near the Black Seapopular Soviet song by Leonid Utesov.
Then the audiences were taken from Moscow, the historical heart of Russia, to the faraway lands of Japan as musicians were performing a medley of Japanese national songs with a spectacular drum solo.
But by performing Knipper’s Cavaliers of the Step and world-famous Katushathe Japanese musicians managed to take hearts of the Russian audiences for good.
For the finale the Central Band of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force was joined by the Exemplary Band of the National Guard Forces of the Russian Federation. Conducted by Colonel Higuti Takahiro, Colonel Vladimir Vasyak, Chief Military Conductor of the National Guard Forces, and Lieutenant Colonel Arkadiy Shmelev, they performed the Olympic March by Udzi Kosyaki, Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture and Agapkin’s Farewell of Slavianka.
