Tokyo Geijutsu Daigaku Opera

July 18, Kotaro Sato conducting in Tokyo Geijutsu Daigaku Sogakudo -- "Cosi Fan Tutte" (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1756-91), featuring Akiko Ohyama, Junko Nakamura, Maya Nagai, Armando Puklavec, Neal Banerjee and Sinisa Stork with the Student Orchestra and senior vocal students of Tokyo Geijutsu Daigaku

A few minute's stroll past Tokyo Bunka Kaikan in Ueno Park are the twin campuses of Tokyo Geijutsu Daigaku, the nation's foremost university devoted to the arts. On the left is the portion devoted to the visual arts: painting, sculpture and the like. Across the road is the portion devoted to the aural arts: music, theater and dance.

A half century ago, when it enrolled such students as Hiroyuki Iwaki, Yuzo Toyama and Akeo Watanabe, the Tokyo Academy of Music was the city's principal purveyor of advanced musical instruction. I am unclear though as to when and how the grandly named Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music came into being, or to the presumed connection between the two institutions.

Known more familiarly as Geidai, the institution in the park quietly churns out a steady stream of performances and seems not to dwell over much on its historical achievements. Aspiring young musicians are prosaically concerned with two fundamental facts about study there: Only a limited number of students are accepted in each area of study; once admitted, they pay no tuition.

The purse strings appear to have been loosened in Geidai's favor recently. A handsome new museum for the visual arts abuts the entrance gate to the left-hand campus. Across the way, the right-hand campus is similarly decorated with its aural counterpart, a comely new concert hall seating 1,140.

The new Sogakudo seems to have changed the entire ambience of Geidai. It is attractively designed and artfully lit. The shoebox design works well acoustically too -- that is, it sounds good when there is a full audience in the seats.

There was a full house on hand for the only performance of Mozart's tongue-in-cheek opera buffa, "Cosi Fan Tutte." It was a canny choice for many practical reasons. The music is beautiful, the cast is small and comprises young characters, the demands on the orchestra and chorus are modest and the lesson of the opera is perennial. The opera's subtitle is "School for Lovers."

The growing passion for opera here is a phenomenon which accords with the national temperament. Many Japanese are repressed romantics. The recent opening of the New National Theater (dedicated to opera) suggests that this is shared in the corridors of clout. There is an audience for opera which is increasing in numbers, knowledge and appetite. A part of that audience filled the seats of Geidai Sogakudo.

Even so modestly designed an opera as "Cosi," though, presents many practical problems in performance. Numerous complexities were removed with the decision to present it in concert style -- that is, without staging, scenery, costumes, props or any of the spectacle of the theater, basing the performance entirely on the music.

The first obstacle of opera is casting, choosing the voices for the characters of the opera. There are many people who sing here in the land of karaoke. Finding great actor-singers with the appropriate physical appearance and that mystical quality of stage presence is quite another matter.

To compound the problem, the music schools and conservatories of Japan are filled with young women. The incidence of young men studying the musical arts is far less, as can be seen when observing the string section of almost any symphony orchestra in the country. In Japan it is far easier to find a Despina, Dorabella and Fiordiligi than it is to find an equally competent Ferrando, Guglielmo or Don Alfonso.

Every obstacle represents an opportunity for those who would overcome it. Geidai's sensible approach was to turn outside -- indeed, outside the country -- to an eminent sister institution, Geidai's counterpart in the land of Mozart, the Vienna Hochschule fur Musik und Darstellerkunst. They found three young men happy to fly around the world to Japan for a quick engagement with the three young Japanese women ready, eager and able to do justice to the distaff parts. It was an inspired solution.

It might be instructive for Japan's music lovers to consider carefully the personal backgrounds of the three singers from Vienna. Neal Banerjee was born in Canada, Armando Puklavec in Croatia, and Sinisa Stork in Bosnia. On stage or in the pit, one forgets everything but the force which binds all musicians in a common voice.

The story of how this happy exchange was conceived remains untold, as does how the artists were selected and how the trip was financed. Suffice it to say that it happened, and that it worked. The artistry of the three men was very impressive, and a splendid example for the other singers.

The singing in general was more accomplished than the accompaniment from the student orchestra. It could be argued that it goes with the territory, for the technique of the instruments is more complex than the simple God-given instrument of the voice. Technically the sound of the orchestra was clean and neat. It seemed to me, though, as if the young musicians had been taught how to play their instruments well, but not how to play well together. At least, not yet.

The production was overseen by Kotaro Sato, whose podium experience includes the conducting of well over a score of operas. A former clarinetist, Sato is himself a product of the conducting department at Geidai, where he has only recently joined the faculty. He guided the music with a genial hand, encouraging the students to overcome initial tensions and relax into the performance as it proceeded. As they did so, the six soloists became more visible in their movements and the interaction of their characters, and the concert presentation became more of a stage.

Now that Geidai has a truly professional-quality hall for public presentations, it seems to have become a more exciting and professional school of music. The Sogakudo holds promise of more good things to come. Indeed, the published calendar is packed with performances small and large throughout the year. It is worth remembering. Pick up a copy of the Sogakudo calendar when next you stroll through Ueno Park, and have a look at the new hall.

Better yet, have a listen. You never know when you might be hearing a future Pavarotti.