The Cantores Minores Made an Exciting Return Trip to Japan on November 18-30, 1997

The Cantores Minores, the Helsinki Cathedral Boys’ Choir, started the celebrations of the choir’s 45th Anniversary by making a concert trip to Japan in late November. The choir’s first visit to the Far East in February 1995 had been a success on all counts and had led to the foundation of the CM Fan Club Japan which already then began to make plans for the new tour that recently took place after almost three years’ preparation. The expectations were high both on our side and in Japan. Having the experiences of the first trip still fresh in our minds, we knew we were going to be recieved in an overwhelmingly warm manner that seems to be so natural for the Japanese.

The President of the Republic of Finland, Mr. Martti Ahtisaari, together with his wife Mrs. Eeva Ahtisaari, is acting as a permanent patron for the activities of the Cantores Minores Choir and he had offered his support for the Japan tour as well. The messages we received from Japan prior to our departure were clear signs of that incredible thoroughness and admirable diligence that our Japanese friends were showing while planning the tour. Down to the tiniest detail everything was in order. What was a surprise to us, was the contribution of high-level authorities of an entire city, Inzai. The mayor and the board of education of this city played an essential role in making our trip successful.

The last concert of the tour was held at Yachiyo Citizen's Hall on Nov. 29, 1997.

I do not believe any of the 71 participating boys felt disappointed with what they experienced in 12 days. Having participated in the first tour in 1995, about one third of the group was already familiar with Japan and the Tokyo area , but also they got surprised for several reasons. When it comes to the courtesy and friendliness of the Japanese, we assumed to be prepared for that at least to some extent, but the interest and attention - sometimes even frenzy - showed towards us by the local people everywhere no matter where we went to, was absolutely amazing. It was not just ordinary politeness, but sincere interest in Finland and in everything we represented.

From the moment we stepped out of the Finnair plane and saw the TV cameraman that had come to the airport just to shoot our arrival we felt we were real guests of honors. On the arrival day the boys had fun watching themselves on TV; three boys had even been invited to the studio to be interviewed in a live broadcast. By that time we all began to feel quite exhausted due to seven hours’ time difference and the jetlag caused by the long 10-hour flight. Some were not too disturbed by the jetlag, the others were indeed - a couple of our boys even called me in the first evening to find out whether it was morning or evening at the time!

The tour schedule was packed with concerts, although we had one free day which the host families had hoped to be able to spend together with their choir guests. Since we didn’t get much financial support for the trip, we had no resources for making an extensive concert tour in the country known for its high prices. Accordingly, all the places we performed in were situated near Tokyo, especially in the region of Inzai some 50 kilometers from the capital.

CM boys acquainting themselves with Japanese traditions at a local temple.

The educational authorities under the direction of mayor Sakae Ebihara had done a great job searching us 40 lovely host families that didn’t take us to their homes just for one or two nights, but offered us a safe place to stay for over a WEEK. And we were told that they hadn’t faced any difficulties whatsoever finding the needed number of families to take care of us — on the contrary there had been too many volunteers!

Every single boy must have brought lots of unforgettable memories to Finland along with the many gifts we got from our hosts. The ritual of giving presents to one another is extremely important in Japan, a thing that can be noticed there everywhere. We felt our souvenirs from Finland were quite humble in comparison with the generosity shown by the Japanese — we actually received so many gifts that it was hard to make them go into the suitcase! The host families bought us souvenirs, drove us everywhere we wanted to go in our free time, washed our laundry, took us to fancy restaurants and spent a wonderful free day with us.

I had the pleasure to stay with the Shibata family that had been my host family three years earlier, too. They took us me and my friend to a sightseeing in the huge Tokyo on our free day, helped us finding good places for shopping etc. The local price level still surprised us and it wasn’t that easy to find something worth buying... The initial shock was great when we tried to shop at Tokyo’s famous Ginza district - you really couldn’t find anything to buy unless you were ready to pay at least $200!

The astronomical prices were not the only stunning thing in Tokyo. All the streets were literally filled with crowds of people and the city seemed to have no beginning nor end. In one word, it was astonishing in its immensity! Of course, in light of figures that’s all one can expect since there are about 25 million people living in the Tokyo Metropolitan area. As we were from Europe, it was surprising to see how few Western people one could see there in the middle of the crowd. In fact, not having black hair we were the center of attention! We got used to having language problems, for the local people usually don’t speak anything but Japanese. The smallest of our boys had their share of problems, but fortunately the host families had a good network; one host mother, for example, received instructions by phone how to wake up sleeping choirboys in English when it was time for them to get up!

Singing Mozart's Requiem in Tokyo.

Our busy tour schedule included five big concerts, a couple of school concerts, a few performances at local old people’s homes and courtesy visits to the mayors of Inzai and Yachiyo City. Already on the first tour day we sang both at the Finnish Embassy and in a live broadcast of the Tokyo Metropolitan TV. In the same evening we had a long rehearsal of Mozart’s Requiem in a Tokyo concert hall called Katsushika Symphony Hills. It was a real stroke of fortune that we finally were able to fulfill our dream of performing a major piece in Japan. The leaders of the CM Fan Club used their connections and were lucky enough to find a sponsor for the concert. The accompanying orchestra consisted of former members of the NHK’s (Japanese Broadcasting Company) famous symphony orchestra and the soloists were Chieko Okabe-Silvasti, Yoshiko Suzuki, Jorma Silvasti and former Cantores Minores boy Jyrki Korhonen who is currently building a career as an opera singer in Germany. The performance of the requiem proved successful as it took place on Friday, November 21. Thanks to the sponsor we had the opportunity to spend the following night at a hotel in Tokyo.

We were pleased to have lots of listeners both in our other main concerts at Abiko City Hall, Sakae’s Fureai Plaza, Inzai Culture Hall and Yachiyo Citizen’s Hall and in our school concerts where we had the pleasure to greet all pupils (ca. 1500) of the Kikari and Inzai Junior High Schools with our music. Every single boy and girl seemed to listen to our performance with great attentiveness and enthusiasm even though we must have sounded quite exotic from their point of view. We received thunderous applause in all places.

The Finnish part of our tour repertoire consisted of pieces by Sibelius, Maasalo, Kuusisto, Kaipainen, Klemetti and Rautavaara, besides there were a few old songs from the Piae Cantiones collection that dates back to the 16th century. We started the major concerts with J.S. Bach’s motet “Fürchte dich nicht, ich bin bei dir“. Heinrich Schütz’s motet “Das ist je gewisslich wahr“ was also frequently performed during the tour. We couldn’t tell whether our Japanese audience really understood our music, but people’s respect for us seemed to have no limits.

We had, of course, a few Japanese songs in our repertoire, too, and I believe that could have been the crucial thing that helped us conquer the hearts of our hosts and the local audience. Our new ensembles CM Quartet and CM Vocal Group performed successfully in the concerts winning much recognition especially with their Japanese folk song medleys arranged by Markku Viitasaari and Jukka Niemi. Most of our concerts were, in fact, joint concerts with the local skillful youth choirs such as the Kotori Junior Chorus and the Yachiyo Boys’ and Girls’ Choir. What a great opportunity we had to convince ourselves of the fact that Japan is indeed a land of choirs at least as much as Finland does! The host choirs had also taken the trouble to learn “the Finlandia Hymn“ in Finnish by heart for our joint performance. Each concert was followed by a joyful party given by the local choirs.. Lots of festive speeches, excellent food, exchanging presents... A typical picture of our Japan tour!

The CM boys also brought joy to the elderly by visiting old people's homes.

The enthusiasm we aroused was at its peak at local schools: from the moment we stepped in a total chaos prevailed! All girls appeared more or less hysterical just after taking a glance at us and everybody wanted to get our signatures. The junior high schools were very well prepared for our visits and had even planned schedules about what we should do and when; at the Inzai Junior High the day was spent learning the ABC of calligraphy and playing Japanese drums, volleyball and cards. Our hosts had even divided us into playing groups on the basis of our name list beforehand! A common language was in many cases difficult to find, but that bothered no-one.

At the Kikari Junior High we had lunch with the pupils in classrooms; every class got a group of three CM boys as guests. I believe the experiences were unforgettable for both sides. In complete contrast to the short Japanese, many of our tenors and basses were relatively tall, which was a cause for a lot of laughing... A TV camera crew of the Japanese Broadcasting Company NHK was present at the Kikari Junior High following our “adventures“ - the same evening the Cantores Minores of Helsinki was introduced on the NHK evening news. We were furtunate to have TV people also from Finland with us on the tour - the MTV3 cameraman spent almost 50 hours of film so we have a reason to expect a high-quality documentary to appear on TV screens in Finland next April.

On Friday, November 28, we said goodbye to our hospitable host families and spent the last two nights at an educational institute in the city of Yachiyo. The closing party of the successful tour was accompanied by quite a storm.... The weather really showed us all its sides: first it was cloudy and chilly, the following day it poured, and suddenly - in just a few hours - the sun began to shine from the clear blue sky and the temperature rocketed. It didn’t quite feel like Christmas was coming!

At the time of departure we just didn’t have the words to express our sincere gratitude to our faithful fan club friends for making up a concert tour we never could have dreamt about in advance. The chairwoman of the CM Fan Club, Ms. Fumiko Nishiyama, and other key organizers Ms. Rieko Kondo, Ms. Yoshimi Hori and Ms. Michiyo Iiyoshi literally spent every minute with us and were always there when we needed them. Ms. Chieko Okabe-Silvasti was the person who initially created our connections to Japan. Heartfelt thanks go also to bishop Hashimoto who let us perform in his temple, Narita-san Shinshoji, already for the second time.

We all know the Japanese are friendly, but the organizers of our tour were not just plain friendly; they were true friends of the Cantores Minores, true friends of Finland. The CM Choir and Japan are now linked with strong bonds of friendship, which guarantees this tour will not remain the last. Next year these “little ambassadors“ will head for the American concert halls, but the unforgettable memories of the Japan tour ‘98 will always live in the minds of each and every one of us.

Dec. 15, 1997 Pasi Mustonen