This Japanese set came along in a very roundabout way…

The Pan-Tones were asked to play at the Denton Folk Fest on a weekend where Robert was unavailable. Around the same time, I had started practicing singing.

Some of the songs I started singing were in Japanese, which reminded me of other songs that were in Japanese. Recently, I had also been wanting to create a set of music that represented my (and other’s) experience growing up as a Japanese American.

As I dug around in my musical memory (and YouTube recommendations), I came up with other songs I remembered listening to in my adolescence. Then, I had the crazy/ambitious idea to arrange it for us three flutists, and me to mostly sing and play keyboard.

We debuted most of our Japanese set at the Denton Arts and Jazz Festival last week with drums and bass, though I originally conceived of the arrangements for the trio.

Here’s the set list for Sunday’s show:

• Sailor Moon theme song
• Totoro theme song
• いつも何度でも (Always with you), from Spirited Away
• 人生のメリーゴーランド (Merry-Go-Round of Life), from Howl’s Moving Castle
• First Love, by Utada Hikaru (Japanese American Jpop singer)
• Endless Story, by Yuna Ito (Japanese American Jpop singer)
• Planetarium, by Ai Otsuka
• Pokémon music from the original Red/Blue game

This is a project that feels very “me,” and personal. It’s music I picked, arranged, and am singing on. Also, the blending of pop and classical music is something that feels very natural to me.

The main two musical styles I grew up with were classical music (from my many years of ballet training), and oldies on the Hawaiian station Oldies 107.9.

Later in high school and in college, I got really into Jpop and Kpop.

But at some point in music school, I started to feel like I “should” listen exclusively to classical music, and that pop was somehow less sophisticated. This is me re-embracing that part of my musical taste!

At the same time as these Pan-Tones shows, I’ve also been playing a small part in Rigoletto at the Dallas Opera, which has been SO cool. Also, what an interesting and wide variety of music I get to perform…

On Sunday, I’ll be playing a church service in the morning (organ), the final show of Rigoletto in the afternoon (piccolo), and the Japanese set with The Pan-Tones (voice, keyboard, flute) in the evening. Phew!