Chorus Concert!

February 19, Tsushima had an island-wide chorus concert. There were about ten groups in all, from all over the island. There were several school groups, including my high school's, and a few adult groups, including Chorus D. (Today it stands for Decrudescence!) I believe we were technically hosting the affair, so we had to help with the grunt work in setting up tables, flyers, programs, etc.

The day's schedule was crazy. The concert began at 2:30, but we wanted to have time for a last-minute rehearsal that morning, and we also needed to do some setting up. So we agreed to meet at 8. On a Sunday. Ugh. What made it worse, though, was that, after a fifteen-minute run-through of our set, and about twenty minutes of setting up the program table and flyers and such, we were done. By 8:45 we had done all the setting up that was needed until 1:30. You can imagine how delighted I was when I figured this out.

We spent the rest of the time chilling out in one of the conference rooms in my town's shopping center. I use the term conference room for lack of a better one. The complex has an auditorium (where the concert was held), and on the third level there are meeting rooms. Most of them are typical classroom fare--white linoleum floors, tables and chairs, maybe a whiteboard and a lectern--but this one was more or less a traditional Japanese home. All the flooring was tatami, the traditional Japanese thatch flooring, and the rooms demonstrated traditional Japanese architecture. I don't say this out of pretending to be an expert on Japanese anything--Nagato, the tour guide bass, told me lots and lots about it. Tatami and traditional Japanese housing almost certainly means sitting on the floor, which almost always means sitting on nothing more than a cushion for however long the group decides to sit there. Since we had a full four hours to kill, I wasn't looking forward to it.

I just can't get used to sitting the way they do around here. The traditional, formal Japanese way of sitting is called seiza, and involves sitting on your shins and feet. While most Japanese are growing more accustomed to western-style seating, they will still sit seiza style during formal events. When sitting on a cushion at a table, it's socially acceptable for Japanese men to switch to sitting Indian style after a few minutes. Women, though, will sit seiza-style or otherwise very very close to seiza-style for the entire meeting/party/event. With all the parties I've been to thus far, ranging from formal principal-is-giving-a-speech-sit-up-straight to just-the-English-teachers-having-fun, I have yet to see anyone pause to stretch their legs out. Short of getting up to go to the bathroom, they'll sit with their legs tucked in, one way or another, for upwards of four hours. I simply cannot do this. I respect them for being able to, and I don't criticize them for any perceived danger of back pain--they've been sitting this way for as long as if not longer than we've been sitting whatever way we sit. That doesn't change the fact that I just flat-out can't do it. Luckily, foreigners aren't expected to adhere to those rules, so I stretch my legs whenever I can get away with it.

Anyway. As each group takes the stage, someone from the group introduces them. Not surprisingly, the group unanimously chose me to give our introduction. One of the guys quickly wrote up something, and I memorized it. I wasn't nervous at all about the speech, which kind of surprised me.

The concert was great. Almost all of the groups before us sang songs in Japanese. One women's group, however, began with Country Roads. It's apparently been translated into Japanese, though, because the only lyrics in English were the phrase "Country Roads" and a quick solo at the beginning. Bless their hearts, their sound was good good, but their English pronunciation was awful. The "r" sound eludes all but the best students around here. That group went on to sing Oh Happy Day, which I only know from Sister Act. They did a great job with it, but I don't think the soloist put enough soul into it.

The high school chorus also sang, and their set included a medley that strung together Summer Nights with In a Rich Man's World. I had never heard the second one before, but apparently it's by Abba, who I've almost never heard of before. Their English pronunciation was adorably bad (the chorus's, not Abba's), but their sound was great.

Our set went just fine. The bass parts weren't very challenging, especially with four of us singing them. We're light on tenors, but our sopranos can wail. All in all, it was great.

We went to a party afterwards, because that's what you do after any special occasion around here. Hanging out and doing karaoke is so much more fun when you're with non-smokers who don't go out with the express purpose of getting blitzed.