The artist catalogue for the Regional Creation Support Programme is updated once every few years. For me, the process is also an opportunity to reflect on the direction I would like to pursue as a performer.Over the past few years, I have been fortunate to have opportunities to perform works for harmonica and orchestra. I used to feel overwhelmed by orchestral music. Perhaps this was only natural, but there were so many sounds that I did not know which ones to listen to, and I felt almost dizzy trying to take them all in.

Because of this, I was more drawn to chamber music and unaccompanied works—music in which I could clearly follow individual lines of sound. Bach’s solo works, of course, as well as the intimate piano sounds of Mompou, and Tallis.

In much the same way, at that time I would sometimes draw during breaks from practising, but I always worked in pencil and never added colour. I think I felt uneasy about defining something by choosing and applying colour to the drawing.

As time has passed, I have realised that, somewhere along the way, I have come to enjoy orchestral music. I rarely find the kind of quiet, focused time that feels right for drawing, but last year, when I drew some autumn leaves that were exceptionally beautiful, I found myself nervously adding colour to them.

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Not long after the New Year began in 2026, something quite unexpected happened.At Christmas, which we celebrated in December, I opened an envelope containing a present from Santa. Inside was some money, along with a message saying, “Please use this for music lessons.”

Once the Christmas holidays had come and gone, and everyday life had returned around the middle of January—somehow feeling a little less colourful than it had during the holidays—I started thinking about what kind of lessons I might take.

 

After giving it some thought, I realised that although I had been singing in a church choir since I was a child, I had always wanted to learn properly how to use my voice. So I asked one of my fellow singers for the contact details of a singing teacher.

 

As I was looking around on the internet, using keywords along the lines of “singing, voice, learning”, the name Voice Study Centre came up in the search results. It turned out to be an organisation that conducts research not only into vocal techniques for singers, but also into areas such as speech and language therapy, acting, broadcasting and other fields related to the voice. I came across information about its Master’s programme in Voice Pedagogy, accredited by the University of Essex.

Why would a harmonica player like me need to study voice pedagogy?
To me, it actually feels quite natural, although it is not easy to explain why.

But with only two weeks until the application deadline, I somehow managed to complete the application, went through an interview, and my life as a student will begin in March. The entire course is online, allowing me to continue my performing career and all my other activities alongside my studies.

Things have ended up becoming considerably bigger in scale than the “music lessons” Santa had in mind. I imagine Santa may be watching the whole thing unfold with some nervous curiosity!

Update 20th July: Our event highlight video is up on YouTube.

It vividly brings back the atmosphere of the day.

Since the performance was planned last autumn and finally took place this spring, the season has changed to summer.

While we were working on the project, the town of Suzu continued to recover day by day. We recently heard that a summer festival was held there.

It was a wonderful opportunity to learn about the area, and we hope to continue supporting the recovery of Suzu in our own small way, whether it be next year, five years from now, or ten years from now.

We would like to once again express our sincere gratitude to everyone who contributed to this project.

We hope to produce another project in the future.

If you would like to view the video documenting the entire project, please contact us.

Update 10th June: It has been nearly three months since the performance, but we have finally completed the process of sending the donations we received for Suzu.

As we wanted to ensure that the donations would directly support the people of Suzu, we decided to use the disaster recovery account established by the Suzu City Office, which allows donations to be made from overseas.

Although the actual transfer process was unexpectedly complicated and time-consuming, we were able to donate a total of 21,3741 yen (£1,151).

Receiving the receipt from the Suzu City Office was a particularly joyful moment, sharing the news with Midori.

March 16: Thanks to everyone’s support, we were able to successfully give our performance.

Despite various challenges leading up to the day, many people attended, and it was particularly memorable that everyone commented on the warm atmosphere of the concert.

The event featured a concert, an introduction of Suzu, and a lunch including Japanese cuisine, making for a packed schedule.

Japanese residents in the UK joined as the MndeMaiSuzu team, actively participating in the luncheon and various other activities on the day, and local British volunteers also contributed to the preparations.

The live stream of the concert was made possible thanks to the kindness of St. Mary’s Church, where the streaming team worked hard to share the music with Amasham, Suzu, and people across Japan, expressing our desire to support Suzu through music.

Thank you. During lunch, we connected with Mr. Mizukami in Suzu and had an online exchange with everyone in the UK.

After lunch, we danced to the Suzu salt-making song “Suna-tori-bushi” with everyone in the UK, and two violinists, friends of Midori, joined us for “Furusato.”

We sang “Danny Boy” together with everyone in the venue, sending our heartfelt thoughts to Suzu.


We will report the details again at a later date.

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