Mail Magazine vol.06
8 May,2012
Hello, this is Kumiko. How are you doing?
From time to time in your life, you encounter incidents which you have never imagined.
Some of them are lovely beyond description, while others are discouraging as if they were a sort of penalty by God.
No matter how good or bad they are, the most important thing is to accept them without judging. Once you accept them “straightly”, carry out what you have to do “calmly”. In the meantime, you’ll notice that you have advanced to the upper stage of consciousness .
Then you’ll find the new and more sensitive landscape unfolding before you.
The experience keeps you growing up until the ultimate moment of your life.
■Kumiko’s “ In Search of the Transparent Sound” vol.6
On Friday evening, I used to look forward to participating in the workshop at Prof. Sasaki’s house. So for their convenience, the participants made it a rule to take his lesson by 5 o’clock in the evening. After having finished private lessons, we went downtown Takadanobaba for dinner and came back to the teacher’s house by 7 p.m. At the thought of how the workshop would be, I got excited and talked about it with other participants. Breaking our conversation, the door of the lesson room clacked, announcing the start of the workshop.
As I graduated from a junior high-school and a high-school run by a Christian organization, singing hymns brought me back old memories. However, the sound of the hymns sung by tuning thoroughly to others’ sounds(voices) was totally different from that of my school days.
First of all, we pay attention not to utter false sound. Then we begin to sing carefully, confirming whether our voiceｓ fit others’ voices. As we sing, we try to tune our sound more perfectly to others sound to such an extent that we feel excessive.
When our sounds become perfectly tuned to others’ sounds, the whole sound build up just like it has a life! It is a sound of happiness while an ordinary quartet sounds separately, unrelated to each other.
I was excited with the process that the whole sound space became more and more transparent as I concentrated to listen to others’ voices more and more thoroughly. The “ depth “ of the sound of the hymns changed! That is why I kept on being excited about that process.
Almost a year had passed since the workshop started. One day, Prof. Sasaki said to me,
“From now on, Kumiko, you coach them!”
“What?・・・・me？・・・・・Can I do that?” I was embarrassed and hesitated for a while.
“Yes, sir” I accepted his offer although I was uncertain of my ability to do it.
In a sense, I wanted to try it.
I asked my seniors to help me. My first day as teacher stared like that.
One summer, I accompanied Prof. Sasaki to Yamagata prefecture to join in a camp for practice which a chorus group composed of old boys of a boys’ high-school in Yamagata organized.
The camp site was the tourist home named “Bokunouchi( my house)”which is run by a member of the chorus group. I remember that the number of the participants of the camp were almost 30 to 40.
They practiced in a very big room which was made of 3 small rooms by removing fusumas. I was excited with the powerful male voice.
At the last day of the camp, all the members of the men’s chorus happened to be in the dining room. Someone started singing in a small voice and others joined him spontaneously one by one. Gradually, the sound became dynamic.
Prof.Sasaki, who had been listening to their chorus, moved his hand all of a sudden, and began conducting. No sooner had his hands jerked in the flow of the sound than the sound expanded powerfully as if his hands breathed a new life into it. I was excited with the change!
With the great conductor, the tune showed unexpectedly its powerful and fantastic face. When it finished, Prof.Sasaki looked at me and smiled simply.
“Like that, Kumiko” he said so joyfully. I remember his smile as if it was just yesterday.
What he did was to breathe a new life into the sound in a matter of seconds and as a consequence the sound space became deeper and more alive. I became more and more absorbed in < the function of consciousness as energy> which breathe a new life into the sound.
The steady accumulation of the sound experiences in this period made the chorus a cappella, “Song of the Wind”, come into being. It has grown up through a lot of findings and notices.
The “future” is time and space where nothing is fixed yet. It’s our consciousness of every moment which fixes it. When I want to draw a desirable future, the law which I have acquired through the sound experiences is very simple and practical.
I want to live out my life just like the way Prof.Sasaki breathed a new life into the chorus in a matter of seconds.
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