A Festival of Japan’s Culture Proceeds
By DANIEL J. WAKIN
Published: March 13, 2011

When Carnegie Hall announced Japan as the focus of this season’s big festival, it did not seem a particularly pathbreaking subject. Now it seems prescient.

As Japan struggles with a woeful trail of disaster, Carnegie is about to plunge into a 40-event exploration of that country’s culture — its music, films, visual arts, design and drama — in the second installment of its citywide festival JapanNYC. The hall’s programmers and managers face challenges on two fronts: the practical problem of bringing in performers from a devastated country and the more nebulous issue of how to recast what was planned as a cultural celebration in a time of tragedy.

As of Sunday no performers had withdrawn, and all but one event was scheduled to go forward. The only event struck from the agenda was a panel discussion, “Innovating and Profiting in Contemporary Japan,” with the Bloomberg company as co-sponsor, scheduled for the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie on Monday.

Festival organizers felt that “to talk about money” on the first day of the festival after the earthquake and tsunami was inappropriate, Clive Gillinson, Carnegie’s executive and artistic director, said in an interview on Saturday. “All of us felt, as a topic, that wasn’t what you’d want to be talking about right now,” he said.

Otherwise, all the performances and events were going forward. Despite serious travel disruptions, Tokyo’s two main airports, Narita and Haneda, were open on Sunday. In some cases groups were already on tour in North America, like the Kodo drummers, scheduled to appear at Avery Fisher Hall on Sunday. Other performers, like the violinist Midori, scheduled to appear at Carnegie on March 23, live in the United States. Carnegie received a message from the NHK Symphony Orchestra of Tokyo that it had already left; it is scheduled to play next Monday at Carnegie, conducted by André Previn.

“The show goes on,” Mr. Gillinson said. “One thing in music and all the performing arts, nobody ever feels they won’t find a solution. Everybody makes things happen.”

Many of the offerings include concerts of Japanese compositions or visual displays, like Isamu Noguchi’s set designs for a program by the Martha Graham Dance Company. That many of the events involve Japanese performers already living in the United States or on extensive North American tours demonstrates how integrated Japanese culture is with the arts in America.

On the matter of how to cast the festival now, Mr. Gillinson said that paying tribute to a stricken Japan “couldn’t be more appropriate” and that the festival “enables everybody to show their warmth and sympathy for Japan.”

“If you think of every place where there’s wars going on, where there are terrible times, where people are suffering,” he added, “they always look to music and culture. These are the things they look to for solace.”

That applies to Japanese people in the United States as well, he said. “It will be really important to see their country paid tribute to in this way.”

JapanNYC is the latest Carnegie effort dedicated to a major theme. Past festivals have focused on China, Berlin and African-American music. The first part of JapanNYC took place in December. Its artistic director is the conductor Seiji Ozawa, who missed some of his appearances in December because of health problems, causing initial disruption at the festival, and he will miss more in April.

On Friday Mr. Gillinson awoke to news of the earthquake. He said he immediately tried to call Mr. Ozawa and his many contacts in Japan, to no avail because of disrupted communication systems. Carnegie then sent out more than 100 e-mails to contacts in Japan: executives of corporations that are helping to pay for the events, performers, government officials and concert presenters. Mr. Gillinson said he also asked for advice from the United States Embassy in Japan and the Japanese Consulate in New York, as well as from Mr. Ozawa, “on any way to help use the festival to do something really meaningful for people in Japan and Japanese people here.” He said Carnegie was investigating a way to steer charitable donations.

By Friday afternoon Carnegie had put a statement on the festival Web page from Mr. Gillinson offering thoughts and prayers and portraying the festival events as a “tribute to Japan and its people.”

Carnegie’s strategy in mounting festivals is to join forces with institutions around the city that present related events and place them under the festival umbrella. One partner in JapanNYC, Japan Society, is helping to present performances by the Kashu-Juku Noh Theater as well as art and calligraphy shows.

The society’s president, Motoatsu Sakurai, said the shows and performances would go forward. “All the tickets are already sold,” he said. “Our major mission is to promote the essential culture. That mission, of course, does not change because of the earthquake. Rather it is very important for us to continue these performances as business as usual.”

He spoke in a telephone interview on Saturday, and before hanging up, added an optimistic note. “Japanese people are very resilient people,” he said. “They are low-key but very, very strong people. I think they will rebound very soon.”