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MUSICAL THEATER AMBASSADORS IN JAPAN
With the financial assistance of Arts International (funded in part through the NEA), this Saturday, October 6, Tony Award-winning composer Jason Robert Brown ("Parade"), TRIBECA composer-in-residence and music director Georgia Stitt ("Watertown") and singers Keith Byron Kirk and Sally Wilfert will open the First Annual Tono American Music Festival in Iwate Prefecture in northern Japan. The concert will take place in the Aeria-Tono Chu Concert Hall at 6:00pm. Proceeds from their concert as well as the four other festival concerts will go to relief efforts in New York.
Tono, a very small town in mountainous northeastern Japan, is rolling out the red carpet for these musical ambassadors. Media from throughout the region will descend on the opening concert, the first stitches on a quilt for the New York Fire Department will be sewn, and donations will be accepted for relief efforts.
According to the festival's artistic director Kevin Simmonds, "After the tragedies in America, people in this area began considering the festival, and especially Georgia and Jason's concert, an opportunity to both grieve and celebrate with Americans. This is a place that foreigners rarely visit. So the electricity of this concert, given all of the circumstances, is amazing and unprecedented. The locals simply can't believe that four New Yorkers are willing to come all this way and share their music at a time like this. For Japanese, in the aftermath of a such a tragedy, it's almost unthinkable to return to 'business as usual' so quickly. But to me, it simply show just how strong, determined and resilient Americans, and especially New Yorkers, are."
Other artists include soprano Valerie Johnson, dulcimer virtuoso Stephen Seifert and the gospel group Agape conducted by Melvin Bryant Jr.
You can get more information on the festival at http://www.tonoarts.org.
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