“The Way of the Pianist” Nikkan San Column #1

I am a pianist.

I am a Japanese female professional pianist who likes to think about things.
Like the fact that not so long ago “Japanese pianist” and “female professional” were oxymorons.
Like how my grandparents during World War II could probably not have imagined that their granddaughter would go to the States in her teens, tour throughout the continents of America and Eurasia, and attain a doctoral degree in music from a university in the States.
And I think about the concept of “music as a universal language”; the expectation, and the trust, that the society placed in cultivating a musician in me.

Everything and everybody I encounter becomes a point of reflection when going through this musical life thinking about things. Today, with the advancement of medical technology and sciences, the power of music is being quantified and revealed in various data. For example, Archaeologist Steven Mithen asserted in his book “Singing Neanderthals” that music predated languages. The music helps us induce all kinds of helpful hormone and neurotransmitters. The feeling of togetherness, for example, by singing in a choir helps us produces more oxytocin, commonly known as the “love hormone.”

However, we have always known about the powerful benefits of music from the ancient times, before any of the scientific data became available. Why else would healers and shamans, religions and the military all use music? We now know that music regulates and synchronizes our pulse, breaths, and brainwaves to the music we listen to. As social animals, it gives us comfort and pleasure to synchronize our heartbeats and movements to those around us. I consider music to be a manifestation of our innately human desire to communicate and to empathize with those around us.

Music reminds us that what we share is greater than our differences. We may have different worldviews and opinions, but we share our fate in that we share this planet and our times on it. Music can help tighten a community, and create a better communication and collaboration. And I am a musician, a cosmopolitan and a thinker, on a mission to help bring out the very best in each of us and this world. And fate has provided me this opportunity to share my thoughts on this platform as a columnist to Nikkan San (A daily Japanese newspaper distributed online and throughout the West Coast). I will be sharing my thoughts that come to me through my daily practice, travels, and performances, referring to music history, theory and biomusicology (yes, it’s an established field of studies!)