The classical music community in the Western world is a strong and tight-knit one, but, especially in the United States, it’s one that is definitely off of the beaten path. Most of our top music schools, with a few brand-name exceptions, don’t cause someone outside the community to bat an eye when they hear the name. Often students of top-tier music schools are left explaining that their school is something like the Harvard of the music world or not explaining at all. Music school is decidedly not a mainstay of American culture, and its denizens often feel like they lead double lives: normal people on the street by day, musician by night. At least we don’t have to run to a phone booth to change like Clark Kent. Once a musician leaves the music school environment, the community is even more isolated from the mainstream–almost a satellite world. After finishing my Master’s at Northwestern, I’ve been keeping largely to myself rather than participating in the music school scene, which has its benefits. Last night I was at Northwestern for one of the many late-night audition boot-camp classes that my teacher holds, and I was struck by a sudden realization of how lucky I am to play the cello and how wonderful it is to be around music.
When much of your day is spent by yourself practicing, it’s easy to forget that a whole beautiful world of music exists outside of yourself. I was forcefully reminded that classical music is not meant to exist in a vacuum. Western culture often pushes it to the side and makes it a footnote rather than a full chapter in the encyclopedia that is popular culture. As such, classical music in all of its beauty and poignancy is often lost on the public at large. Apart from Disney’s “Fantasia” and a few other pop-culture hits (think “Looney Tunes” and its opera spoofs), classical music really doesn’t inhabit the public consciousness.
This is not necessarily the case in many other countries. European culture is much more centered around classical music, largely as a result of the long-reaching lineage of composers and performers that links modern Germans, for example, directly with the music of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms. Asian cultures, too, seem to bring classical music and its art to the forefront. Japanese culture in particular has done much to move the art of classical music into the public aesthetic. It is now home to not only several high level summer festivals, but to an international version of the New World Symphony, the Hyogo Performing Arts Center Orchestra. In Japan, classical music has also found a voice and advocate in the nation’s wildly popular manga and anime culture.
My teacher Hans Jensen brought several videos to my attention as beautiful examples of classical music at the forefront of Eastern pop culture. After doing a bit more reading, I’ve discovered that the videos are part of a Japanese phenomenon called “Nodame Cantabile,” which began as a serialized manga by Tomoko Ninamiya in 2001. The series depicts the relationship between two aspiring classical musicians, Megumi “Nodame” Noda and Shinichi Chiaki, as university students and after graduation.The series has been adapted as two different television series: as an award-winning live-action drama that aired in 2006 followed by a sequel television special that aired in January 2008, and as an anime series spanning three seasons with the first one broadcast in 2007, the second one in 2008 and the third one aired in 2010. Two live-action movie sequels to the television drama, with the same actors, were produced with release dates of 18 December 2009 and April 2010. In addition, several soundtrack albums of classical music have been released, as well as three video games.
The main character, Megumi Noda, or “Nodame” is a piano student at Momogaoka College of Music. An extremely talented pianist who wants to be a preschool teacher, she prefers playing by ear rather than reading the music score. She is messy and disorganized and a bit rough around the edges. Shinichi Chiaki is Momogaoka’s top student. Born into a musical family, he aspires to be a conductor. Despite a boyhood spent in Prague, he is trapped in Japan because of his childhood phobia of airplanes and the ocean. They meet by accident and a winding love story of sorts ensues. Opportunities open up as both begin taking risks, stretching themselves far more than they ever thought possible. Chiaki helps Nodame face her fears and enter a piano competition; Nodame helps Chiaki gain the opportunity to lead an orchestra.
Nodame Cantabile was also adapted an anime TV series, produced by Japan’s Fuji TV. These videos, from that anime series, are remarkable in so many ways. For musicians everywhere, the scenes in these videos are familiar as our everyday lives, and it’s surprisingly moving to our stories played out for everyone to see. Above all, though, they are beautiful, inspiring pieces of visual and musical art that deserve the chance to speak for themselves.
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