Japan's Cherries Tamae 20-Piece Band comes to Cork

The Lord Mayor of Cork Cllr. Deirdre Clune photographed with the Japanese Ambassador Mr. Keiichi Hayashi, Mr. Takeda, Patron; Band Conductor and School Principal and band members.

Cork Children's Chorus Cultural Exchange Programme 2005 / 2006

A cultural, artistic and social exchange programme is currently being co-developed by Cork Opera Works and EU-Japan Fest for Cork Children's Chorus and Japan's children's jazz orchestra, Little Cherries Tamae.

Little Cherries Tamae were invited to Cork by the Cork Children's Chorus for the week beginning Monday, 28 November 2005. While in Ireland, Little Cherries Tamae experienced Irish culture firsthand when they attended school, rehearse, socialise, and perform with the children of Cork Children's Chorus as part of the closing series of events for Cork 2005: European Capital of Culture.

The Cork Children's Chorus will travel to Kagoshima in the south of Japan in July 2006. While in Japan, the members of the chorus will experience Japanese culture firsthand when they, in turn, attend school, rehearse, socialise, and perform with Little Cherries Tamae in the Third International Music Festival For Youth as part of EU-Japan Friendship Week.

Cork Children's Chorus

Cork Children's Chorus continues to go from strength to strength. In this year of culture they have represented their city with their performance of Red Sun in the Civic Ceremony which launched Cork as European Capital of Culture 2005. They have performed Schubert's Mass in G as part of the Easter liturgy at the Honan Chapel, University College Cork. They have appeared in Madame T for Meridian Theatre Company at The Everyman Palace Theatre and have stolen the stage in the opera Hansel and Gretel for Cork Opera Works and Cork Opera House in a co-production which celebrated 150 years of Cork Opera House.

Over the past few months the children have shared their stories of the sea with International Film Composer, C.S.L. Parker as part of Cork City Council's Criteria Artist-in-Residence Programme, supported by the Arts Council of Ireland. In return, C.S.L. Parker has created waltzes, inspired by their maritime tales, for the children to perform. Ships and Waltzes by C.S.L. Parker in collaboration with Cork Children's Chorus was recorded and received its premiere performance in November 2005 in Millennium Hall, City Hall, Cork.

Cork Children's Chorus is a chorus of more than 100 children aged between 10 and 17 years from Cork city and county. These children have been selected from a specially devised workshop-audition process and together represent a broad cross section of musical, social and cultural backgrounds.

Cork Children's Chorus offers its members some fifty rehearsals during the academic year together with midterm art, music and drama workshops, concert and stage performances, and social events. Not unlike a cultural youth club, Cork Children's Chorus marries artistic excellence, music education, social and cultural exchange with sheer good fun!

Cork Children's Chorus is a project which promotes an equality of access to artistic opportunities among communities. Cork Children's Chorus is a non-profit-making education outreach programme, developed by Cork Opera Works and supported by Cork City Council, RAPID, Cork 2005: European Capital of Culture, Arts Council of Ireland, Culture Ireland, and EU-Japan Fest.

For more information, contact Sonya Keogh at Cork Opera Works Tel: +353 (0)21 4321785 or visit our websites www.corkchildrenschorus.com and www.corkoperaworks.com

Little Cherries Tamae 20-Piece Band, Conductor: Takashi Onishi

Little Cherries Tamae 20-Piece Band performing in City Hall, Cork.

Made up entirely of elementary schoolchildren, Little Cherries would be an unusual big band anywhere in Japan. Originally formed in 1984 at Nejime-machi Kamiyama Elementary School, the baton has been successively inherited by Kametsu Elementary School in Tokunoshima and Murasakibaru Elementary School in the city of Kagoshima over the course of twenty years.

Meanwhile Little Cherries have been performing more than thirty concerts a year, not only at school and local areas, but in contests and events also. Their performances abroad at the International Children's Music Festival in Germany and twice at the Glenn Miller Festival in the United States have won them plaudits. Indeed, they were celebrated as the "world's 8th mystery" in the United States.

They travelled to Cork in late November 2005 where they partook in a cultural, artistic and social exchange with the children of the Cork Children's Chorus. This programme is being co-developed by Cork Opera Works, Ireland and EU-Japan Fest, Japan and is supported by Cork 2005: European Capital of Culture.

For more information visit: http://www.eu-japanfest.org/english/program/12/japan/kago_jazz.html

Cork Opera Works

Cork Opera Works is an opera company for Cork founded in January 2004 by Cork School of Music graduates Allin Gray, Sonya Keogh and John O'Brien.

Cork Opera Works aims to create a sustainable programme of opera in the Cork region by developing the resources necessary for the production of opera, and producing works which are relevant and feasible within our geographical and cultural context.

Cork Opera Works have thus far developed the Cork Children's Chorus, Cork Opera Works String Orchestra, The Works Chorus, and have absorbed and developed the chamber choir Seraphim. These ensembles pursue their own individual rehearsal and performance programmes, and are available for operatic productions.

Cork Opera Works is committed to the production of contemporary Irish artworks and has to date partaken in the premieres of works by C.S.L. Parker and Angel Climent, in addition to the premiere performance by the Cork Children's Chorus of the commissioned work for the Civic Launch of Cork 2005: European Capital of Culture Red Sun.

Productions in 2005 include the first staged production of Judith and Holofernes by John Gibson in St Fin Barre¹s Cathedral as part of the official calendar of events for Cork 2005: European Capital of Culture, Madame T at The Everyman Palace Theatre in collaboration with Meridian Theatre Company, again, as part of the official calendar of events for Cork 2005: European Capital of Culture, and the opera Hansel and Gretel at Cork Opera House in co-production with Cork Opera House in celebration of 150 years of Cork Opera House.

Cork Children's Chorus is, for Cork Opera Works, far more than an outreach programme. It is an integrated part of the company's production resources and a training ground for future performers in the genre.

Further information can be found at http://www.corkoperaworks.com.

EU-Japan Fest

EU-Japan Fest, a collaborative project of Japan and Europe, was launched in 1993 when the trade friction between Japan and Europe was becoming a serious political issue. Since then, EU-Japan Fest has held numerous events, in co-operation with the Cultural Capital of Europe and various art and cultural organisations of Japan and Europe.

EU-Japan Fest supports transnational creative activities in culture and the arts on a 'people to people' and 'region to region' basis. Programs are carried out jointly by Japanese and European persons or organisations that comply with the Fundamental Activities Policy of the EU-Japan Fest Japan Committee, in that they;

• support activities both to promote and to develop traditional culture.
• are sensitive to the talent and distinctiveness of youth, and provide the necessary support.
• acknowledge and support the standpoint of art forms whose worth remains unsettled.
• support creative activities in culture, the arts and the mind with attention to both the benefits and the drawbacks of globalisation.
• support the construction of international networks by and joint efforts of people on the scene in culture and the arts.
  

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