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Anchorage, Alaska, 1991. We drove about two hours away from town, and the majestic Matanuska Glacier, 6.5 km wide and 40 km long, spread out before us. It lay in its grandeur, continuing the pattern of melting and freezing, as it had done for millions of years. Of the many glaciers in Alaska, this is one of the few that tourists can explore on foot. It was the day before our concert at the Anchorage Music Festival, where I was to create calligraphy on a canvas of 3 x 5 meters in the performance of Isao Matsushita's "Hiten" for Piano, Bass, Noh O-Tsuzumi drum and calligrapher. The musicians and I were taking a break to visit the glacier. The huge thick walls of ice whose whitish blue seemed infinitely transparent; the clear, deep crevasse inspiring an awe that bordered on fear; the pure blue lake emerging in the ice, contrasting the blue of the sky above… The scenery did not seem to be of this world. The winds of genesis were blowing here. Shonosuke Okura, with his Noh O-Tsuzumi by his side, called out "O-oh, O-oh" and started to hit the O-Tsuzumi, making it cry, "Ka-n, Ka-n." The sound ran between every opening in the glacier and through the ice walls, and then ran back, echoing in every direction with infinite repercussions, as if to awaken the winds of genesis. All of a sudden, a few minutes after the O-Tsuzumi's sound, a great roar started toward us. There must have been a crack in the ice somewhere. The roaring sound of nature made us feel as if the entire glacier had cracked and was going to take us down with it. In that moment, I could not help but feel a deep sense of wonder. This was an experience in which I felt the winds of genesis, the ancient winds. |
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