[/floatl]Canada.com: A stranger in the strange land
"Charles Dutoit does not look Japanese," Kent Nagano was saying backstage at the Takemitsu Memorial concert hall of Tokyo Opera City...But Nagano, born 56 years ago in California, does look Japanese, which greatly increases the complexity of his relationship with an already complex nation...Could he rehearse in Japanese? Apparently not. In Japan he gives interviews in English, with an interpreter. Between encores at Tokyo Opera City, where the MSO gave the last of six concerts in Japan on Wednesday, Nagano said only "domo arrigato" to the audience, words known to almost any tourist in Tokyo. Yet the little-known fact is that Nagano can, after a fashion, speak Japanese...But he fears that his Japanese is not only infantile but antiquated. His grandparents on both sides immigrated to the United States around 1895...Just how he is perceived in Japan is hard to gauge. Possibly the Japanese themselves are undecided. But it is significant that the posters promoting the MSO tour represented his name as "Kento Nagano," with the surname spelled out, rather than with the symbol for the Nagano family name. The implication: This fellow is not Japanese. "Tokyo is a great city and I look forward to every visit," Nagano said. "But I'm still a foreigner"...more...
