Gagaku Music Performed at the Woodford Folk Festival

From 27th December to 1st January every year, the Woodford Folk Festival, one of the biggest music festivals in Australia, is held in a suburb of the rural town of Woodford which is located about 70 km north of Brisbane. World famous artists and local musicians participate in the festival together with poets, theatre show artists and academians, holding live performances, literature forums, comedy shows, workshops, symposiums, etc. This time, responding to the initial approach from Mr. Yomei Nakajima, a Shakuhachi player living in Brisbane, some volunteer followers in our region performed the Gagaku music at the festival this time.

The Gagaku performance was conducted from 8:00 p.m. on 29th December at the “Folk Lorica” where folk music and dance performances all over the world are shown. This performance was led by Mr. Yukihiro Doi, a doctoral student who is researching Aboriginal music at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra, having been sent from Tenri University Oyasato Research Institute. Mr. Doi first introduced the history of the Gagaku music as well as the activities of the Tenri Uniersity Gagaku Music Society in the world using a Power Point presentation, and then performed “Etenraku”, a very famous piece of Gagaku music, together with four other members including Ms. Cornelia Dragusin, a doctoral student who is researching Tenrikyo music at the ANU, Mr. Yomei Nakajima and two staff members from the Oceania Centre, which attracted the audiences very much.