{"id":13912,"date":"2010-10-08T13:21:45","date_gmt":"2010-10-08T17:21:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/?p=13912"},"modified":"2010-10-08T13:21:45","modified_gmt":"2010-10-08T17:21:45","slug":"interview-with-satoshi-okamoto-of-the-new-york-philharmonic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/2010\/10\/08\/interview-with-satoshi-okamoto-of-the-new-york-philharmonic\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Satoshi Okamoto of the New York Philharmonic"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photo: Chris Lee<\/p><\/div>\n

\u00a0By JQ <\/em>magazine<\/strong><\/a>\u2019s\u00a0<\/em>Justin Tedaldi<\/strong><\/a> <\/strong>(CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02)\u00a0for Examiner.com.\u00a0Visit his NY Japanese Culture\u00a0page<\/em> here<\/a><\/strong> to subscribe for free alerts\u00a0on newly published stories.<\/em><\/p>\n

Japanese native Satoshi Okamoto is a double bass player for the New York Philharmonic, a position he has held there since 2003. Prior to that, he was a member of New York City Ballet Orchestra for one year and an assistant principal of the San Antonio Symphony for eight years. Last September, he performed at the New York Philharmonic\u2019s Opening Gala Celebration for its169th season with Music Director Alan Gilbert and Wynton Marsalis\u2019s Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra for the U.S. premiere of the latter\u2019s Swing Symphony<\/em>. I caught up with Okamoto following the performance to learn more about what it\u2019s like to play with an esteemed ensemble.<\/p>\n

What were your impressions of this year’s Opening Gala, and what was your favorite thing about it?<\/strong>
\nI thought it was very successful. The orchestra played very solidly. It was quite a high quality performance. Mr. Marsalis’s music was really nice, too. I always wish for more contemporary composers to use existing rhythm patterns to write music, like the Baroque era. In his piece, there were a lot of those: Charleston, Kanasas City swing, New Orleans parade marches, bebop, and so on. The orchestra was nicely woven into a jazz style music. If I can wish more, it would be nicer and more creative if there are more classical elements in the piece, because it’s a little like big band music played by an orchestra.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s it like working with musical director Alan Gilbert and Wynton Marsalis?<\/strong>
\nI know Alan from my school days in Juilliard. He was conducting the pre-college symphony where I was a ringer (helper). I always have a great time playing under his baton. For me, it comes very natural to synchronize with his music, I would say, more than any other conductor. I don\u2019t really know Mr. Marsalis.<\/p>\n

As a musician, what\u2019s the difference between working with an orchestra in Japan compared with New York?<\/strong>
\nI have never been a regular member of Japanese orchestras, so maybe it\u2019s not totally fair for me to make a comparison. But I think New York has more of an advantage to attract great musicians worldwide. Like the NBA or MLB, you often have to reach outside of your country to grab the best players. Even though Japanese orchestras are becoming international, it\u2019s still harder for them to get the first class players from overseas compared to the New York Philharmonic, which is in a great position to attract the best players around the world. As a result, I\u2019m surrounded by truly amazing musicians and you can\u2019t have this kind of experience except only a few places in the world. I am enjoying it and really appreciate it.<\/p>\n

Read the rest of the interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0By JQ magazine\u2019s\u00a0Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02)\u00a0for Examiner.com.\u00a0Visit his NY Japanese Culture\u00a0page here to subscribe for free alerts\u00a0on newly published stories. Japanese native Satoshi Okamoto is a double bass player for the New York Philharmonic, a position he has held there since 2003. Prior to that, he was a member of New York City Ballet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,25,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articlejournalism","category-interviewprofile","category-music"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pkZ7m-3Co","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13912"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13915,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13912\/revisions\/13915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}