It's official: Sonos is in the house!

We had our first concert at the Yashiro Learning Omi Core on Friday night. The concert hall is part of what is most likely a community center, in the middle of a pretty small town (translation: out in the middle of nowhere). We'e played in places like this before, though, and they invariably are beautiful, intimate, and welcoming. The larger venues (Izumi, Tokyo Opera City, Kioi, etc.) are fun, but the audiences are so inviting in the smaller towns. Here's a picture of us in the hall:



After they got the entire tree built, it really was quite lovely. And they constantly adjusteed the gels on the lights, so the tree shifted colors throughout the evening. (A quiz: How can you tell that we're not playing in this picture?)



(Apparently Lois thought we did something right!)

And with these little halls (seated about 450), you never know what you're going to get in the lobby. I was pleased to find a beautiful vase that was almost as tall as I was (it's on a little stand).



After our concerts, we invite the audience to come up and see the bells. Well, more like play with them. The kids love 'em, but the adults also seem to have a great time. And of course we get tons of pictures. "ichi... ni... san - *cheezu!*" (Yes, they do say "cheezu" like we say "cheese" - it's a very assimilating culture.) More pictures on this tomorrow.



Type at y'all later,

---Jason