Love Transcending Time and Space
Piano and Pipe Organ Improvisation
TADAMITSU SAITO
CONCERT IN ITALY
The Teatro Massimo
On December 4, 1997, Saito performed on the pipe organ of the Duomo of Monreale, Sicily, Italy, which is renowned for its brilliant Byzantine mosaic. On December 5, he gave a benefit concert at the Teatro Massimo, an important cultural heritage site of Palermo, the capital city of Sicily, and one of the largest theaters in Europe. The proceeds from the ticket sales of this concert were donated to Telefono Azzurro, a nation-wide toll-free helpline operated by volunteers for children in trouble or in danger.
The pipe organ of the
Duomo of Monreale
Love Transcending Time and Space
-Tadamitsu Saito message-
The brilliance and beauty inside our hearts reflects what human life was originally intended to be, and is life itself, blessed with love.
Stricken with a serious disease in my teens, I was on the brink of death several times, hovering between life and death. The feeling of a slight hope just managed to save my life. Tears filled my eyes. Then I spent over a decade or so, till I grasped that this subtle feeling is an eternal guide for life, emerging from deep inside my body. As I grew conscious of it, my poor physical condition started to recover; sometimes gradually, dramatically at other times. I have encountered within myself countless lives of others who are injured internally and spiritually, which resonate with each other and are assimilated into a vast space and then healed. With no will or intention at all on my part, this life-to-life encounter occurs repeatedly within my body, and then unites itself with nature. I understood that this is the very work of love. Later I became able to express this state of being through piano improvisations, where a series of these inner encounters and communications takes place naturally. I sincerely wish that every one of you will be able to feel true love at the center of your life, which shall continue to shine forever in this vast universe.
Thank you very much.
Leoluca Orlando -Mayor of the City of Palermo-
Dear Maestro,Palermo is a city on the road to normalcy, a city that wishes to rediscover its own roots. It wishes to recover its history, its places of memory, its artistic treasures and its cultural heritage.The symbol of this road is the Teatro Massimo, one of the most beautiful and biggest theater in the world, which is best known for its supreme acoustics.Palermo has recovered this theater after 20 years as well as other historic spots and monuments, which had been closed and abandoned for a long time and were returned to all the people.But the land of Palermo is not only for the Palermitans; but it is also for all the people in the world, because Palermo is now an open city, a door to the Mediterranean, a door to Europe.Palermo is a city that always welcomes the tourists, sportspeople, and athletes from the world over in a very hospitable manner.Palermo, which we long to change, is now changing to a city full of joy. And it is the big events and cultural arts that are necessary for this city to be joyful.Thank you, Maestro, for joining us with your art in this pursuit. And we are grateful to you for the gift that would contribute to our high and noble goal. Being one of the most significant expressions, your art is as noble as our goal.
