Tsukimi Moon Viewing at Garden of the Phoenix 2024

The Japanese Arts Foundation and Culture Center welcome you to the annual Tsukimi: Moon Viewing event in the historical Garden of the Phoenix in Chicago’s Jackson Park.

A Tsukimi (tsoo-kee-mee), or moon viewing celebration, honors the autumn or harvest moon. Here in Chicago, we will be celebrating with partners at Asian Improv Arts Midwest featuring special guest artist Umeya Takane from Tokyo! Takane is a leading tsuzumi, hand drum, artist. Her talents are celebrated internationally, and we are thrilled to feature a special performance at this year’s TSUKIMI!

Alongside Takane, our partners at Asian Improv Arts Midwest will provide additional traditional Japanese music performances including a performance by Toyoaki.

About guest artist Umeya Takane:

Takane is a certified performer from the traditional Umeya clans (Tsuzumi & Narimono) respectively. She has been active in Nagauta, a form of Japanese Classical music used in Kabuki, the theater genre with origins in the dramatic dance of the early seventeenth-century Tokugawa shogunate. Performed first by all-female ensembles, Kabuki gained popularity for its eroticism among the lower-class population before being banned and changed to all-male ensembles. Kabuki re-emerged in the early Meiji period and today is per-formed frequently in theaters and on television. Nagauta was incorporated into Kabuki theater in the eighteenth century and is still performed by an ensemble utilizing traditional Japanese instrumentation, with shamisen as the main instrument accompanied by taiko drum, tsuzumi hip drum, kotsuzumi shoulder drum, and n kan flute. Takane Umeya is among only a handful of certified classical players in Japan today and in high demand as house musicians for Kabuki and Nagauta Music. She performs frequently in classical and festival music concerts, and collaborations with contemporary music and media arts.

This event is INVITE ONLY and seating is VERY limited - we strongly suggest early registration.