THEY went to the Land of the Rising Sun and their music took the country by storm – including the first performance ever to take place in the Hiroshima Memorial Peace Garden.
The 65 young musicians from Ayrshire Fiddle Orchestra (AFO) were given standing ovations at each of their six concerts in Japan, but perhaps the most moving moments came in the city that was destroyed by an atomic bomb in 1945.
They were given unprecedented permission to perform the first music to be played in the memorial garden – Lament for the Children of Hiroshima, written by Harry McFarlane, a 90-year-old former music teacher.
As the mayor of Hiroshima Kazumi Matsui and Yasuyoshi Komizo, Secretary General of Mayors for Peace, stood watching in silence, Mia Walsingham, who has been playing violin since she was four, started her performance.
She told the Sunday National: “That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I was quite nervous at first with all the cameras and all the people, but once you start playing you forget all about them and it’s all about the music and what it stands for.
“We were in the museum before that and I understood what I was actually playing for and I just wanted to honour that and bring everyone together.
“It was quite emotional, and the fact that the rain held off throughout my solo – and started quite literally just as I finished – made me bubble a wee bit.”
The 17-year-old describes herself as a classical musician and joined AFO in 2014 so she could learn traditional music.
She said that what the lament stands for was more emotional than the music itself.
“It has different sections, so it’s got the area of hurt and what people went through but at the end it’s about the peace that came after that,” she said.
“Everyone came together and it didn’t matter where they came from. Everyone just wanted to help rebuild Hiroshima.
“Everyone was quite intrigued to listen to it, a lot of people walked past and stopped to hear what was going on. And there were a lot of people back home who got up early to tune in to the live stream.”
As ambassadors for the World Peace Tartan, the musicians presented small gifts in the material to their hosts.
Walsingham said there was much to see in Japan: “I was really interested to see the shrine and find out more about the history and the hierarchy of Japan.
“My favourite day was probably going to see the stadium and then going to Chinatown and walking through what they’ve built there, more the cultural aspects of it.
“The concerts went down really well. It’s a totally different kind of audience in Japan than it is here. Everyone seemed to love what we were doing and even the kids were clapping along. Everybody wanted to dance to what we were playing. There was a standing ovation every night. I think it went down very well.”
AFO music director David Moore described the visit to Hiroshima as an emotional experience.
He said: “We are very proud of these amazing young musicians. It has been a very emotional and moving day for us all in Hiroshima.”
Euan Terras, the orchestra’s tour director, added: “When Mia played the lament, it felt such a poignant moment – so moving.”
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