A reflection on Hisatada Otaka’s Symphony No. 1, heard at the Osaka Philharmonic’s subscription concert on April 11, 2026, and remembered as a historic performance.
With Tadaaki Otaka conducting, the Osaka Philharmonic in Festival Hall, and images of Sakuranomiya, Umeda, Ryōanji, and Ninnaji on April 8, 2026 woven together, this piece sends that emotion out to the world.

2026-04-12
Yesterday’s Osaka Philharmonic subscription concert was a historic performance… an overwhelming performance.
Above all, the opening work, Hisatada Otaka’s Symphony No. 1, received a supreme performance.
The conductor was Tadaaki Otaka, Hisatada’s son, the orchestra was the truly magnificent Osaka Philharmonic, and the venue was Festival Hall, now one of the finest halls in Japan.
The breadth of the stage and the height of the ceiling are also of the highest class in Japan.
I was listening from the center of the second row from the very front, and I was moved to tears.
They were torrents of tears.
If one thinks of a person like myself living through the prewar, wartime, and postwar years, and then composing Symphony No. 1 soon after the war, one should understand without words.
A composer was alive in Japan after 127 cities across the country had been burned, and after two atomic bombs had been dropped upon it.
He is a man like myself.
I feel his love for Japan, and his conviction, trust, and faith in the beauty and greatness of Japan, which has endured as the country of the highest civility since the dawn of history.
Where could there possibly be melodies gentler and more beautiful than these?
At any rate, I wept.
Tears overflowed.
They would not stop.
At the end of the final movement, one ought to rise at once in a standing ovation.
That is the expression of gratitude due to a supreme performance.
And yet, amid torrents of tears and deep emotion, the final movement ended.
I remained seated, and all I could offer was a gentler and quieter applause than usual.
On YouTube, I chose the performance closest to what I heard that day… Tadaaki Otaka and the NHK Symphony Orchestra in 2011.
And once again I wept.
For those melodies flowed through the Pioneer Exclusive system in my home.
I send this out to the world together with Sakuranomiya, Umeda, Ryōanji, and Ninnaji on April 8, 2026.