Bringing Israeli music to Tokyo

It is three weeks since the Tokyo gig and I am still coming down from it. Bringing Israeli music to a city that far from Tel Aviv was always going to be a strange thing to attempt. The fact it worked at all is what has stayed with me.

A trip three years in the making

My love affair with Japan is a long story. I’ll keep it short here: at age 14 I started studying Japanese at school and it became a real passion. I hadn’t been to Japan for a while and originally planned to go back in February 2020. COVID killed the trip, and at the same time I was launching the Kol Cambridge crowdfunding campaign, which absorbed everything for the next eighteen months. When I eventually got round to planning the trip again, I noticed something interesting: we had a patron in Tokyo..

It seemed worth trying to set up a gig.

It wasn’t easy. Persuading a local venue to take on an unknown DJ from Israel, playing music in a language nobody in the room speaks, was a slow negotiation. I went through a long list of people I know who are in or connected to Japan. Eventually Mogambo, a small bar with a generous-minded owner, said yes.

A weeknight at Mogambo

The venue is not big and the gig was on a weeknight, so I had quietly lowered my expectations. The turnout was better than I had feared. People were curious. They danced. The Israelis in the room were a lifeline whenever I needed someone to bring a bit of a hafla vibe.

Special thanks to Pau for his help. Meeting in person, after years of him being a name on a patron list, was a small joy in itself.

Want Kol Cambridge in your city?

The Tokyo experiment has made me want more of these. I have access to some funding that can help make community gigs happen in other places. If you ‘re somewhere with a few Kol Cambridge listeners and you would like the show to come to you, drop me a line via the contact page.