The Paper's reporter Liao Yang
"If I hadn't been addicted to music, I probably wouldn't have become a novelist."
From the first novel, Listen to the Wind, music has been indispensable in Haruki Murakami's literary world. Murakami loves music, especially jazz, and spends most of his life with jazz.
Haruki Murakami is also keen on Christmas Eve, December 24. He has a number of works related to Christmas, and in the early works, the birthday of the protagonist "I" is December 24.
The main visual of "Haruki Murakami's Whimsical World"
Haruki Murakami + Christmas Eve + Jazz, Shanghai Oriental Art Center grasps the hearts of literary and artistic youth, and will launch "Haruki Murakami's Whimsical World" on Christmas Eve on December 24, revealing Haruki Murakami's jazz private playlist. The concert selection may come from Murakami's novels and essays, or from Murakami's special program "Murakami RADIU".
The concert will focus on Murakami's most frequently touched literary themes, "love", "everyday life" and "dreams", as well as his special theme for the epidemic in Murakami RADIU.
The first chapter, "Love," will kick off with Norwegian Woods. It was an early Beatles song released in 1965. In the 1960s, when Japan's economy was developing rapidly, people's spiritual crisis was increasing day by day, like rootless duckweed, lonely and nihilistic. In 1987, Murakami, who was influenced by this, wrote a young adult novel under the same name, which swept the world.
This chapter also includes Duke Ellington's "Beginning with a Kiss", Nat King Cole's "Pretend", and Antonio Carlos Chopin's "Ipanema Girl", highlighting the charm of African American jazz and Bassa Nova music.
The second chapter, "Everyday", selects jazz songs that are closely related to people's lives.
For example, Bill Evans's Waltz for Debbie, Murakami once said of the trio, "The human self, through the filtering device of talent, becomes the appearance of rare gems falling to the ground." For example, In Vanon Duke's "Autumn In New York", every time he runs the New York City Marathon, Murakami will play this song in his head.
The third chapter, "Dreams," is arguably the most romantic of the concerts, including Harold Allen's "It's Just a Paper Moon," Waller's "Gite Bawaulz," and Glen Miller's Moonlight Serenade.
Chapter Four, "Brighter Tomorrow," selects four tracks related to tomorrow and hope from Murakami RADIUM's recommended tracks, including Jerome Cohen's "In Search of Hope," the Beatles' "The Sun Is Out," Felix Bernard's "Winter Wonderland," and Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World.
Murakami RADIU began in 2018. In May, to boost morale and help the Japanese people alleviate the psychological trauma caused by the epidemic, Murakami launched a special program to share his favorite music with listeners. "No matter how bad the situation is, there is a bright side. Believe in tomorrow. He said.
The concert will bring together a group of jazz musicians and singers, including jazz guitarist Zhang Xiongguan, singer Zhang Le, saxophonist Li Shihai, drummer Xu Zhiyao and bassist Tian Xin.
Guitarist Zhang Xiongguan
Zhang Xiongguan also showed his creative ability and created two new songs: "Johnny Walker" applies the dualistic parallel structure of odd and even chapters in "Kafka by the Sea" to the creation; "Naoko's Forest" uses the harmony and rhythm of modern jazz to depict Naoko's wandering, fearful and confused life in "Norwegian Forest".
Editor-in-Charge: Liang Jia
Proofreader: Shi Gong