Joe Hisaishi conducted the Philadelphia Orchestra in a #17 Phillies jersey. Here’s why.
The Studio Ghibli composer wore it to honor his favorite baseball player, on his first visit to Philly.
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You might have thought the Japanese composer and conductor was showing solidarity with the recently declared “unhappy” Phillies outfielder when he sprang onto the stage of Marian Anderson Hall for an encore Friday night.
He was wearing a Phillies jersey with a “17” and “Hisaishi” on the back.
But it turns out the jersey on the 74-year-old Hisaishi was a nod to a different MLB No. 17: Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani.
Hisaishi was here conducting three concerts of his own music with the Philadelphia Orchestra, and he was backstage after Wednesday night’s concert icing his conducting (right) shoulder when he mentioned to an orchestra manager that he would soon be leading concerts in a baseball stadium: the 42,000-plus-seat Tokyo Dome.
So the orchestra decided to outfit him in Phillies gear with the number of his favorite player on back.
These concerts marked Hisaishi’s Philadelphia debut, and it was a grand slam, if a delayed one. He was originally scheduled to appear for two shows in January, but postponed because of illness. A third concert was added and the run nearly sold out. The program included his Symphony No. 2 and Viola Saga with orchestra principal violist Choong-Jin Chang as soloist.
It was a knowing audience. These works were written for the concert hall rather than the composer’s better known habitat on soundtracks to Hayao Miyazaki films like My Neighbor Totoro and Castle in the Sky. Still, filmic aspects in both works were abundant enough to suggest a familiar soundscape, and the audience was in Hisaishi’s thrall.
But the suite from Spirited Away — the 2001 film — was fully transporting. With Hisaishi shuttling back and forth from podium to piano, the performance by the Philadelphia Orchestra was surely among the most polished interpretations this music has ever received.
And the most moving. Bruce Springsteen recently said that an album is “a record of who you are and where you were at that moment in your life.” It might be impossible to know who Friday night’s audience was or where they were in 2001. But for a few at least, the journey back sailed along a path of tears.