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AI: What about your mother?

GY: Yeah, my mother, Kiyoka, was born in Hokkaido (on April 27, 1897). And she eventually -- oh, it was interesting. Her father worked in the lumber business because there was, forestry projects was much more plentiful up in that area, in those days. It was not as urbanized or commercialized in Hokkaido. And he worked as a person who would walk around the forests in Hokkaido to measure the size of circumference of trees to measure which trees might be cut down for lumber. That's what he did. But I understand eventually he was fired for something. Maybe he drank too much sake or something. That's the story I got. I don't recall.

I didn't ever, ever know very much about my mother's early childhood nor my father's childhood. As a child, I didn't care. I was more interested in playing outside. And, and it took me a long time, a long time to appreciate what they really, how -- had to suffer, what joys they had as children. And I was, and I don't feel very good about not having asked them. On the other hand, my kids today don't ask me what, "Hey, Dad, what did you do?" [Laughs] And so that's cool, I think it's a matter of generations. When you're young, you're into yourself, too. So that's cool.

And my mother eventually ended up in Kyoto and somehow was enrolled in a school where they taught the students to become teachers and in her case, to become a kindergarten teacher. And again, this school was sponsored and its origin was a Christian organization from the United States or Canada. And so they received a lot of instruction about, I'm sure, about religion, about the Bible. And in connection with that, they sang hymns, and in connection with that, she learned how to play the organ. Where you had the foot pedals and so the wheezy sound, but nevertheless, introduction to Western harmony and learned how to play the piano, to read music from hymnals. And that was her introduction to Western harmony, and it's never stopped there. She, she, when she came to the United States a few years later, which was 1920 or '21 with her brother, who was a chaplain of, in Doshisha University, which was, again, in origin -- its origin was some kind of Christian organization from the Western world, the United States or Canada.

AI: Excuse me. So when she came from Japan to the United States, she came with her brother?

GY: Yes.

AI: And with other family members?

GY: Yes. She came with her brother, who at the time was a reverend, a Christian minister (at) Doshisha, Reverend Seizo Abe. And, of course, my mother was Kiyoka Abe. She came with her (niece)... yeah. The (niece), right. Her name was Jun-chan or Junko. We called her Jun-chan. And they came in 1920, maybe '20, '21, early -- late '20s, rather, late '20, year 1920 or '21, just to visit, I suppose, but became a permanent situation for my mother because her brother, Reverend Abe, became the chaplain or the reverend or the pastor of the Japanese Congregational Church. And my mother stayed as a result of that. And soon enough, some of the people in the neigh -- in the community said hey, here you are. You're by yourself. Here's this cool cat, Koji Yoshida, who's single. And they didn't tell her, but he's getting on in his age, and what do you think? So somehow or other, they were introduced to each other and decided to get, they decided to get married, and they were married in 1921. And I'm the result of that marriage, a year later in 1922.

My mother enjoyed her music, Western music. She never talked about the koto, the shamisen. Never sang any kind of tunes like that. Of course, Japanese children's songs were introduced to, to me through records. And so that was part of the Japanese culture that was brought over, but none of the traditional music. So my early background was filled with music -- records, of course. And not too much radio. Records, Japanese folk songs, children's songs.

I remember one of the songs we had was the Waseda University's school song. And that was kind of neat, too. It was a very, marching kind of thing: Waseda, Waseda, Waseda. And I remember that clearly. It's, it's still in my ears, and it's kind of neat that about five years ago, to bring the song to today, I met a young man who sang a lot of Western songs, in Japanese, of course, who sang in the male chorus at Waseda University. And there's a great tradition of choral music in Japan today. Male choruses are rather abundant, I think, especially in the universities. And he sang this Waseda chorus. And he and I started a Japanese -- I wouldn't say Japanese. It's a choral group. A choral group, maybe there were six or eight of us at that time singing Japanese songs exclusively, although as Nisei, I was very fond of the early childhood children's songs. Very dear to my heart. And after some incident where I heard him sing a song that was very dear to me -- I think it was "Kojo no Tsuki," which is a very popular song, very old song, but still sung -- not as a pop song. I approached him and asked him about starting a group, and he said yes. And well, to make a long story short, we still sing Japanese songs. But that was Waseda, but that takes me back to my days as a child, listening to record that my mother had about the Waseda University. Getting back to my mother --

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 2002 Densho. All Rights Reserved.