Andreas Vollenweider - Treasures of the Archives – Part 45
🎵Treasures of the Archives – Part 45:
Memories of
✨“Down to the Moon“ | Tokyo, 1987✨
"Here you can see an excerpt from the beginning of our concert in Tokyo in 1987.
During our ‚Down to the Moon‘ tour around the globe, we stopped in Japan before continuing on to Australia.
I must admit that the Japanese audience surprised me somewhat—to put it mildly, they completely threw me off balance.
We were used to concertgoers being quite animated, with frequent shouts and applause between pieces.
However, throughout the entire first half, the people in the sold-out main concert hall of Japanese television remained as motionless as a photograph.
There was no visible or audible reaction whatsoever.
I genuinely feared that they absolutely disliked our performance.
But after the final song before the interval, the hall virtually exploded.
The Japanese audience surpassed anything we had experienced in terms of enthusiasm.
Backstage, I told my friends about the impression I had had.
They simply replied that they knew the Japanese were incredibly respectful and therefore extremely reserved.
Yet it had never occurred to anyone to let me in on this secret...
Naturally, I was much more relaxed at our concert the next day in Osaka.
There is also some very sad news connected with this video.
Our friend and wonderful keyboardist Christoph Stiefel passed away on January 21, 2026.
We still cannot believe it and miss him deeply." – Andreas