John Kamitsuka Piano Performance

“There’s a lot of tension in the world right now.”

On a sunny day in May, John Kamitsuka—world-renowned pianist and one of HIS’s founding students—returned home.

He didn’t just perform. He invited us into a space where melodies carried meaning, where stories lingered in the air like unfinished chords.

“There’s a lot of tension in the world,” he began. But he didn’t raise his voice. He let the silence say what words couldn’t.

It felt like a message for a tired generation—one running too fast, thinking too loud. A reminder that life isn’t a race, and the good stuff doesn’t come all at once. That maybe we ought to “slow down” before we burn out trying to be everything.

As he spoke about the world—about conflict, about a planet cracking under pressure and the loneliness of people. 

“And they’re sharing a drink they call loneliness, but it’s better than drinkin’ alone…”

Because sometimes, playing music is the only way to hold a conversation that matters.

And sometimes, harmony isn’t just in sound—it’s in the choice not to turn against each other.

He played Bach, describing the music like a walk shared by three voices, each with something to say, none stepping over the other. A lesson, perhaps, for how we could live. Side by side, different but moving together.

He spoke of Beethoven—not the legend, but the man. A boy from a broken home, lost in Vienna, losing his hearing, ready to disappear into silence. But something stopped him.

He listened inward.

He wrote what he knew.

And came back not to survive, but to create.

There was pain in that story, but also something deeply human:

“You’ve got your passion, you’ve got your pride, but don’t you know that only fools are satisfied…”

Beethoven wasn’t satisfied. And neither, it seems, is Kamitsuka. Not with noise. Not with fame. But with truth—however fleeting, however quiet.

When the final note faded, and the applause gave way to curiosity, a student asked how long it took to learn the piece.

He didn’t hesitate.

“A lifetime.”

And in that moment, it was clear:

He wasn’t just playing the piano.

He was reminding us how to live.