SOUL OF THE CITY FILM
COMING SOON
World Premiere - Presidio Theater - San Francisco, CA
THE WISDOM KEEPERS
BRENDA WONG AOKI • MAS KOGA • DEREK NAKAMOTO
presents
SOUL OF THE CITY
THE WISDOM KEEPER’S EXPERIENCE
For 50 years, Brenda Wong Aoki and the late composer Mark Izu have been pioneering forces in American contemporary performance. SOUL OF THE CITY is their magnum opus: 130 years of one family’s odyssey navigating the ups and downs of racism and resilience to establish the first Japantown in the Americas. Descended from Scotland, Australia, China, and Japan, the storyteller’s tale unfolds through poetry, dance, puppetry, Noh, Gagaku, and archival photographs, accompanied by live jazz musicians.
This work represents 30 years of research, 5 years of development, the artistry of 14 performers, and a team of designers, filmmakers, and digital collage artists—all coming together to tell the tale of those who make the soul of San Francisco.
“I came to the show with 4 of my cousins and an auntie who is turning 90. We were remembering stories about our own families and the show reminded us that we need to share our family history with the next generation.”
Note from Brenda Wong Aoki, Artistic Director
These are maddening times chaotic hateful frightening humankind seems to be teetering on the edge of a black hole, but there's an old Japanese saying which came from a Chinese proverb, which probably came from Persia, which most likely can be traced to Egypt. Quotations Koike OIKOI parentheses CARP) in Japanese symbolizes perseverance, in the face of adversity. The court that makes it to the top of the waterfall is transformed into the dragon that sources end of the sky.
Soul of the city explores the transformative power of story and of storytelling. Sharing memories of how I got to know, my hope is at my story and courage. Is you to look at your own story. Each of us has a story. Our stories connect us in overtime, they become one big story. Our Storytellers remind us, humans have been in dark times before and lived to tell the tale. We, the living, persevere, not to just keep on keeping on, but they, but that one day our grandchildren's grandchildren may take flight.
“...extraordinary capacity for evoking an entire spectrum of experience out of her own body and throat.”
Note from Mas Koga, Musical Director
This album includes compositions by the late Bassist and composer Mark Izu,at the center of the Asian American arts movement since the 1970s and Aoki’s husband, who passed in 2025. The recording was completed two years later the leadership of Mark’s longtime Music Director Mas Koga. Composers on this recording include Mark Izu, Mas Koga, and Brenda Wong Aoki. The musicians have performed with Aoki and Izu for nearly 30 years - the music could never have been made possible with out these decades of shared life and love.
“An open-ended community portrait sketched with jazz... a musical conjuring of the past celebrating the legacy and resilience of San Francisco’s Japantown and Western Addition communities.”
ABOUT THE FILMED PERFORMANCE
Renowned performing artists Brenda Wong Aoki and Mark Izu, in collaboration with Presidio Theatre, filmed live and immortalized the vibrant cultural narratives of the city of San Francisco with "Soul of the City," a compelling performance deeply embedded within the City’s Asian American heritage that showcases a fusion of traditional arts, jazz, and spoken word. Brenda Wong Aoki states, "This performance is our love letter to San Francisco—a city of stories, struggles, and dreams. Through the mystical and the historical, and we reconnect with the city’s spirit and its enduring legacy." The show’s narrative is inspired by the profound question, 'Does a city have a soul?'. The soul of a place is made by the breath, life, and fierce love of the people who live there; and continues on long after their gone. Knowing who you are helps you to endure. The demons disappear.
As long-time documentarians, when Emmy Award-winners Emiko Omori and Wendy Slick saw the live performance of Soul of the City, they were struck with its powerful, entertaining, and dazzling presentation of history. The story brought to life by Brenda Wong Aoki blended her years of study of Japanese Noh and western acting and created a musical fusion of Asia, Africa, and American jazz - with visuals taken right out of history. They strongly believe Soul of the City needs to be shared widely and what better way than to create a video -- a portable performance.
“Soul of the City” orchestrates a poignant exploration into the heart and soul of San Francisco through a tapestry of personal and collective histories that reveals the divine within us all. Aoki, guided by her family’s multi-ethnic legacy and armed with symbolic talismans, leads this journey to rediscover the essence of a city. This powerful blend of autobiography and city history marks significant contributions by Aoki’s ancestors to the cultural landmarks of Japantown and Chinatown, and asks audiences to consider how their own stories contribute to the soul of their city, and how their lives now will have impact long after they are gone. who came before them have contributed to the soul of their cities - and how their cultural multiplicity will contribute to the soul of the city for future generations.
ABOUT THE COMMUNITY RITUAL
The audience is invited to come as they are and to wear celebratory attire and cultural regalia if they feel compelled to. As audiences arrive at the screening, they are welcomed into the world of the film by writer and performing artist Brenda Wong Aoki, and musicians Masaru Koga and Derek Nakamoto. Audiences are invited to participate in a shinboku (sacred tree) ritual that reminds us that our roots connect us to the earth and the earth connects us to one another. Following the artists, the audience enters the theater in a procession. Throughout the film screening, interactive moments are intentionally included to further connect the audience to the on-screen storytelling.
ABOUT THE ALBUM
The Soul of the City album, the soundtrack accompanying the live filmed performance, paints a rare tapestry of jazz, Japanese, afro-beats, fusing Japanese taiko with Western drum set, Japanese sho with saxophone, and more. It is a celebration of the spirit of the City of San Francisco, its people, and the soul of their soundtrack. The album will be released simultaneously with the premiere of the film at the Presidio Theater and will be available alongside the film presentation with live music performance and radio interview opportunities featuring Brenda Wong Aoki, Mas Koga and Derek Nakamoto.
ABOUT THE WORKSHOP
The artists will offer a pre or post-screening day workshop with local community members to develop their own ‘Soul of the City’ multidisciplinary arts offering rooted in their own experience. Participants will learn to tell the story of their cities through expression, art, and deep storytelling and it will not require any prior experience or training to be a part of the session. Together, the film artists and workshop participants will collaboratively develop the seeds for telling the story of the ‘Soul’ of their City.
PRESS ARTICLES
"A Storyteller Searches for Her City"
International Examiner
"‘Soul of the City’ believes the spirit of San Francisco lives in the people and their stories"
San Francisco Chronicle
"How Brenda Wong Aoki rocks the kimono — past, present and future"
San Francisco Chronicle
“Brenda is the foremost narrative voice working in America today.”
ABOUT THE MASTER ARTISTS ON TOUR
BRENDA WONG AOKI is a playwright, an artistic director, and America’s first nationally recognized Asian Pacific storyteller. She creates works for theater, symphony, contemporary dance, world music, taiko, jazz, live performance with film & museum installations. A descendant of Japanese, Chinese, Spanish, and Scottish ancestors, her work speaks to the essential hybridity of American culture. Aoki has deep roots in San Francisco. In the 1800’s, her grandfather Reverend Chojiro Aoki was a founder of the nation’s first Japantown here in San Francisco. One of the world’s first fully Japanese Christian priests, he was forced out of Grace Cathedral because he supported his younger brother’s marriage to a white woman. Aoki wrote an award-winning play, Uncle Gunjiro’s Girlfriend, about this story and the children resulting from the marriage, the first documented bi-racial Japanese children in the United States. Aoki’s grandmother Alice Wong, a bi-racial Chinese woman, was a founder of the first Chinatown Garment Union in the nation’s first Chinatown, also here in San Francisco. Aoki has been awarded Hollywood-Dramalogue, Critics Circle, Dramatist Guild Awards, two NEA Theater Fellowships, the first Wattis Artist Residency and a Japan-US Creative Artist Fellowship. Past presenters include the Kennedy Center, New Victory Theater on Broadway, Hong Kong Performing Arts Center, the Adelaide International Festival in Australia, the Esplanade in Singapore, San Diego Rep, Dallas Theater Center and the Apollo Theater. In 2023, she premiered a new work about her family’s 127-year history in San Francisco commissioned by a Hewlett 50 Playwright Award. Since 1976, Aoki and her partner, composer Mark Izu, have created original performance works by people of color representing the authentic story of America (BrendaWongAoki.com)
MAS KOGA New York City based wind instrumentalist and composer Mas Koga is a long time friend of First Voice who has also worked domestically and internationally with luminaries such as Akira Tana, Anthony Brown, Wayne Wallace, Kenny Endo, Art Hirahara, and the late Fred Ho, as well as his mentors Hafez Modirzadeh and royal hartigan. As a composer he has been featured in various shows and projects including the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, when they premiered their newly-restored version of 1919 silent film “The Dragon Painter” accompanied by his original live score. As a Shin-Issei who grew up as a Third Culture Kid, his music encompasses the many cultural traditions that he has been touched by, and the worldview developed through diverse life experiences. His album as a band leader titled “Flower Fire” was released in 2018 and is available online on various platforms (www.maskoga.com).
DEREK NAKAMOTO is a record producer, arranger, and film composer whose four-decade career spans R&B, jazz, and orchestral film scoring. He co-wrote Hiroshima's "Thousand Cranes," arranged 23 albums for Keiko Matsui, and produced Waldemar Bastos' Classics of My Soul with the London Symphony Orchestra. A longtime music director for Nobuko Miyamoto, he recently released his debut solo album, Is Today the Day?, at www.dereknakamoto.com.
The SOUL OF THE CITY Story
“Soul of The City follows a storyteller who has no more stories to tell. Her husband is sick, her boy has moved away, and nobody is buying the stories she’s trying to tell. Pursued by demons and haunted by ghosts, the storyteller embarks on a journey to find the soul of San Francisco. This multimedia music drama is a ritual performance. Rooted in traditional Japanese theater and music and infused with contemporary spoken word and Asian American Jazz, Soul of The City reveals the divine in us all.
The audience is invited to dress in celebratory attire and will gather in the garden to put prayers, photographs or talisman on the Soul of The City sacred tree. A Buddhist priest will bless us with a purification ceremony and willing participants will be given temple bells to call the ancestors. We will then go inside the theater. The audience will witness a ritual performance of jazz, storytelling, and poetry that is accompanied by photographs and images of Brenda’s family in San Francisco since the 1800’s. At the conclusion of the performance we will return to the garden for refreshments, renewed, recharged and inspired to carry on.”
“Aoki’s remarkable talents as a performer and storyteller – talents which include an impressive synthesis of modern and traditional Japanese and American theatrical techniques of dance, mime, movement, song and voice placement...”
CREDITS
Written by Brenda Wong Aoki
Original music by Masaru Koga, Mark Izu, and Derek Nakamoto
Directed by David Furumoto
Music Direction by Masaru Koga
Multimedia Direction by Wendy Slick
Performed by Brenda Wong Aoki, devorah major, Caroline Cabading, Shoko Hikage, Masaru Koga, Jimi Nakagawa, Shoko Hikage, Jimi Nakagawa, Kenneth Nash, and Sara Sithi-Amnuai.
Costumes by Lydia Tanji
Lighting by Kate Boyd
Multimedia by Olivia Ting, Andi Wong, and Mark Shigenaga
Soul of the City
Presidio Theater Poster (2024)
Historical Photos from SOUL OF THE CITY
The Making of SOUL OF THE CITY (2023)
ABOUT SOUL OF THE CITY ARTISTS
Brenda Wong Aoki (
Storyteller) and
Mark Izu (
First Voice Resident Composer)
Featuring the haunting eloquence of writer-performer Brenda Wong Aoki with the silk and iron tones of composer-contra bass player Mark Izu - artists in the vanguard of cultural metamorphosis. Their original story-dramas are rooted in Gagaku, Nohgaku, contemporary theater, personal story, history and legend. Izu is listed in The Grove Dictionary of Music as a seminal leader of Asian American Jazz. Aoki is the America’s first nationally recognized Asian American storyteller. Both Aoki and Izu come from founding families of San Francisco and San Jose J-towns, two of the three remaining Japantowns in the U.S. Their work has garnered multiple Hollywood-Dramalogue Awards, NEA Fellowships, Critic Circle Awards, INDIE Awards, Dramatist Guild, ASCAP awards and an Emmy. Shoko Hikage, Mark Izu, Brenda Wong Aoki are world-class artists who continue to teach, tour and perform.
Mas Koga
(Music Director, Composer)
New York City based wind instrumentalist and composer Mas Koga is a long time friend of First Voice who has also worked domestically and internationally with luminaries such as Akira Tana, Anthony Brown, Wayne Wallace, Kenny Endo, Art Hirahara, and the late Fred Ho, as well as his mentors Hafez Modirzadeh and royal hartigan.
As a composer he has been featured in various shows and projects including the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, when they premiered their newly-restored version of 1919 silent film “The Dragon Painter” accompanied by his original live score.
As a Shin-Issei who grew up as a Third Culture Kid, his music encompasses the many cultural traditions that he has been touched by, and the worldview developed though diverse life experiences.
His album as a band leader titled “Flower Fire” was released in 2018 and is available online on various platforms.
Jimi Nakagawa (
Musician)
Jimi Nakagawa started playing drums in high school in Japan. He studied Taiko at SF Taiko Dojo, Sukeroku Daiko and under renowned masters. He’s been performing worldwide with SF Taiko Dojo and Somei Yoshino Taiko Ensemble as well as Jazz musicians like a guitarist, Nguyen Le, and a drummer, Peter Erskine to name a few. Jimi's refined stick work has been featured in films, “Rising Sun” by Philip Kaufman and “Mifune the last Samurai” by Steven Okazaki. He is leading OH-IN TAIKO school in El Cerrito, CA.
devorah major (
MOTHER)
Born and raised in California, devorah major served as San Francisco's Third Poet Laureate (2002-2006). In 2022 she received Italy's Regina Coppola International Literary Award performing in Sardinia and Northern and Southern Italy. In 2019 her sixth book of poetry with open arms was released in a bilingual edition in Italy. A Willow Press Editor's Choice her seventh book of poetry Califia's Daughter was published by Willow Press in July 2020. She has worked with First Voice on several projects including Mark Izu's Song of the City. In June 2015 major premiered her poetry play Classic Black: Voices of 19th Century African-Americans in San Francisco, with music composed and performed by Destiny Muhammad, at the San Francisco International Arts Festival. Trade Routes, a commissioned symphony with devorah major's spoken word and chorus, premiered under Maestro Michael Morgan with the Oakland East Bay Symphony in 2006. She is on two CDs as a part of Daughters of Yam with Opal Palmer Adisa. devorah major performs her work nationally and internationally with and without musicians. She has been a participant in international poetry festivals in Italy, Belgium, Bosnia, Jamaica, and Venezuela, and performed her poetry in France, the Bahamas and Germany. http://www.devorahmajor.com
Kenneth Nash (
Musician)
Internationally renowned producer, arranger, musician, author, and teacher, Kenneth Nash is creating some of today's most rhythmically compelling music. Breaking out into a superbly syncopated realm all his own, his high energy innovative playing has earned him a reputation as one of the foremost percussionists in jazz and contemporary music. Fusing jazz, pop and world-music elements, he creates an effervescent style of music.
Kenneth Nash has composed and arranged percussion pieces for the Joffery Ballet, The San Francisco Opera & American Conservatory Theatre. He has written and performed music for films, television and theatre.
Nash received the Isadora Duncan Award, In the same year his book Rhythms Talk was released worldwide in three language’s.
Kenneth Nash has performed or recorded on hundreds of recordings and productions with such artist as : Herbie Hancock, Pointer Sisters, Weather Report, Sergio Mendes, Dizzy Gillespie, Ahmad Jamal, Freddie Hubbard, Grover Washington Jr., B.B.King, Andy Narrell, Pharoah Sanders, Alice Coltrane, Bobby McFerrin, Roy Haynes, Ira Sullivan, Airto, Cannonball Adderly, John Handy, Kenny Burrell, Gary Bartz, Merle Saunders, Bobby Hutcherson, Andre Crouch, Walter and Edwin Hawkins, Tramaine Hawkins, Art Pepper, Johnny Griffin, Michael White, Patrice Rushen, Raoul DeSouz, John Lee Hooker, J.J. Johnson, Dexter Gordon, Kenny Clark, Woody Herman, Stan Getz, Lionel Hampton, Sadao Watanabe, Joe Henderson, Azar Lawrence, Norman Connors, Streamlinetrio/ featuring Kenneth Nash, Lionel Hampton
Shoko Hikage
(Musician)
Koto (Japanese zither) player Shoko Hikage is grateful to have studied with wonderful teachers, Chizuga Kimura, Iemoto Seiga Adachi, Tadao and Kazue Sawai and more. Hikage graduated from Takasaki College in Japan with a major in koto music and received her master's certificate from the Sawai Koto Institute. In 1992, she moved to Honolulu, Hawaii to teach koto at the Sawai Koto Kai Hawaii and at the University of Hawaii. Hikage moved to San Francisco in 1997 and has continued her career as acclaimed koto performer and teacher. She, Mark, and Brenda have worked together on numerous amazing projects.
Sara Sithi-Amnual (
Musician)
Sara Sithi-Amnuai is a multi-instrumentalist (on trumpet, sheng, and some handcrafted electronic instruments) based in Los Angeles. Her interest in the connection between culture and gesture has led her to build gesture-based musical interfaces - one of those is Nami, a custom built glove interface designed for live musical performance inspired by Nikkei community research. She has presented her work at the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression, received the 2021 Nikkei Music Reclamation Fellowship with Sustainable Little Tokyo, 2019 ASCAP Foundation Herb Alpert Young Jazz Composer Award, and has performed with the Pan Afrikan People's Arkestra.
Raychel Hatch (Dancer)
Raychel Hatch (she/her) is a Chinese-American dancer based in the Bay Area. Originally from South Bay, she grew up in a Chinese Immersion Program where she practiced Wushu, Kung fu and Chinese dance. She holds a B.A. in Performing Arts & Social Justice, with a concentration in dance, and a B.A. in Psychology from University of San Francisco. She has worked with the Dance Generators (an intergenerational dance company of ages 18-90), Robert Moses, Tracey Lindsay Chan in her Panels dance film, and ODC's production and choreography mentorship program: Pilot 74. She is interested in how emotions, identities, and social constructs can be understood through dance.
Hiroko Tsunetsugu (
Ikebana/Sacred Tree Installation Artist)
Artist/designer Hiroko Tsunetsugu creates elegant and refined installations, objects, and garments using textiles, flowers, and other natural materials. Whether functional and built to last or ephemeral and decorative, Hiroko's meticulously hand-crafted creations are guided by her Japanese roots and the unique attributes of the materials at hand.
Soon after arriving in the United States, Hiroko crafted stage elements for First Voice productions of Kuan Yin and Mermaid thanks to an introduction from her mentor Maria Vella. Nearly a quarter of a century later, she is pleased and proud to continue collaborating with First Voice's family of Asian-American creators.
Andi Wong
(Multi-Media Artist/Designer)
Fifth-generation Chinese American Andi Wong has designed graphics and multimedia for First Voice projects, including J-Town Culture Bearers (2019), Earth Dance Offerings (2020), Story Circle of the Japanese Diaspora (2021-2023), Song for J-Town (2022) and Soul of the City (2023). Her creative partners include Marcus Shelby, The Last Hoisan Poets (Genny Lim, Flo Oy Wong and Nellie Wong), Del Sol Quartet, and the Internet Archive. Her film, "Drawn from Life: The Creative Legacy of Flo Oy Wong," premiered at 2023 SVAP FilmFest. She curated the companion exhibit for Huang Ruo's Angel Island 2024 premiere at BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music).
Claudine Naganuma (Choreographer)
Claudine Naganuma was born and raised in San Francisco and currently lives in Oakland where she directs her dance company, dNaga. Naganuma is the founder of the GIRL Project, a free art and empowerment workshop for girls living in East Oakland and is the Program Director for Dance for PD®, Oakland. After receiving her M.F.A. in Dance from Mills College, she served as the Artistic Director of Asian American Dance Performances and was a founding board member of the SF Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center. Her choreography was part of Dave Iverson's 2014 documentary Capturing Grace and the company recently performed in Barcelona at the World Parkinson's Congress. www.dNaga.org
Ki' Shae Qetlah (Dancer)
Ki' Shae was called to express herself with movement in her formative years. She first began traditional African Dance and Martial Arts until she was accepted into Classen School of Advanced Studies where she majored in Ballet and Modern Dance. She trained with Derrick Minter of Ailey II, Denise Vale from the Martha Graham Dance Company and Mary Margaret Holt of Houston Ballet at the University of Oklahoma Summer Dance Intensive for many years. She went on to join the University of Oklahoma Ballet Performance and Pedagogy Program, where she danced with the Oklahoma Festival Ballet. Ki' Shae is a Faculty Member for the ODC Youth & Teen Dance Program and Company Manager for the teen Hip Hop Dance Company, SEEDS. She has danced with the Kendra Kimbrough Dance Ensemble and is a company member for RammDance & Tim Rubel Human Shakes for their 2023-2024 home season. Ki' Shae's focus in her dance practice is inner peace and the advocacy of accessibility and equality.
Kate Boyd (Lighting Designer)
Kate Boyd designs scenery and lighting in the Bay Area. She recently designed the lights for Justice at Marin Theatre Company and scenery for The Language of Wild Berries for Golden Thread. Recent Aurora shows include Born with Teeth, Hurricane Diane and Everything is Illuminated. She has also designed at Center Rep, Magic Theater, New Conservatory Theater, Merola Opera, the SF Conservatory of Music, Company C Ballet and Theaterworks. Kate is a resident artist with Golden Thread Productions and a recipient of the Gerbode Design Fellowship. Kate teaches stagecraft and design at Lick-Wilmerding High School.
Lydia Tanji
(Costume Designer)
Lydia Tanji is thrilled to be working with Brenda and Mark again. Past productions include: Kuan Yin, Mermaid, and Type O. Other theater credits: ACT, Berkeley Rep. Theater, Theatreworks, Public Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club, Syracuse Stage, Arena Stage, Huntington Theater, Guthrie, Indiana Rep., Dallas Theater, Children’s Theater, Seattle Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Mark Taper Forum, and South Coast Rep. Film credits include: The Joy Luck Club, Hot Summer Winds, Dim Sum, Thousand Pieces of Gold, and The Wash. She also co-produced Vanishing Chinatown: The World of The May’s Photo Studio which aired on KQED and KVIE.
Olivia Ting (
Video Designer)
Olivia Ting is a digital multimedia artist whose interest in visual communication as a storytelling vehicle about the human condition brought her to work in collaboration with movement-based performers. In addition to theater work, Olivia continues to work as a graphic and video media designer; her clients include the San Francisco Dance Center, San Francisco Performances, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, the San Jose Children’s Discovery Museum, and the Oakland Museum of California. Olivia will serve as the Video Projection Designer for OurTown.
Emiko Omori (Filmmaker)
Emiko Omori began her career as a filmmaker and cinematographer in 1968, when there were few camerawomen and fewer still Asian American cinematographers. Her first job was as camera/editor on the KQED program, Newsroom, in San Francisco. She left KQED in 1972 and, since then, has freelanced as a producer, director, cinematographer, and editor on many award-winning films, taught, and traveled extensively with her work in addition to making her own films. Her Emmy award winning documentary Rabbit in the Moon premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.
Wendy Slick (Filmmaker)
Wendy Slick is an established Bay Area film producer, director, writer, and editor. She has produced a wide range of films over the last decades, establishing herself as a talented and sensitive filmmaker who is effective in multiple roles and a variety of contexts. “Passion and Power — a women’s rights film” — garnered a successful run following a Lincoln Center premiere. Her work for American Playhouse, PBS, Lucasfilm, Disney, Showtime, and Apple has been honored with Emmy and ACE nominations. She recently produced and directed “A Love Poem to My Friend Ethel” — a portrait of a longtime activist in her 80’s that premiered at the Mill Valley Film Festival.
Mark Shigenaga
(
Photographer)
Mark Shigenaga is a third-generation Japanese American with a passion for supporting community activities through photography. This pursuit has deepened an understanding of his heritage and enabled a connection to many cultures. A chance alignment at the 2013 San Jose Obon led to a commission from Mark and Brenda to photograph their work MU later that year, followed by continued documentation of many First Voice performances. While his photographic style continues to evolve, he is most inspired by images that portray the vibrancy and Soul of our collective communities, whether through the sharing of various art forms, celebrations, or remembrances.
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