Lost Freedom: Japanese American Confinement in America, Narrated by George Takei

The program’s centerpiece is a world premiere of a Moab Music Festival commission by Composer-in-Residence and violist Kenji Bunch, narrated by George Takei.

Actor and author George Takei revisits his past growing up in Japanese American Confinement camps during WWII as he honors three living Japanese American composers. Takei will lead the audience through a dark part of American history that saw Japanese Americans stripped of their property and liberty, including a glimpse of Moab’s Citizen Isolation Center at nearby Dalton Wells. This new work, by Kenji Bunch, honors those individuals. Percussionist/composer Andy Akiho plays several of his works, joined by MMF musicians. Compositions by Paul Chihara, also a Confinement camp survivor, fill out this special concert.

The concert takes place on the lawn of the scenic resort, overlooking the Colorado river and surrounded by towering red rock walls.