The Path to Becoming a Double Bass Player: Meeting Mentors Who Influenced Me
My journey with instruments began with the tuba, but a particular event opened the door to becoming a double bass player.
The wind orchestra club at the junior high school I attended didn't have many members, so we practiced at our own pace and performed for school events like morning assemblies and sports festivals.
After my close senior club members graduated, I enrolled in Toda High School, which had the only orchestra club in the prefecture. Eventually, driven by the desire to "have a place to play the wind music we love," we gathered volunteers, even involving students from nearby schools, to form what would later become the Toda Citizen's Wind Orchestra.
Soon, I started visiting Toda High, drawn there by my junior high seniors. A female club member who played the double bass saw potential in me and said, "Kikuchi-kun, you're coming to Toda High and playing this." Her words made me think, "Oh, is that so?" and without a second thought, I enrolled in Toda High.
And so, I ended up playing the double bass in the orchestra club. For a while, I played both the tuba and the double bass, but the high school orchestra was small, and there were almost no pieces that used the tuba. Since I was in a state of indecision anyway, I decided to specialize in the double bass with my future in mind.