GMU Pop Culture Journalism

Feature Response: The 10-year-old guitar prodigy

Last month, The New York Times featured an interesting and impressive article on Yuto Miyazawa, a 10-year-old Japanese guitar prodigy who has been leaving people in awe as of late for his incredible guitar skills at such a young age.  This article is an introduction to the man, or should I say kid who explains what it is like to tour at such a young age, what artists he looks up to, how he began playing, and most of all, how he balances out touring and publicity with living a “normal” life as a schoolboy in Japan.

The writer of this article, Joyce Hor-Chung Lau, interviewed Yuto, his father, Tsuneo Miyazawa and his manager, Steve Bernstein.  Lau went above and beyond to interview this young prodigy, and had to go to the Hong Kong Fringe Club, a small club all the way in Hong Kong.  Lau first heard of Yuto from his first televised performance on the Ellen DeGeneres Show last May.  After that, he played at the Lollapalooza festival in Chicago and has since gained notoriety.  On top of that, Ozzy Osbourne has put his name out there as well, and performed the song, “Crazy Train” on stage as Yuto got to jam with one of his idols.

Since the article was well-balanced and didn’t have any major glitches, there were not many questions the writer asked that should not have been answered.  The only thing to point out is that Yuto’s father is quiet and did not answer a lot about his son’s talent.  For example, the author points out that his father often accompanies Yuto on his travels but remains in the background and could be mistaken for a particularly clean-cut roadie.  Also, his father is quoted saying,“We are proud of him,” in a shy manner about his son.

This feature is organized in a perfect fashion.  The author begins the piece by talking about Yuto’s performance at the Hong Kong Fringe Club.  A fan then shouted at Yuto to play the song, “Crazy Train,” and held up a camera phone with a video of the old Ozzy Osbourne favorite, thinking Yuto had no idea what he was talking about.  The prodigy knew what to do, but denied the fan and instead played his own ballad, “Let’s Go.”  The rock and roll attitude is already starting to sink in.

This next part then follows up to him performing “Free Bird” and finishing off his encore with, of course, “Crazy Train.”  Next, the writer delves into his performances of the small stage (Hong Kong Fringe Club) to the big stage (Lollapalooza).  A point then had to be made of his performance with Ozzy Osbourne and how he lifted him up on stage while playing a long guitar solo.

The Ozzy Osbourne experience led to a great transition to his personal, and rather simple life.  His father works at a bank and his mother is a housewife who cares for him and a younger brother.  The author then discusses how some prodigies are surrounded by staff and private tutors, but Yuto prefers to go to school and then tours during the holidays, something very unselfish.

This leads to the discussing of how he began playing guitar, which was at the age of 1 year and 10 months while picking up a vegetable grater, cradling it and trying to strum it.  The real guitar lessons began at the age of four.  Now that is what you call talent.

The author ends off by discussing what is in store for the future of the young guitar prodigy, and how once he stops playing music on stage, he is just like any other 10-year-old kid in society.