"Shotengai no Pianist" drama: Episode eleven of thirteen recap

 

 Air Dates: October 3rd to December 26, 2022  Monday nights at 10:30 pm on BS Shochiku

Thirteen 25 minute episodes, subs once again done by GEO9875 at DA

Also known as Pianist in the Shopping District

Main Cast: Usually have to update this section often but don't think that's going to happen in this series. Most of the action will be taking place at the Kajiwara Music Store which is in the shopping district in an unnamed small city.

Kiita Komagine as Ren Sawamoto.... Young man about 22 or so in age who works as an electrician. He still lives with his mother and about ten years ago his father disappeared, how and why were explained in the final three shows. Ren is so talented at the piano but ten years ago stopped playing, when his father left? It seems so as the family piano was sold at that time and it appears Ren has found it at the Kajiwara music store, will finding it spark his interest to start playing again? Yes it did and even after not playing for ten years Ren is still a master.

 Mio Yuki as Modori Kajiwara.... About twenty in age and works at her father's music store, she seems to run the place. Midori isn't all that talented as far as music goes but has a dream to be a painter and wants to attend an art school. No one seems to recognize her talent except for Ren, the pair never met until the first episode.

 Hiroto Yoshimitsu as Yosuke Kajiwara.... Midori's father and seems to be nice man, also a big fan of music and thinks that his daughter doesn't have much talent at painting!

An Hasegawa as Moe Kato.... Daughter of the next woman and is ten years old. Moe loves the piano but has to sneak into the Kajiwara store to play their street piano as her mother hates the the instrument and would rather see her daughter studying 100% of the time. Moe is a beginner but does show a lot of talent and her favorite piece is "Fur Elise" by Beethoven. 

Maki Kubota as Masae Kato.... Moe's mother who as explained hates the piano and owns a clothing shop near the music store, she says the piano is way too loud which I think is a lie. But she has softened her views about the piano as the series has gone on and really encourages Moe these days to play it.

 Naho Toda as Sakiko Sawamoto.... Ren's mother and to date don't know much about her but seems she's been secretly communicating with Ren's father all these years.

Short promo video for the eleventh episode

Previous recaps:

Episode one .... Episode two .... Episode three .... Episode four 

Episode five .... Episode six .... Episode seven .... Episode eight

Episode nine .... Episode ten

 

 Final trio of recaps for this series, there's three posts in a row and won't view the next two until this is written up and for some reason it took a while to get inspired about writing these up. This was a one episode story and will my long ago prediction be correct? That's of Ren finally seeing his father who left the household ten years ago. His father's name is Tadashi, when he left Ren and his mother Tadashi's company had been struggling and eventually went bankrupt. The family piano had been sold to pay off some of the debts, it's been rediscovered by Ren which has been very key to the storyline and let's get to this eleventh episode.

 Ren's father appears to have the household on December 25, 2012 as Christmas day of 2022 is circled on his calendar at home, the return date of the father? If so things better get moving as when this episode began off it was December 10th, a few days did pass in this show so it's probably about the 15th. But as you can see in the screenshots the weather is still nice, thought this took place in a smallish town not too far from Tokyo but perhaps not. All the episodes to date have been fun and enjoyable, also have learned about many older composers. But this was the slowest show to date as really not all that much took place so was trying to stretch things out a bit. In the top screenshot is the composer featured in this episode who is Claude Debussy who was from France. Like many he didn't live a long life dying at the age of 55 in 1918.

 The song we'll hear most from him is "Claire de lune" which was a piece from his 1890 "Suite bergamasque" and besides Idols you also learn there was music before J-Pop! In the second screenshot is the Kajiwara Music Shop where 90% of the action takes place, to date haven't seen the store make one sale! The female above is Midori who runs the shop for her father Yosuke, she's a very upbeat young woman but the last few episodes her attitude about her future has been a bit up and down. Midori's dream is to become a painter but in all honesty is only fair at it, she's failed twice to get into art school and is beginning to wonder should she abandon her dream? The only person to enjoy her paintings has been Ren and Midori noticed at the start of this episode she paints so much better when Ren is playing the piano. There's something about his 'Aura' while playing and even Ren had no clue what Midori was talking about. So she began to think how can she combine her painting and Ren's piano playing together, Midori came up with an idea which is this show's main story.

 If you've been viewing this series too you may have noticed something that I have. Which is how Midori has slowly been falling for Ren, he's not quite the 'love of her life' but Midori does have a crush on him which he hasn't noticed.... or has he? In this episode it was hard not to see the facial expressions of Midori while she was with Ren, don't think this drama will end on a romantic note but the two do seem like they would make for such a perfect couple. Midori's grand plan is to have a video of her painting while Ren plays the piano, it'll be taped by the young girl Moe. "Canon" and "Maiden's Prayer" are two other compositions we've heard in this series, both superb songs but Midori didn't feel either brought out Ren's aura as much. So it was settled on that he'll play Debussy while Midori is painting, that will be taking place at the music store over the weekend.

 It didn't seem as though Midori had any concrete plan on what she was going to paint, she thought that Ren's playing would inspire her while the event was being filmed. It's hard to say if Midori is talented or not, better than I am but that's not saying much. Her father Yosuke does support her but has also said her paintings are sadly not all that good. But Ren has always thought Midori's creations were superb and could that be one reason she has that unknown crush on him? Time flew by and it's now Saturday, when the first ever dual video of Ren playing and Midori painting will take place. We did see a bit off Midori's painting such as above but for the most part we didn't see too much of how it was shaping up until the end of the performance. 

 In the top screenshot above you can see how Midori's painting ended up, looked okay but there was one more step to come. I thought it was ingenuous how Midori then took a piece of paper that she had drawn the keys of a piano on. She then laid it on top of painting while holding it slightly down, she then raised the paper to reveal the final version of the painting which is in the second above screenshot. Not sure what it was supposed to be, piano keys in the sky(?), but Ren, Moe and her father were very impressed with the painting which could be her best one to date. So Midori's spirits are much higher than they were in the beginning of the show, could she have possibly found a different style of painting which she'll continue to do?

 That's unknown and when episodes are only ~24 minutes in length many things are left for us to figure out. For the final scene Ren and Midori were outside the music shop talking about art and music. To Midori Ren's playing is a tad like Synesthesia for to Midori the music brings colors to her head and is why she can paint so much better while he's playing. So that brings us to the conclusion of this show which while slow was another enjoyable one. Two more episodes to go and will Ren finally be reunited with his father? There is one other question which is about Midori. Her mother died fifteen years ago  and the anniversary date of her death will be happening soon. Three episodes ago Midori told Ren she wanted to have a special occasion for the anniversary but no mention has been made since of it.