“I feel quite honored to be asked by the Galaxy festival to make a monument to represent my impression of Sado Island during my residency there in September 2021. My first consideration was to make something that would be lasting …possibly for many generations. The second was to make something that would endure without the limitations of today’s technology. Wakarimasen was one of the first phrases that I learned in Nihongo and I soon wrote a melody using this word. When I conceived of making the monument of two arms emerging from the earth, I envisioned chimes hanging down from the hands and tuned to this melody. This solved the issue of having a monument that would endure and represent a phrase of music I created while in Japan. The monument is altogether 3 meters high and the arms, which are 2 meters long, sit on a base of 1 meter. People who visit the monument will be able to play the melody with wooden beaters which will be available near the monument. The sequence of the melody is to start on the thumb side of the left arm for the ascending scale of the melody and then come back from the “”pinky”” side of the right arm finishing at the thumb of the right arm. Of course the chimes can be played in any order if one chooses. I envision that the chimes will be constructed of stainless steel or a metal of equivocal resonance.”