Performing Arts

The Performing Arts Program introduces performers from Japan’s contemporary and traditional music, dance and theater scenes, and commissions non-Japanese performing artists to create works on themes relating to Japan. Many distinguished artists have performed in the Society’s 260-seat theater and on Society-produced North American tours. Since 1953, Japan Society’s Performing Arts Program has inspired audiences in New York and beyond with over 1,000 productions ranging from traditional Japanese arts to contemporary theater, dance, music and more.

Performing Arts 2024-2025 Season

Japan Society’s 2024–2025 season, celebrating Artistic Director Yoko Shioya’s 20th anniversary at the helm of the Performing Arts Program, culminates this spring with a wide assortment of music workshops and concerts. In May, five leading shakuhachi masters come together as The Shakuhachi 5, for a new music concert linking the Edo period’s cool culture to today, while our shakuhachi workshops offer plenty of opportunities to explore, play and even craft this unique Japanese instrument. Then, in June, young jazz sensation Shun Ishiwaka has his U.S. debut in two contrasting concerts that place the percussion prodigy front and center as lead man.

Sneak preview of our 2025-2026 season:
In conjunction with the launch of her highly anticipated New York solo museum exhibition debut, Chiharu Shiota: Two Home Countries (September 12, 2025–January 11, 2026), Chiharu Shiota’s internationally lauded stage design will also be featured this fall through a new work of theater commissioned by Japan Society. Based on one of the defining novels by legendary Japanese author Yukio Mishima (1925–1970) and developed with former SITI Company director and founding member Leon Ingulsrud, this new work brings Shiota’s fluid, responsive and deeply intimate stage design to American audiences for the first time. Check back soon for more information and details on the entire 2025–2026 season which coincides with the 100th anniversary of Yukio Mishima’s birth!