Tong Poo 2

Tong Poo 1

There are a number of versions of Tong Poo available on YouTube, recorded over decades. I can't say for certain who composed the work but from the 1978 video (above), it may well have been improvised during a 'shared piano' duet by music phenom Ryuichi Sakamato and his first wife Akiko Yano, a music phenom in her own right who began playing piano at the age of three. 

We can see from 1983 clips inserted in the duet video that Tong Poo was eventually fleshed into a YMO (Yellow Magic Orchestra) techno-pop performance involving more than one type of instrument.

By the time the following video was made, in 1993, we can hear from the roar in the audience filling the huge Tokyo Dome that Tong Poo had become a YMO favorite. By then the orchestration for the simple tune had taken on complexity and the depth to support virtuoso performances on instruments other than piano.

So one way to refer to Tong Poo is "Artists at work."

********