Kitaro's journey from unabashed electronica to a more relaxing orchestral style is culminated with the live release of Live in Yakushiji. I was lucky enough to see this particular concert series live in Shibuya, Japan and a variant of that concert is reproduced brilliantly here. The music along with the photos in the booklet set the mood for a fantastic listening experience that shows how much Kitaro has grown as an artist and continues to keep his music fresh, despite a tendancy for artists to "over-technologize" their music. Kitaro has none of that here.

This is my first Kitaro CD and I am amazed. The music is so moving that you can't help but feel your soul stirring inside. This music will keep anyone on their spiritual path.

After seeing the DVD of this, getting the cd's were a must! This Kitaro performance is just too good! The place that it took place makes it all the more special!

this cd is really good. the song caravanasary is really really good and relaxing. i reconmmened the unique styleo f kitaro to anyone. its very soothing. and i do think he does promote peace. if u see most of kitaro's reviews...they r all great. kitaro has always been great and he always will be. great from the beginning till the end.

This record represents the worst of Western misperceptions of the East (dealt out by a fellow from Japan, nonetheless) with the worst of the West. New Age drivel set to monstrous post-Romantic bluster. This could possibly be the worst record ever made. Honestly, at least the various golden throat singers have some humility. But Kitaro is all self-serious, at the same time as he is brutally inept. There are about three good moments in this entire 2 disc extravaganza of schlock: the opening with the monks of the place he recorded this, and a couple of Stockhausen-esque moments of great sound. Unfortunately these moments were few and far between and were used solely as atmosphere for the silly twaddle that Kitaro confuses for deeply-felt emotion.

To add insult to injury, Kitaro wraps himself up in enough quasi-spiritual garbage to bring embarassment to Joseph Campbell. Compound that to his sentiments of dedicating the work to "world peace" (c'mon, Man, are you kidding anyone?), and you have a truly hideous and funny parody of the New Age movement. Unfortunately the laughs stop somewhere about 10 minutes into the first Kitaro composition. Naturally this stinker is going to be a major PBS schlockbuster, probably a pledge-drive warhorse.

If you want good solid spirituality in highly dramatic music, might I suggest Monteverdi's Vespers, Mozart's Requiem, or anything by Messaien? If you want good Eastern spiritual music, there are plenty of good recordings of various monks and other mystics. There are even some good East meets West recordings (for instance, the classical music of Persia or the garmon work of Ramahm Assadolahi, the Azeri master of that instrument). You could take a dart and throw it at just about anything released in the last 10 years, and it would probably be better than this.