Who is Broodal, a supporter who loves the Kanagawa Philharmonic?

Have you heard of " Blue Dull, " the cute dog character with blue polka dots? He's often seen at Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra (hereafter referred to as Kanagawa Philharmonic) concerts and on their website, so it's safe to say he's a music lover. Upon further investigation, I discovered that Blue Dull was created by Yokohama design company NDC Graphics in 2004 to coincide with the opening of the Minatomirai Line, and is currently active as the official mascot of the Kanagawa Philharmonic. This sounded intriguing, so I spoke to Kanagawa Philharmonic PR representative Koichiro Tago and NDC Graphics' Azusa Tanaka about the story of Blue Dull and the Kanagawa Philharmonic.

"With the opening of the Minatomirai Line, talk arose of creating a new symbol to represent Yokohama. As we brainstormed ideas, we came across the story that Dalmatians used to be used as guide dogs for horse-drawn carriages in the West. Inspired by this, we chose the Dalmatian as a symbol to welcome visitors to Yokohama. The local government, local shopping districts, department stores, and others came together to launch the Yokohama Blue Dalmatian Project," says Tanaka.

Indeed, the agile and graceful Dalmatian is a perfect fit for Yokohama's image. That's why a Dalmatian with blue dots was chosen as the campaign character. However, initially, the key visual was a real Dalmatian with its color changed using CG.

Later, when NDC Graphics held a design exhibition, the idea of "creating a character that would appeal to the Yokohama brand" was further developed, and a character called " Blue Dal" was born by a design unit led by the late Kenzo Nakagawa.
Yes, Blue Dal was named after Yokohama's image color, "blue," and "dalmatian."

In order to develop the character into one that will be loved for a long time, we first produced a picture book. This wordless picture book is filled with the hope that it will be enjoyed by a wide range of people, regardless of age or nationality.

This is the four-panel comic strip "Blue Dal's Sunday" that was serialized in the Sunday edition of the Kanagawa Shimbun. It was a popular series that ran from April 2006 until last fall.
Later, Broodal 's adorable character and the concept of "regional revitalization" caught the eye of people associated with the Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra, and a collaboration began. In 2008, Broodal was appointed the Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra's support mascot, and merchandise featuring the Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra playing instruments was also released.

"The Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra's mission is to create a musical culture that is closely connected to the local community. Classical music also has an image of being fun and intellectual, so we were grateful for the Kanagawa Philharmonic's offer, as we wanted to carefully nurture Brooddal ," said Tanaka.

"Due to the reform of the public interest corporation system, the Kanagawa Philharmonic had to become a public interest corporation by the end of November 2013, but at the time our financial situation was very tight and it would have been difficult to continue if we had continued like this. We felt that the only way to continue our musical activities was to ask for support from the local community, so we considered opening a fund named after Broodal . We spoke to Mr. Nakagawa, who readily agreed, and so the 'Broodal Fund' was established," says Mr. Taga.

Furthermore, Nakagawa spun the story of the launch of the Blue Dal Foundation into the story of Blue Dal .

The story goes that when Broodal 's friends "donate" acorns into the tuba, beautiful flowers eventually bloom from the tuba that Broodal plays.
"Inspired by this story, we had the idea of placing an old tuba at the concert venue instead of a donation box. We didn't go ahead with this idea because it would have been a pain to collect the coins afterwards (laughs), but I think it gave us a chance to take a more positive approach to fundraising," says Taga.

Currently, Blue Dal has a wide variety of goods!
You can purchase them here as well as at Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse No. 1 and Osanbashi Pier.

The most popular items are the badges. By responding to requests from orchestra members and children, the orchestra now has all the instruments it needs. It looks like Broodal might even hold a concert someday.
Maybe Broodal is a genius?!

This is "Kanagawa's Delicious Water, Forest Harmony," a bottled water manufactured and sold by the Kanagawa Prefectural Enterprise Bureau. The bottle features a Blue Dull design, and a portion of the sales will be donated to the Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra.

2020 marks the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, concerts in the first half of the year were canceled, but with the state of emergency lifted, the orchestra is slowly getting back on track.
" Broodaru is a character living in the present, so I'm sure he's looking forward to the Kanagawa Philharmonic concert," said Tanaka.

I'm looking forward to the day when I can go to concerts and enjoy music freely!

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