Tsuyoshi Tomoko (in 2007/2008) was my beginning project with namu art for Life network. My name is Anikó Kiss. I was born on the June 3, 1983 in the village of Hennigs and now live in Berlin. I came to Berlin in 2000 as a street kid, without a home. I got involved in a youth institution which has helped me to gain control of my life again. They offered theatrical projects in which I took part. In 2006, I got involved in a version of Shakespeare's “Romeo and Juliet”, but our version was about street kids. My role involved a lot of singing. Una Gonshorr was watching this play and was very impressed with my voice.

During that time I was working on improving my professional qualification through a combined work-school program. I had to work 2 days and go to school 3 days which didn't leave me much time for the music. I had the idea to finish my vocational training with namu Art for life network, a registered association. Remuneration was not important for me. This way I was able to pursue my hobby 2 days a week and prepared my graduation during the other days. This was during the summer 2006 and in 2007.

Then in January, 2007 I asked Una whether I could build my own project. I wanted to understand how something like that works and whether I was able to do it. Said, done. I had my own project and today it gives provides a lot of pleasure. The project is very structured quite simply. My job is to select the music which I would like to interpret, to rehearse it and to make it into a nice musical programme. I present my projects to Una, because the organizational guidance is her role and this is a good thing too, because I'm not very skilled in organizing. The next step is the artisitic conversion and performance. We choose the music titles and the different genres. We also determine whether we invite guests, as for example Michael Ritter and Holger Trenz - both great musicians-. Together, as a small ensemble we rehearse the pieces of music and perform them in hospices and hospitals in front of a huge number of adults. You might ask yourself why adults? Oh well, the singing ensemble “APONI” consists of adults who perform music for children and youngsters. However, I wanted to play music for adults. I cover my musical repertoire from the music from 60's, jazz, pop, soul and rock up to the charts from today. I feel bad that I haven't been able to find a name for my project for nearly 1 ½ years. So, I spent time at home in front of my computer and have researched in the internet. In the meantime I have resumed my school program to expand my knowledge. As I very much appreciate Asian culture I have decided theat the project should be named “Tsuyoshi Tomoko”. Literally translated “Tsuyoshi” means strong or robust and “Tomoko” means child of wisdom. So - a name not only fitting for this project fits, but also to me personally.

Project manager Anikó Kiss
Coaching Una Gonschorr
Participants Holger Trenz, Michael Ritter