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Budokan


Budokan

Each big city has a multipurpose indoor arena. Usually the arena is build for hosting indoor sports but also used as the concert hall too.

Indoor sports are usually professional sports, as like ice hockey or basketball. Madison Square Garden in NYC is for both, ice hockey and basketball.

Tokyo, one of the largest cities on Earth of course has several indoor arenas. The construction has started mainly for the summer Olympic games in 1964. One of the indoor arenas built at that time is Budokan(officially called Nippon Budokan). Budokan was the venue for the judo matches. Judo was introduced to Olympic games officially from Tokyo 1964.

From then, Budokan is known for holy place for judo players, but after the Olympic games, it has been used as the concert hall too. The first concert was played by The Japan Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Leopold Stokowski in 1965. In 1966, The Beatles came to Japan for their first time and played at Budokan. Of course the tickets were sold out immediately and Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department had to send their riot police officers inside the Budokan. Budokan can accommodate up to 14471 spectators.

After The Beatles, Budokan was used by domestic artists and overseas artists, thanks to its good location; middle of Tokyo and subway station is nearby. Then, it was recognized as the top status to play at Budokan for domestic artists. Overseas artists playing at Budokan were only superstars.

Although superstars tend to have concerts at Tokyo dome(indoor baseball stadium) which can accommodate more than 40000, but playing at Tokyo dome is limited to baseball's off seasons.

Sting, vocal and bass player of legendary band The Police played at Tokyo dome for The Police's reunion tour in Tokyo but played in Budokan for his latest solo tour in 2017.

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