On the occasion of the National Day of the Republic of Croatia at EXPO 2025 Osaka on Sunday, September 21, 2025, from 11 A.M. to 12 P.M., the Official Ceremony will be held at the National Day “Ray Garden” arena.
The Official Ceremony will feature the singing of the Croatian and Japanese national anthems and speeches by high-ranking officials, and will feature the Kwansei Gakuin Glee Club and the National Folk Dance Ensemble of Croatia LADO.
The Kwansei Gakuin Glee Club will perform a piece that has connected Japan and Croatia for more than a century: “U Boj, U Boj.” The story began back in 1919, after World War I, when they were returning from Siberia and their ship was damaged in a typhoon and docked in the city of Kobe for repairs. During their stay, they met students from Kwansei Gakuin University — among them members of the young Glee Club, the first university men's choir in Japan. One of the songs the soldiers gave him was “U Boj, U Boj” as a powerful call to battle. At the farewell gathering, the Glee Club members surprised the soldiers by singing the song “U Boj, u Boj”.
“U Boj, u Boj” comes from the Croatian national opera Nikola Šubić Zrinski, composed by Ivan Zajc in 1876. The opera depicts the heroic defense of Siget in 1566, when Zrinski and his knights offered their last resistance to the Ottomans. The song is sung as the heroes emerge from the fortress for their final battle.
Today, “U Boj, U Boj” is one of the most beloved compositions of Japanese male choirs, and its story is a testament to cultural exchange, friendship, and togetherness.
The National Folk Dance Ensemble of Croatia LADO will also perform at the Official Ceremony. LADO is a professional folklore ensemble founded 76 years ago with the task and goal of researching, collecting, artistically processing and performing the most beautiful examples of the rich Croatian music and dance tradition.
Its top dancers, who are also outstanding singers, easily transform from a dance ensemble into a representative folklore choir, and the musicians of the LADO Ensemble orchestra are top multi-instrumentalists who play more than eighty traditional and classical instruments.
LADO owns a unique collection of original folk costumes of exceptional value and beauty, so each concert of the Ensemble, in addition to song and dance, is also a kind of review of original Croatian traditional attire. All this, along with the presentation of the amazing wealth and diversity of folklore expression from such a small area as Croatia, makes LADO unique in the world. The Ensemble's concerts around the world are met with undivided enthusiasm from the audience, but also by professional critics, who regularly rank it alongside the world's best folklore groups.