BRC Imagination Arts created the USA Pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka in Japan. The team was inspired by the legendary “It’s A Small World,” which premiered at the 1964 New York World’s Fair.
Created by Walt Disney and his team for the UNICEF Pavilion sponsored by Pepsi, it was ridden by ten million guests from 1964 to 1965. It then opened at Disneyland, Magic Kingdom, Disneyland Paris, Hong Kong Disneyland, and Tokyo Disneyland, entertaining over 250 million people in more than 60 years.
The secret of its success is the unforgettable song, a wish for world peace that has become a legendary “earworm” and an emotional souvenir hummed by generations of guests worldwide. For the USA Pavilion project, BRC Imagination Arts’ goal was to create a pavilion as memorable and enjoyable as this.
The team aimed to take World Expo visitors on an emotionally resonant journey into the American spirit of creativity and imagination, utilising BRC's Deep Story methodology to merge the story's heart with “Brand USA” for “invitational transformation,” turning visits into moments of genuine connection with the US.
Having created memorable pavilions since 1984, BRC Imagination Arts knew that an original musical score and signature song were vital to carry the theme and deepen the experience—much like “Small World,” so visitors would exit “humming the pavilion.”
"Imagine What We Can Create Together"
Christian Lachel, executive creative director and co-media director of the USA Pavilion experience, says: “The music we created tells the story of the American spirit through song in a way that resonates with people from around the world. The song that carries people through the pavilion is an anthem that’s catchy, with a modern feel that’s also timeless. Memorable.
“The song becomes an emotional souvenir people remember and cherish. We knew 90% of visitors would be from Japan, so we made sure what we did connected with Japanese music and culture. We created music that was friendly, inviting and memorable.”
The pavilion theme, "Imagine What We Can Create Together," invites visitors to see America's strengths: creativity, innovation, entrepreneurship, and collaboration. Every aspect of their journey, including the music, conveys this message.
The host of the pavilion, the US Department of State, knew that America had to ‘get it right’ at Expo 2025 Osaka. A World Expo is a global performance, and how you show up matters. The pavilion needed to resonate with the Japanese audience, who would be 90% of visitors.
The theme of inviting the world to imagine a better future suggested sub-themes used to create realms of experience: connection, innovation, adventure, and space.
The Space realm's payoff is the rocket launch experience—a technical and creative feat showing BRC's ability to emotionally engineer genuine awe. Visitors, amidst LED screens, 360-degree sounds, effects, and lighting, feel part of a NASA launch with vibrations, media, smoke, and soaring audio. Then, they are invited to see a lunar sample, as at Expo 1970 in Osaka.
A linear narrative experience
For the team, the challenge was then to stitch the themes, sub-themes, and the realms they’d inhabit together into a single, inspiring guest adventure. The answer was a song embedded in an original musical score. But first, they had to determine an approach that would showcase the song.
The decision was to create a pulsed, narrative, linear experience, much like a film that unfolds through a series of connected spaces and scenes. This approach would maximise visitation while not losing the story thread, and align with guest preferences for "short form, high impact" media. Guests travel through a series of concise, focused scenes, each supported by a unique musical expression of a simple, catchy song.
The experience is hosted by Spark, an animated, multilingual mascot that moves between screens and presentations, embodying creativity and guiding guests with friendship and continuity. Not just a photo op, Spark embodies the theme, journeying with guests from start to finish, enhanced by music that fosters emotional flow.
Choosing the right music
With the theme, experiential approach, and mascot in place, it was time to explore the music. For storytellers and designers, music is an essential tool that shapes how guests feel and remember, transforming fleeting moments into lasting memories through the power of human emotion.
BRC Imagination Arts partnered with music producer Brian Yessian and his team at Yessian Global Music:
“Our process began as an inspired collaboration with BRC, who had a very specific idea of what they wanted. They wanted a catchy, memorable song embedded in an original musical score that carried guests through the pavilion. The melody of the song would repeat in each narrative experience as the lyrics evolved to reflect the content.
“The song would brighten every story beat, touch the heart and stir the emotions. We leaned into the aesthetics of regional pop music: J-Pop, K-Pop, C-Pop. Music is such a defining bridge between cultures and peoples. We used elements of these great, popular genres to grab people. We even had a Brass Band in New Orleans play the song in a brass-band style."
“Our task was challenging, because the song would be presented in English, Japanese and Mandarin. Each iteration of the song and story-driven lyrics had to land perfectly with that audience. Our main composer in the US, Mark Chu, is a kind of mastermind at this. He dug deeply into rhyme schemes that would work for all three languages. We had a Japanese producer and a Mandarin producer to ensure the music worked for everyone. It did.”
The lasting impact
The USA Pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka demonstrates music's transformative role in World Expo experiences.
It actively shapes visitors' journey by blending English and Japanese melodies into an inclusive sonic tapestry that amplifies the pavilion's message of collaborative possibility.
Yessian adds: “A client messaged me that he was in Osaka for the Expo, and I asked him if he’d visited the United States Pavilion. He messaged back saying, “You mean the one that I can’t get out my head? It’s the only music I kept humming the whole day I was there.” That’s what it’s all about, getting people to ‘hum the pavilion’ as they leave.”
Last week, BRC Imagination Arts announced that its founder and chairman, Bob Rogers, will once again be hosting the Legends Panel at IAAPA Expo. This year, the panel includes four exceptional talents who contributed to the creation of Universal's Epic Universe.
