GUEST ARTISTS I MUSIC FROM JAPAN Friday I October 19, 2018 I 7:30 pm Conservatory Recital Hall
SATOKO INOUE piano KO ISHIKAWA Japanese sho
13th Performance I 2018-2019 Academic Year I Conservatory of Music I University of the Pacif-
CONCERT PROGRAM I OCTOBER 19 I 7:30 PM kusa no shomotsu II (2018) [book of grass]*
Satoshi Tanaka (b. 1956)
Himmel im Wasser (2001) [Sky in Water]
Takashi Fujii (1959-2018)
Nonviolent Way II (2018)*
Yuji Itoh (b. 1956) Intermission
Kaze no Yume II (2018) [Dream of the Wind II]
Robert Coburn (b. 1949) sho, computer, and video
distant light ... quiet stream (2017/2018) piano solo
Robert Coburn (b. 1949)
a soft breath of winter light (2017/2018) Robert Coburn (b. 1949) sho, piano, and electronic sound *World premiere
PROGRAM NOTES
Sho player Ko Ishikawa studied Japanese traditional Gagaku music under his masters Mayumi Miyata, Hideaki Bunno and Sukeyasu Shiba. He is a member of Reigakusha Gagaku Ensemble in Tokyo. He is recognized internationally for his performances of both Gagaku music and contemporary and experimental music. ww.radiant-osc.com Ishikawa’s recent performances include: 2018 - Europe and the world, a symphony of cultures (British Museum, London); Salon Tokyo; and with the Bozzini Quartet (Montreal, Quebec). 2017 - In a Winter Garden (Stanford University, California); Yugenism: Animated Soundscapes of the Japanese Sublime (London); ISCM World New Music Days (Vancouver). Satoko Inoue completed post-graduate studies in composition at Tokyo Gakugei University. Since 1991, she has been engaged in solo activities after her career as a member of Musica Practica Ensemble. Her recitals, especially those of Jo Kondo’s piano works and of Morton Feldman, are highly rated at home and abroad. Her activities have spread worldwide, as she has played at ISCM (Bucharest), Ciclo de Conciertos de Música Contemporánea (Buenos Aires), and other international contemporary music festivals. She has given solo recitals in Europe, North and South America and the Middle East and has given lectures and Masterclasses at the Cairo Conservatoire, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama (London), and other universities. She has planned and produced the series of concerts called “Music Documents” thrice a year for more than 10 years. Six solo albums have been released under HatHut Records (Switzerland) and several record labels in Japan and other countries. She was awarded the 10th Keizo Saji Prize of the Suntory Music Foundation. She is currently a professor at the Kunitachi College of Music in Tokyo. kusa no shomotsu II [book of grass] This piece is the gradation of the sounds which are changing slowly. It’s said that Sho’s sound shows heaven. So, you will be able to listen to the spatial sounds in this piece. The title was taken from the poem of Arseny Tarkovsky who is father of Andrei Tarkovsky.
PROGRAM NOTES Sho player Ko Ishikawa studied Japanese traditional Gagaku music under his masters Mayumi Miyata, Hideaki Bunno and Sukeyasu Shiba. He is a member of Reigakusha Gagaku Ensemble in Tokyo. He is recognized internationally for his performances of both Gagaku music and contemporary and experimental music. ww.radiant-osc.com Ishikawa’s recent performances include: 2018 - Europe and the world, a symphony of cultures (British Museum, London); Salon Tokyo; and with the Bozzini Quartet (Montreal, Quebec). 2017 - In a Winter Garden (Stanford University, California); Yugenism: Animated Soundscapes of the Japanese Sublime (London); ISCM World New Music Days (Vancouver). Satoko Inoue completed post-graduate studies in composition at Tokyo Gakugei University. Since 1991, she has been engaged in solo activities after her career as a member of Musica Practica Ensemble. Her recitals, especially those of Jo Kondo’s piano works and of Morton Feldman, are highly rated at home and abroad. Her activities have spread worldwide, as she has played at ISCM (Bucharest), Ciclo de Conciertos de Música Contemporánea (Buenos Aires), and other international contemporary music festivals. She has given solo recitals in Europe, North and South America and the Middle East and has given lectures and Masterclasses at the Cairo Conservatoire, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama (London), and other universities. She has planned and produced the series of concerts called “Music Documents” thrice a year for more than 10 years. Six solo albums have been released under HatHut Records (Switzerland) and several record labels in Japan and other countries. She was awarded the 10th Keizo Saji Prize of the Suntory Music Foundation. She is currently a professor at the Kunitachi College of Music in Tokyo. kusa no shomotsu II [book of grass] This piece is the gradation of the sounds which are changing slowly. It’s said that Sho’s sound shows heaven. So, you will be able to listen to the spatial sounds in this piece. The title was taken from the poem of Arseny Tarkovsky who is father of Andrei Tarkovsky. Born in Hokkaido, Japan, Satoshi Tanaka studied composition with Joji Yuasa, Kenjiro Urata and Shin-ichiro Ikebe at the Tokyo College of Music. In 1984 his orchestra piece “The Hour of Silence” was selected for Gaudeamus International Week of Music in Holland and was performed by NOS Radio Orchestra conducted by Richard Dufallo. Tanaka was awarded the 9th Irino Prize in 1988 for his composition “Iris Field,“ performed by the New Japan Philharmonic, conducted by Kazuhiro Koizumi. In 2004, he was appointed by Asian Cultural Council as Composer in Residence in both New York and San Francisco. His “The Hour of Silence” was performed by Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kazuki Yamada at the Suntory Hall in Tokyo in 2011. The CD of [Works for Piano] (E-112) performed by Satoko Inoue was released on EMEC discos in Spain in 2014. Himmel im Wasser [Sky in Water] The title of this piece is derived from the poem of the same title by Hans Carossa (1878-1956), a German poet. The poem is about his recollection of a beautiful vision of the sky when he was a child and the reflection of a cloud as it passes over a pond and the splendid radiance of the sun remembered. There is no doubt that my inspiration for this music is from my impression of this poem, however, the music developed from truly pure musical interest, and it dose not have to be listened to in connection with the poem. Through my music I had hoped to manifest a unique sense of time by creating the sequence of every moment that constantly keeps on making exquisite transformations such as light and shade reflected on water.
PROGRAM NOTES
Robert Coburn
Kaze no Yume II [Dream of the Wind] This is a dream piece and in being that it floats somewhere between memory and actuality. The wind is the breath used to draw sound from the instruments used in its making. The central action of breathing surfaces in many practices in Japan. The breath connects this piece directly with the sho as the player brings the instrument to life literally by breathing through the instrument. In doing this, the sho becomes an extension of the body and makes heard the motion of the breath. The breath itself shapes the pacing of the work bringing the player and the listener into direct contact with the passage of time. Visual elements used to create the video, and sounds used for the computer portion, were collected as field recordings in Japan. distant light ... quiet stream a soft breath of winter light These two compositions are examples of Coburn’s recent research into the experiential primacy in works by a group of visual artists who might be considered minimal: Fred Sandback, Robert Irwin, Agnes Martin, John McLaughlin, Callum Innes, and others. The compositions do not attempt to depict the paintings and/or sculpture but rather to represent the influences of artists’ thinking in Coburn’s own shaping of sonic experience. Irwin is known for saying, “seeing is forgetting the name of the thing one sees.” In an attempt to redirect the focus of the viewer from the object itself to the intangible sense of experience alone, these artists moved off the wall, either figuratively or actually, to open up the visual, spatial and temporal aspects of experience. The influence of their art is reflected in Coburn’s work by the attention given to making a place for listeners in the music. In doing so he has heightened the balance between sound and silence, and refocused his sensitivity on the inner life of the sonic elements employed. In a soft breath of winter light this is extended to the quiet electronic elements used within the work. Created during a residency at the Elektronmusikstudion EMS in Stockholm, they expand the sonic and spatial sense of the experience drawing the listeners focus outward to imagined soundscapes.
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