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LMJ 5: CD Introduction

Innovation in Contemporary Japanese Composition

by Marc Battier

In Innovation in Contemporary Japanese Composition, the compact disc (CD) accompanying this volume of Leonardo Music Journal, we present a selection of recent contemporary music from Japan, a genre seldom heard in the West, albeit much wondered about. Each of the seven composers presented on this recording represe nts a particular approach to music. In this sense, the CD can be seen as a journey, not unlike the tradition of Ukiyo-e, the woodblock prints popularized in the nineteenth century by Hokusai and Hiroshige that depict various sceneries and encounters one can experience on a journey. The pieces of music gathered here are like seven stations on the J apanese road to new music.

Leonardo Music Journal asked three composers to play a double role: they were to choose from among their own recent productions a piece that would represent their approaches to music technology. At the same time, each was asked to propose the name of a composer whose work displays yet another way of thinking about music. The first three composers are Mamoru Fujieda, Hinoharu Matsumoto and Kazuo Uehara. They in turn contacted Yuji Takahashi, Shigenobu Nakamura and Masahiro Miwa. In addition, as a curator of the project, I directly invited Ichiro Nodaira, whom I knew would introduce yet another view on composing with technology.

The Japanese contribution to musical technology has been major, at least over the past two decades. The amount of research devoted to music technology has been enormous, and the musical instrument industry in Japan displays remarkable inventiveness. Yet, Japan's contribution to experimental music is far too little known outside Japan. Only a handf ul of Japanese composers' names are mentioned, for instance, in music history books published in the West. Despite this, Japan has maintained a discreet but resolute attitude toward music research. All throughout the 1950s, among the artists gathered in the Experimental Workshop, Toru Takemitsu, himself a founding member, developed an inquisitive approach to expanding the gamut of expressive means in music, through reflection on Japanese tradition and Western contribution, while at the same time pioneering the use of technology. Later, one of the musicians on this CD, Yuji Takahashi, along with Toshi Ichiyanagi, founded New Directions, a group dedicated to the active performance of music o n the edge of the avant-garde, both from the West and from Japan.

Takahashi's contribution on this CD, Kumo-Rinzetsu, is a reflection on the relationship between a composer and musical means. Sitting at his desk, he interacts with his computer, which is itself controlling some digital sound- production devices. There is no score, no public---only a strong and articulate intention. In fact, all co ntributions on this CD represent, in a way, a testimony of the depth of thought involved in the act of making music and the use of technological means, whether they be software algorithms or synthetic sound sources.

This is why the pieces gathered here run the gamut from pure instrumental music to pure musique concrete: from the piece for viola da gamba and cembalo, My Favorite Few of Coltrane's by Masahiro Miwa, to Walk, a piece realized by Shigenobu Nakamura by processing the sound of footsteps.

The piece by Ichiro Nodaira, Neuf ecarts vers le defi, represents a growing tendency to link the act of performing (here, on a piano equipped with MIDI captors) to a computer that reacts to the performer and processes the piano sounds or synthesizes sounds in real time. Although it is only a brief excerpt from a longer piece, Noda ira's contribution gives us an idea of the considerable effort he takes in transforming this kind of interaction into art.

Although stylistically very different, the piece by Kazuo Uehara, Sohgu II (Encounter 2), is an example of music created with a hyper-instrument, in which the composer acts as an agent in the interaction chain, while playing his sensor ear harp, a sensored sound sculpture.

Hinoharu Matsumoto, a composer who has a large catalogue of instrumental and electronic works, has chosen an excerpt from a live performance of Dawn Bird, in which he uses a graphic program that creates dynamic patterns, always in evolution, to control sound synthesis activity in real time.

It is another sort of observation of movement that Mamoru Fujieda has chosen for his composition, Ecological Plantron, in which the interaction of an orchid to its environment is captured and analyzed, the data being used as the source of the music. Once matching sounds have been produced, the ecological process is reversed, when the composer uses a mechanical system to further integrate the sounds into the acoustical environment. In conclusion, I would like to express the intense pleasure I have taken in interacting with the seven composers in the process of producing this CD. It is my wish that the listener will experience the same pleasure upon experiencing these seven views on new Japanese music.

LMJ 5: CD Introduction

Innovation in Contemporary Japanese Composition

LMJ 5 Table of Contents