Yuji Takahashi (piano, synthesizer)
Born September 21, 1938, in Tokyo, Japan
Pianist and Japanese composer Yuji Takahashi (brother of the innovative pianist Aki Takahashi), studied composition with Mina Shibata and Roh Ogura, Hiroshi Ito and piano at the Toho School of Music between 1954 and 1958. In 1961 he made a sensational debut at a festival of modern music school, sponsored by the "Nippon Broadcasting Company, replacing the last minute solo that was expected. This marked his emergence as a leading exponent of new piano music.
the beginning of his career as a composer goes back to 1962, with a work for electronics and twelve instruments. About the same time, along with colleagues composers Toshi Ichiyanagi and Kenji Kobayashi, organized an assembly for a new music group "New Directions".
Sponsored by the Ford Foundation, Yuji Takahashi lived in Berlin from 1963 to 1965, studying with Iannis Xenakis. In 1966, supported by a grant from the JD Rockefeller III, came to New York to study computer music and to attend summer courses at the Berkshire Music Centre in Tanglehood, between 1966 and 1968.
In New York composed music using computers, and was, therefore, a highly visible and influential participant in the activities of this new type of music United States with appearances at the Berkshire Music Center, Ravinia Music Festival, Stratford Festival (Ontario) and the Center for Creative and Performing Arts, State University of New York at Buffalo. During this time, was a soloist with ensembles such as the London Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Symphony Orchestra Toronto and Buffalo Philharmonic.
gave solo recitals in the Athens Festival, the Stockholm Festival, the Bach Festival in Oxford, the "Domaine Musical" in Paris, Signaal series in Amsterdam, the double series in Los Angeles, the concert in Princeton, and evenings by New Music and New Images of Sound in New York. In 1966 and 1968 he acted and spoke at the Congress of the International Music Council (IMC) of UNESCO in Manila and New York, and wrote a play presented at the Japanese Pavilion of the Music World's Fair in Osaka in 1970.
Yuji Takahashi remained in America until 1972, teaching piano at Indiana University and the Conservatory of Music in San Francisco. In 1971, during his residence in San Francisco, he played three of his own electronic works ("Time", "Yeguen" and "Bridges") in one of the first informal concert (called "Bring your own pillow," bring your own pillow in the Gallery on Grant Avenue Hansel Fuller) who would become the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players (SFCMP, a gathering of contemporary musicians.)
For many years, Yuji Takahashi was recognized, along with a few other pianists (Tudor, Kontarsky, Helffer, Roger Woodward, Jacobs, Rzewski) as someone able to decrypt and play the hardest of new works for piano. Xenakis wrote "Brother" and "EONTA" both to Takahashi. Takahashi released "Brothers" in Tokyo in February 1962 and "EONTA" in December 1964 in Paris, under the direction of Pierre Boulez. Takahashi also released a series of works by Toru Takemishu ("Piano Distance "- 1961," Crown "- 1962," Arc "-1963 and" asterism "-1969), and even wrote about his relationship with Takemitsu in an essay of 1996:" The Life of the Composer. "
pianist Among his recordings are the complete works of Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern and Alban Berg, Messiaen's music (solos, and "Visions of Amen ", with Peter Serkin), Xenakis, Cage, Rzewski, Na, Cardew, Takemitsu, composer Indonesian Selamat A. Sjukur, Earle Brown, and Roger Reynolds, also the Art of Fugue (BWV 1080) Bach, and the Toccata in E minor, two volumes of solo piano music of Satie, a Sonata by Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, and "Marche Reminiscences pour mon dernier et vogage "by Rossini. And very important as a director are his recordings of music by Xenakis, Maceda, Gubaidulina, Zorn and Varese.
On his return to Japan in 1972, Yuji Takahashi has participated in the organization and presentation with similar groups of musicians, composers transonic group (along with Takemitsu and Yoji Yuasa) in early 1980, the Suigyu (Water Buffalo Band), writing and performing Asian protest songs and, in 1999, Ito.
in recent years has been great to work with computers in music, in 1989 was made in the Macintosh Festival in Tokyo, and in 1991 organized the first Pacific Rim Festival Ikebukuo Computer and Cyber \u200b\u200bCafé. He has participated in symposiums and discussions about his work, such as the ISCM 19th Summer Course for Young Composers in Poland in 1999 with Louis Andriessen, the Tokyo Festival 1999, where presented with, among others, the musician and composer traditional in Korean Hwang Byung-ki, and the Northeast Asia Festival in Osaka (2003), where he organized a symposium called "Proposals from East Asia", with Chinese composer Qu Xiao-song and Korean composer Hyo-shin Na. In 1997 he was composer in residence at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, where he performed numerous works by him, many young musicians, and he participated as a pianist and director.
In his music as stochastic processes practiced by Xenakis. His musical activities / policies have connected personally and musically with composers such as Frederic Rzewski, Cornelius Cardew and Christian Wolff. His work here has borne fruit in many parts, such as: "For You I Sing This Song", written in 1976 (for the American Bicentennial) by gupo TASHI, "Kwangju, May 1980, written to accompany Tomiyama Taeko slides, as a memorial to those killed in the uprising of the Korean city of Kwangju against the dictatorship of Chun Doo-whan. The piece also exists in a version for orchestra.
Translated:
Yuji Takahashi (Piano, Synthesizer) / in: Bach Cantatas Website
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