curtain call Photo: Ten Goto
Maiko Inamura (Soprano) Photo: Ten Goto
Shino Saito (Flute) Photo: Ten Goto
By featuring a program of works for soprano and flute by Beat Furrer from Switzerland and Takahiro Kuroda from Japan, two composers of different generations and backgrounds who studied composition in Austria, the program attempted to show the audience what differences and similarities there are between their works. The first half of the programme consisted of two pieces excerpted from Beat Furrer’s opera ‘invocation’, which were formed independent chamber music pieces, and a piece he composed inspired by radio drama (Ger.: Hörspiel). The second half of the programme featured the première of a new piece by Kuroda, the organiser of this project. This piece was based on the poem ‘Ива’ (Eng.: ‘Willow’) by Anna Akhmatova, a female poet active between Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union. The concert deepened the Japanese audience’s understanding, insight and interest in the characteristics and depth of the Austrian contemporary music scene (although of course this was only one part of what can be introduced), and in addition the audience was highly satisfied.
Takahiro Kuroda
Takahiro Kuroda (b. 1989) is a Japanese composer based in Tokyo.
In recent years, his works have ranged from purely musical to socially and politically oriented, but his primary concern is that the audience and appreciator is confronted with some question through his work. On the one hand, he composes and created works that approaches the state and the transformation of time and space in compositions upon the consideration concerning the relationship between sound and silence, and on the other hand, he composes and creates works that raise and approach issues that emerge upon the observations of various histories from the past to the present, as well as today’s aspect of society and current circumstance. These are his personal interests, but he hopes that the works that are created from such interests will be a mirror of the audience and appreciator’s inner self.
Kuroda received The 29th JSCM (Japan Society for Contemporary Music) Award for Composers and The 37th IRINO PRIZE for Chamber-Orchestral Composition. In 2018 he was commissioned by Music From Japan to compose a piece and invited to Music From Japan Festival 2019 in New York as one of the Japanese composers influenced by John Cage.
Takahiro Kuroda
tkhrkuroda@gmail.com
KM Art Hall, Shibuya City, Tokyo
