Thursday 7 April 2005
6:00pm – 8:00pm
UK-Japan Overtures: Developments and Collaborations in Music
Daiwa Foundation Japan House
Organised by the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation
The genres of traditional, classical and contemporary music in the UK and Japan are closely intertwined and represent a successful sharing of knowledge and experience. In music education and performance, the links are numerous and growing but rooted in the past. From the introduction of the Western classical tradition to Japan in the Meiji period to the study of Japanese traditional music in the West, the cross-currents of influence have evolved in a range of performance contexts. Music education in Britain has been enriched by the influence of Yamaha and Suzuki methods while Japanese artists and musicians have become central to the international music scene. Conversely, there is a significant initiative underway in Japan to adopt and adapt music and arts education techniques pioneered in the UK. This seminar explored developments and collaborations in music through performance, production and shared international experience.
Organised in association with The Japan Society.
About the contributors
Noriko Ogawa
Noriko Ogawa is a UK-based Japanese pianist. She was awarded third prize in the 1987 Leeds International Piano Competition and has since achieved considerable renown in Europe, America and Japan. She has received a number of awards, including the Japanese Ministry of Education’s Art Prize in 1999 in recognition of her contribution to the cultural profile of Japan and, most recently, the Okura Prize. In 2004 she was appointed as an advisor for the new concert hall in her hometown, the MUZA Kawasaki Symphony Hall. She has been a judge for the piano and grand finals of the BBC Young Musician of the Year Competition, and performs as a duo with British pianist Kathryn Stott with whom she has recently completed a tour to Japan.
Michael J Spencer
Michael J Spencer is Director of Creative Arts Net. He was previously a member of the London Symphony Orchestra and a major contributor to their award winning Discovery programme. Subsequently he became Head of Education at the Royal Opera House where he developed the interactive software In2arts:opera . This was placed by the DfES in every state secondary school as a core curriculum resource for the performing arts. He is a frequent contributor to programmes outside of the UK and is the education consultant for the Association of Japanese Symphony Orchestras with whom he has created several initiatives throughout Japan. In 1999, he received a Japan Festival Award for his work introducing kabuki drama to British students.
Dr David Hughes
Dr David W Hughes (chair) is Senior Lecturer in Ethnomusicology and Head of the Department of Music, SOAS, University of London. He lectures and writes on the music of Japan and Indonesia, and has lived in Japan for nine years. He has served as chair of the British Forum for Ethnomusicology and on the executive board of the International Council for Traditional Music (a Unesco organisation).