Weaving Japanese Sounds

Pianist Sachiko Kato organized a concert of "new and newer" music last night at the Tenri Cultural Institute. Familiar names like Ichiyanagi and Satoh represented the older generation of Japanese composers, while more recent works by Moto Osada and Dai Fujikura rounded out the program.

Osada's piece Take the Six for marimba and electronics was a musical portrait of New York City, opening with street sounds and progressing to a percussive contest between man and machine "representing humans' fight in keeping up with ever-evolving technology." Although Greg Giannascoli made an impressive effort navigating the very difficult marimba part, I think it's safe to say that technology ultimately triumphed. The unrelenting perpetual motion of the electronics was similar to the music of street percussionists who perform underground, calling to mind a crowded subway station full of sweaty commuters on a sultry summer day.

I've been enamored with Somei Satoh's compositions for quite some time after having been introduced to them though Margaret Leng Tan's recordings. I was looking forward to hearing his Toki no Mon for violin, piano and percussion. Unfortunately the violinist Airi Yoshioka was not up to the task of providing the shimmering tone this extremely static music requires. Her playing was much better suited to the last piece on the program, Dai Fujikura's Unaccountable Espressivo for piano trio.

Although I found the first of Mari Takano's Two Chansons to be a bit grating, I enjoyed the touches of ironic humor she employed in the second song (complete with tongue-clicking sounds from both soprano and pianist). Koto virtuoso Masayo Ishigure performed, along with percussionist Matthew Gold, a relatively new work for a very ancient instrument by Akira Nishimura. My favorite piece of the evening was Ichiyanagi's Two Existences for two pianos. The work is full of conversational echo effects, which Kato and Blair McMillen handled beautifully while playing on instruments of incongruent lengths and tone qualities.

Favorite pre-concert activity: peeking in the windows of the doggy-gym next door to the Tenri.
Favorite post-concert activity: pinky mimosas at Spice.