Showing posts with label Japan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Japan. Show all posts

16.3.14

Flute & Guitar


Mie Ogura & 
Atanas Ourkouzounov
False Classic
2011

Tracks:

01 - Rada
02 - No Mystery
03 - Bul-Bop
04 - "Musica Ricercata" Allegro Con Spirito
05 - "Musica Ricercata" Rubato-Lamentoso
06 - "Musica Ricercata" Vivace
07 - "Musica Ricercata" Vivace-Energico
08 - "Three East Tales" N°1 the Fox's Dance
09 - "Three East Tales" N°2 the Red Elf's Lullaby
10 - "Three East Tales" N°3 Dracula's Caprice
11 - Spain
12 - Take the "A" Train
13 - Macedonian Song
14 - Bulchenska Ratchenitsa

Works by Ligeti, Corea, Ourkouzounov, Ellington, Papasov.

Mie Ogura: flute
Atanas Ourkouzounov: guitar

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Flute

  
Born in Japan 1973, Mie Ogura started to play the flute at age 7.
In 1989, she finished her studies at the Takamatsu Music Highschool in Japan and obtained the first price in the National students Flute Competition in Osaka.

In 1994,Mie Ogura moved to France,and in 1999 graduated with Diplôme Supérieur from Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris under Pierre-Yves Artaud and Sophie Cherrier.. then obtained an improvisation diploma under the tutelage of Alain Savouret.
She also studied baroque flute with Pierre Séchet and jazz improvisation Jean-Charles Richard, as well as indian music with Patrick Moutal.

In 2001 she obtained a scholarship from the Academia Musicale de Siena(Italy) under Aurèle Nicolet(flute) and Alain Meunier(chamber music), also worked with Franco Donatoni.They highly appreciates her playing.

Her playng is called"The fan of sound",since 1995 Mie Ogura has appeared regulary as a soloist and chamber musician with different ensembles and orchestras,among others,Ensamble Sphota(improvisation),Ensemble L’Itinéraire,Ensemble Entretemps(contemporary music),Orchestre pour la paix(Classical), Compagny Robinson(contemporary Danse) etc...and invited in many festivals in the world (Europe,America,Canada,Australia,Japan..)

Her improvisation playng in also appreciated from many jazz and classical musiciens such as Loelle Léandre(cb), Glenn Ferris(tb), Masataka Hirano(Sax), Shin-Ichi Fukuda,Kazumi Watanabe, Carlo Domeniconi(gt) and many others.

Mie Ogura has recorded with the ensemble Triton2 (Label MFA,France) and Ensemble Ourkouzounov (Label KLE,Italy),and Duo with Atanas OURKOUZOUNOV (Label Varié in Japan and Label H&S Paris) also edited the jazz flute beginners book « Flute Jazz Coffeebreak », published in 2005 at Edition Trim (Japan).

Her favorite musiciens is Miles Davis,Roland Kirk,Chick Corea,Keith Jarrett,Hari Prasad Chaurasia etc....

Flute and imrovisation professor at the Jacques Ibert Conservatory in Paris,and Conservatory in Sucy en Brie.
  

Guitar
  
  
Atanas Ourkouzounov (b. 1970 in Burgas, Bulgaria), a leading figure in Bulgaria’s contemporary music, is winning international fame both as a guitarist and as a composer. His music features the asymmetric rhythms and modal harmonies typical of his homeland but, like Béla Bartók, Ourkouzounov (pronounced Oor-koo-ZOO-nov) uses regional traditions as a point of departure from which he ranges widely in an intu-itive and personal way. Whereas Bartók’s muse was the piano, Ourkouzounov’s muse is―fortunately for guitarists―the guitar. Ourkouzounov has written over 60 works for guitar―solos, duos, trios, quartets, instrumental ensembles, and two concerti―a number of which have won important prizes, and a majority of which have been published by leading publishers.

Atanas Ourkouzounov performs widely as soloist, with his wife the Japanese flautist Mie Ogura, and with the Ourkouzounov Ensemble (two guitars, flute and cello).
In addition to three CDs on which Ourkouzounov plays, more than 30 CDs of his music performed by others are currently available.

Ourkouzounov is also in demand as a teacher and juror at conferences and conservatories in Europe and Japan and he holds a full-time position at the Conservatoire “Maurice Ravel” in Paris.

Atanas Ourkouzounov grew up in Sofia, Bulgaria, where he began guitar studies with Dimitar Doitchinov.

Starting in 1992, he continued his studies in France with Arnaud Dumond, Alexandre Lagoya and Olivier Chassain. He studied guitar, chamber music, analysis, ethnomusicology and improvisation at the Paris Conservatory and graduated in 1997 winning by unanimous vote the First Prize in guitar.

Six years before he went to Paris, he started to compose. He was 16 years old and had been playing guitar only one year. For fun, he began changing details in pieces he was learning and then he wrote his first piece―3 Inventions―using the baroque idiom and subject of a fugue he was studying. He became intoxicated with composing and soon started using melodies, rhythms, and modal harmonies of Bulgarian folk music. At the same time, he was avidly listening to recordings, especially Arthur Honegger’s Symphonie N°5 and Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring and Petrushka.To this day, Igor Stravinsky, György Ligeti, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Claude Debussy are among Ourkouzounov’s favorite composers.

While at least a trace of Bulgaria is always present in Ourkouzounov’s music, in the last eight years he has also written pieces he calls “dedications” in which he composes his own music
from the point of view of other composers and/or idioms―for example, Caprice d'après Paganini(which imagines a "new” Paganini as he might exist today); Fantaisie d'après Kapsberger (which draws on elements of 17th-century music for archlute); and Toryanse
Tales(which uses a Japanese folk theme).

Ourkouzounov is also fascinated by timbre and idiomatic colorisitic effects ―as explored for example in Light Echoes from Star -light―5 Nocturnes, in the Reflet guitar duos, and above all in the Visions Chromatiques N°1for guitar solo and the Visions Chromatiques N°2 for voice, violin, mandola, and guitar.

Ourkouzounov feels the “timbre” works are more contemporary and abstract―and perhaps more personal― than his pieces in which Bulgarian elements prevail.

Ourkouzounov enjoys performing flute-guitar duos with his wife. Typical programs are two Ourkouzounov works alongside arrangements and original music by diverse composers―for example, pieces by Chick Corea, Keith Jarrett, Béla Bartók, and Claude Debussy―as well as arrangements Ourkouzounov calls “postcards” (folk music from countries such as Mali, Japan, Bulgaria, Brazil, and India). As a listener, Ourkouzounov loves performers such as the conductor Carlos Kleiber, the pianists Grigory Sokolov and Keith Jarrett, and many jazz or folk-jazz musicians―for example, the Bulgarian clarinetist Ivo Papazov, the Bulgarian flautist Theodosii Spassov and the group Shakti (especially the guitarist John McLaughlin and the tabla player Zakir Hussain).
 


 
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5.1.14

Agua

  
Japan: The Spirit of Water
1999

Tracks:
 
1. Shinrabansyo (All Creation) by Synergy - from Taiko (15021) - 5'23"
2. Zangetsu (Waning Moon) by Masayuki Koga - from Eastwind (17067) - 11'01"
3. Daha (Pounding Wave) by James Ashley Franklin - previously unreleased - 5'21"
4. Haru no Umi (Spring Sea) by Tomoko Sunazaki - from Tegoto (17068) - 7'00"
5. Ise (The Sea of Ise) by James Newton - from Echo Canyon (13012) - 5'39"
6. The Wave by Synergy - from Matsuri (13081) - 6'44"
7. Mountain Stream by Honoka - from Water Spirits (13160) - 6'19"

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Japan: The Spirit of Water is a superb exploration of Japanese tradition—the mastery of Japanese musics and spirit—emphasizing the link between the culture of Japan and the influence, or spirit, of water featuring both traditional and non-traditional techniques.

In the realm of music, or the art of sound (ongaku) as it is termed in Japanese, the fascination with water is something which cuts across stylistic or historical boundaries: new developments proceeding from traditional forms provide new vehicles for the embodiment of, amongst other sentiments, the spirit of water. This embodiment may be explicitly programmatic in nature, the program then often containing elements of the human world as well as the non–human environment. A famous and popular piece of this kind is Haru no Umi (Spring Sea) from the early 20th century. Although originally scored for the common combination of koto and shakuhachi, many arrangements of this piece now exist, including some for western instruments. The image of this piece proved to be so powerful that Haru no Umi has achieved the status of a national heritage heard virtually everywhere in Japan on New Year's Day.

The combination of koto and shakuhachi, in recent times, has become a musical exploration drawing on the traditional style and extending them as reflected in Mountain Stream with its melodic and harmonic structure based on tradition with an improvised musical process which is not traditional.

Japan is also the land of percussion sounds, the taiko. It appears in two of Japan's main dramatic forms, Nô and Kabuki, and is central to festival (matsuri) music as reflected in The Wave. Shinrabansyo (All Creation) combines taiko with shinobue (a Japanese transverse bamboo flute).

Raintree stems from a Japanese composer trained in Western composition. Ise is a piece by a Western composer/performer who has assimilated Japanese influences into his playing of non–Japanese music and instruments.
 
   
  

31.8.11

Flute & Satsuma-Biwa



Wil Offermans & Junko Ueda
Voice & Noise - How to Survive in Paradise
1992

Tracks:

1. Voice & Noise (1992)

    * Part 1 8'54"
    * Part 2 3'27"
    * Part 3 5'42"
    * Part 4 5'41"

Junko Ueda, voice, satsuma-biwa
Wil Offermans, flute, bass flute
recorded on April 11 & 12 1992 at the church of Chêne-Pâquier, Switzerland

2. How to Survive in Paradise II (1990) 31'22"

Junko Ueda, voice
Wil Offermans, flute, bass flute, live-electronics
recorded on May 6, 1992 at Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague, Holland

All compositions by Wil Offermans
 
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 Japanese singer and performer of satsuma-biwa Junko Ueda has performed all around the globe with Wil Offermans - a Dutch flutist/composer - as the Duo Ueda-Offermans. Combining the seemingly opposite oriental and occidental circumstances, Junko Ueda & Wil Offermans gave their first duo concert in 1988. Out of this unique combination they have developed their compositions and improvisations, exploring the integral time-space between ancient and modern, oriental and occidental. During the last years, the duo has appeared at numerous music festivals (i.e. Musique Action Nancy, Singapore Festival of Arts, Quebec Summer Festival, New Music Festival Middelburg, Musica Contenporena Bogota) and has toured extensively all over the world. After various solo productions, their duo CD titled How to Survive in Paradise was released.

Junko

Wil
What sounds great live is not necessarily a good record. But it is interesting enough to share it. Especially since the flute got such an important feature on this blog. And watch out what they'll be doing next... And let's see where we are going next, it will be interesting at least...

Hasta la posta proxima!

4.8.11

Shakuhachi and Organ

  
Masters of Zen
Shakuhachi and Organ
Hōzan Yamamoto & Wolfgang Mitterer
1998

Tracks:

1. Encounter - Hozan Yamamoto/Wolfgang Mitterer/Masakazu Yashizawa
2. From A Distant Place - Hozan Yamamoto/Wolfgang Mitterer/Masakazu Yashizawa
3. Classical Feast - Hozan Yamamoto/Wolfgang Mitterer/Masakazu Yashizawa
4. Twilight In The Tirol - Hozan Yamamoto
5. Midnight Cathedral - Hozan Yamamoto/Wolfgang Mitterer
6. Blooming In The Peak - Hozan Yamamoto/Wolfgang Mitterer
7. Buddha's Smile - Hozan Yamamoto
8. Dedicated To The Organ - Hozan Yamamoto/Wolfgang Mitterer
 
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The combination of electronic organ and shakuhachi may seem strange but if we recall that the ancestor of the electronic organ, i.e. pipe organ was an instrument in which air in a pipes is set in vibration, the combination, is not so strange.
 
   
山本 邦山
Hōzan Yamamoto
Born 1937

Shakuhachi

Head of the Hozan-kai Shakuhachi Guild, performer, teacher, composer and pioneer in expanding the possibilities of the shakuhachi, Hozan Yamamoto attended the Seiha Music College graduating in 1962. After formation with Reibo Aoki and Katsuya Yokoyama of the widely acclaimed "Shakuhachi Sanbon Kai" trio in 1966, he electrified the conservative traditional scene by applying his talents to a variety of crossover collaborations beginning with the jazz idiom in 1967. These have led him to work with such world renowned musicians as Ravi Shankar, Jean Pierre Rampal, Tony Scott and Gary Peacock. Through the seventies and eighties to the present he has led the shakuhachi world receiving innumerable honors, including Ministry of Cultural Affairs and Education Ministerial awards for his performances, recordings (numbering in the hundreds) and compositions. He currently serves as lecturer at The Tokyo University of Fine Arts and Music.

Designated Living National Treasure in 2002.
 
 
Hōzan Yamamoto (山本 邦山, Yamamoto Hōzan; born October 6, 1937 in Ōtsu, Shiga prefecture) is a Japanese shakuhachi player, composer and lecturer.

wiki

Wolfgang Mitterer (* June 6 1958 in Lienz, East Tyrol) is an Austrian composer and musician (organ, keyboard).

wiki

Don't trust the cover. Don't trust the title. This is not Gheorghe Zamfir & Marcel Cellier- Panflute & Organ (nothing wrong with that) and it is not Jean-Claude Jégat & Louis Yhuel - Bombarde Et Orgue (we are not in Brittany). These are not two Zen Masters... It is electronic organ and shakuhachi plus drum and bass, no not what you think... I guess you have to listen for your good self... : )

22.4.11

Shakuhachi

  
Gorô Yamaguchi
Great Masters of the Shakuhachi Flute

1988

Tracks:

1. Yûgure-No-Kyoku ("the tune of everything")
2. Igusa-Reibo ("rush plant yearning for the bell")
3. Sôkaku-Reibo ("nesting of a crane")
4. Hô-Shô-Su ("young phoenix")

Extra shakuhachi (track #4): Hômei Matsumara
  
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Gorô Yamaguchi  plays some of the most austere pieces in the shakuhachi repertory for this recording. The music generally has something of a plaintive nature, but includes some rather dissonant-sounding passages, including trills. This music generally has associations with Zen.
 
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Gorō Yamaguchi (山口 五郎) February 26, 1933- January 3, 1999, a Japanese shakuhachi (vertical bamboo flute) player, was known for his musicality, phrasing, impeccable technique (and modesty) in solo and ensemble performances. He headed the Chikumeisha shakuhachi guild and became a world-famous Japanese performer and teacher. In 1967-68 he was appointed Artist in Residence at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut (USA).

While at Wesleyan, Nonesuch Explorer Series recorded his "Bell Ringing in an Empty Sky" LP, an influential first recording of shakuhachi in the US. NASA included one honkyoku from that LP, "Tsuru No Sugomori," (Nesting of Cranes) on the Voyager Golden Record which was sent into space. In 1992, the Japanese government designated Yamaguchi a Living National Treasure (Ningen Kokuhô).
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Gorô Yamaguchi is considered one of the greatest Japanese shakuhachi players of the 20th century. From 1992 to his untimely death in January of 1999, at the age of 65, he was designated "National Living Treasure," a unique title given in Japan to artists who attained the highest mastery of their art. This CD, released by Auvidis in 1988, presents a master at the height of his art. What strikes with Goro Yamaguchi is the subtlety of his playing. The music is so meditative, so peaceful, so gentle, so natural, so masterly and effortlessly performed (although this flute is considered one of the hardest to play). Meditative music at is best! ~ Bruno Deschênes
The shakuhachi (尺八, pronounced [ɕakɯhatɕi]) is a Japanese end-blown flute. It is traditionally made of bamboo, but versions now exist in ABS and hardwoods. It was used by the monks of the Fuke school of Zen Buddhism in the practice of suizen (吹禅, blowing meditation).