Takemitsu, Tōru

born Oct. 8, 1930, Tokyo, Japan

died Feb. 20, 1996, Tokyo

Japanese composer.

In 1951 he founded Tokyo's Experimental Laboratory to promote an integration of Japanese music with contemporary European developments. Soon acknowledged as Japan's leading composer, he explored avant-garde techniques such as serialism, aleatory music, graphic notation, and electronic music, combining them with traditional Japanese motives and instruments (e.g., November Steps, 1967, for biwa, shakuhachi, and orchestra). He created an individual sound world in which silence itself is an important element.

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▪ 1997

      Japanese composer (b. Oct. 8, 1930, Tokyo, Japan—d. Feb. 20, 1996, Tokyo), achieved worldwide renown for works that combined the tradition of Western classical music and the sounds of traditional Eastern instruments, especially the biwa (a short-necked lute) and the shakuhachi (a bamboo flute), in addition to serial music and musique concrète. His compositions also used percussion in unusual ways, electronic alteration of orchestral sounds, and even silence to return to music the sensuality he thought it had lost. In addition to concert works, he composed more than 90 film scores, including Woman in the Dunes (1964) and Ran (1985). Takemitsu was, for the most part, self-taught, though he did study intermittently with the composer Yasuji Kiyose. He first performed in public in 1950 and the following year helped found a new group, the Experimental Workshop. Takemitsu's first composition to attract international attention was Requiem for Strings (1957), which became one of his most popular works. Igor Stravinsky and Aaron Copland promoted his music, and it began to be performed abroad. Major orchestras also began to commission and perform his compositions, among them what was possibly his best-known work, November Steps (1967). Takemitsu's later music reflected the influence of Claude Debussy, George Gershwin, and Olivier Messiaen and incorporated elements of tonal harmony along with those of serial music. He also claimed that the Japanese formal garden inspired the structure of his music, as illustrated by such works as A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden (1978) and Tree Line (1988). Takemitsu was active in festivals of modern music and was director of the Space Theatre at Expo '70 in Osaka, Japan. Among his awards were the Gravemeyer Award (1994) and the Glenn Gould Prize (1996). Takemitsu's last work was a piece for the flute, and he was working on his first opera at the time of his death.

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