The Merits of Approaching a Challenging New Work
Call it a culturally informed performance practice or speaking cello with a Japanese accent
I first discovered Miyagi’s famous “Haru-no-umi” in the fall of 2009 when I was putting together the program for my recent debut album, Folkfire, and really wanted to include a composition by an Asian composer. Like Bartók’s “Romanian Dances” or Vaughan Williams’ Six Studies in English Folk Song, also included on the CD, “Haru-no-umi” combines Western art music with a tradition that was dying out in the early part of the 20th century.
“Haru-no-umi” is not an adaptation of a folk tune, but an original composition. It combines two traditional Japanese instruments, the koto and shakuhachi (bamboo flute), with Western influences in a style called Meiji shinkyoku, or simply shinkyoku (“new works”).
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