Awarded the 20th Keizo Saji Prize for 2020
Suntory Foundation for the Arts
Highlights "Purified Night" 12min./2021/Shinjiro Maeda
The video director, Shinjiro Maeda, edited Highlights "Purified Night" from the 3 hours of live streaming.
You can check out the photos taken by Hyogo Mugyuda during the live stream on this Instagram account: masahiro_miwa_festival
Twitter account: : miwafest
Composer/musical director: Masahiro Miwa
Video director: Shinjiro Maeda
Formant voice synthesis: Nobuyasu Sakonda
Poetry: Shigeru Matsui
Photograph: Hyogo Mugyuda
Dance: Takao Kawaguchi
MIDI accordions: Eugene Okano, Akihiro Nishimura
Organ: Minako Tsukatani
Sō: Yumika Ehara
Rebab: Naho Homma
Gamelan: MargaSari (Naoki Ebisuya, Takuya Oi, Gaku Kurokawa, Kanna Taniguchi, Shin Nakagawa, Akihiro Nishimura, Midori Moriyama)
Open called performers
6 chickens
Sponsored by Salamanca Hall
Co-sponsored by Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences [IAMAS],
Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University
Masahiro Miwa: A Pentagram for Chickens (2020 commissioned, W.P.)
Johannes Ockeghem: Missa pro defunctis (organ and two MIDI accordion version) (15th C.)Lyrics
Formant Brothers: Spirit World Radio + Boi-Pa and Umi Yukaba (2020)Lyrics
Masahiro Miwa: Monju-Bodhisattva Speaks (2019)Lyrics
Masahiro Miwa: The Divine Melody + The Shooting Star Worship (2020 version)a message for believers
> Monologue Opera "THE NEW ERA"
> The Shooting Star Worship
> Missionary broadcast〈The Divine Melody〉
Massage from Masahiro Miwa
[Music Description]
The first half of 2020, when the unforeseeable coronavirus halted the movements of artists and concert halls and forced most music transmission venues online. In a post-coronavirus era, when artists can no longer enjoy music in the same space as the audience in the way that used to be the norm, how can music live on in society? Will this fundamentally change the history of music? Where can the music of the future find sources of light?
To question this state, which we might call “the end of the end of music,” in Japan and around the world, I will hold “a wake for music by music” without an audience and broadcast it online from Salamanca Hall in the city of Gifu.
J. Ockeghem’s Requiem will be performed by artificial voices with a pipe organ, the altar of Western music, and “the radio from the spiritual world” will intercept the voices of the dead. With my new piece that will be presented at this concert, Niwatoritachi no tame no gobōsei (Pentagram for chickens), I expect that the people connected online will be present at a secret ceremony to mourn art by humans. It could be that the world depicted by the Miwa+Maeda monologue opera “The New Era,” premiered in 2000 and presented again 17 years later, has now become reality.
Masahiro Miwa
Composer/musical director
A musical composer, Miwa has presented a great number of works with algorithmic composition, a method of composition that utilizes computers. He has won 1st place in the 10th The IRINO PRIZE, 1st place in the 14th Concorso Internationale Luigi Russoro, won the 14th Akutagawa Award for Music Composition, and the 2010 Minister of Education Award for Fine Arts (Development of the Arts Division) in addition to many other awards. In 2007, his “Reverse Simulation Music” won the Golden Nica Award in the Digital Music Division of the Ars Electronica. He is a professor at the Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences [IAMAS]. Elder brother of the the Formant Brothers.
Video director
Maeda presents his work, which spans the categories of video, media art and documentary, at film festivals and exhibitions like the Image Forum Festival, the Ebisu International Festival for Art and Alternative Visions, and the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival. He actively plans exhibitions, collaborating with artists from theatre, art and other fields. He has been supervising director of the DVD label SOL CHORD since 2005. He is a professor at the Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences [IAMAS].
Formant voice synthesis
Musician, media artist and media theory researcher. Sakonda creates artworks using real-time synthesis of singing voices, which he developed in his own right. He is a professor at Nagoya University of Arts and Sciences, Department of Film and Media Studies. Young brother of the Formant Brothers.
Poetry
As a poet, Matsui has been creating works in collaboration with sound designers and visual artists. He wrote the thesis “Tsutomu Konno: A Faction in Search of Radical Expressions in Television”, among other achievements. He is an associate professor at the Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences [IAMAS].
Photograph
As a photographer, Mugyuda is currently working on a single theme, Artificial S. Since 2010, he has been showing his photographic activity "pile of photographys" on the web.
Dance
Kawaguchi joined the performance group Dumb Type in 1996 and began his solo career in 2000. "About Kazuo Ohno", which was performed in 38 cities around the world, was nominated for the New York Dance and Performance Awards (Bessie Awards) in 2016.
MIDI accordion
Okano graduated from the piano department of Tokyo College of Music. He is known for his diverse activities that transcend genres. He has performed many of the Formant Brothers' synthesized voice works on MIDI accordion. Lecturer at the piano department of Shobi College of Music.
MIDI accordion
In addition to his work as a pianist, he has been involved in a wide variety of performance studies and musical activities in Japan and abroad, including contemporary music, gamelan, blues and music education. He graduated from Kyoto City University of Arts.
Organ
After graduating from the Tokyo University of the Arts, Tsukatani returned to Japan after performance activity in the Netherlands. She plays pipe organ, piano, harpsichord, and arranges music, and has been involved in many world premieres.
Sō
She has been playing the koto, a Japanese traditional musical instrument, from both classical and modern perspectives. She graduated from Tokyo University of the Arts, and completed her postgraduate studies at the same university.
Rebab
As a gamelan player and performer, Homma has been performing internationally in both traditional and new Javanese gamelan music, and has been involved in the collaborative creation of songs, poetry and dance.
Gamelan
Based in Toyonoh-cho, Osaka, MargaSari has been engaged in expressive activities using the Javanese gamelan. Especially they have been active in the field of contemporary gamelan, including the premiere of a new work by Masahiro Miwa.
Open called performers
Masato Ishida
Kaori Ono
Asuka Kagami
Kou Houka
Takuya Goto
Yutaro Sato
Tomohiko Sugino
Misaki Takagi
Hiroaki Nakaji
Rina Niinmi
Hanataro
Nobuhiko Hayashi
Yuina Hara
Haruka Horaguchi
6 chickens
During the live stream, we will be sending out several "poems" from the venue to viewers' email addresses as part of the work of this performance. With the poems, we invite you to spend time with the chickens and the performers at Salamanca Hall.
You must register your email address in advance to receive the poems.
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We may send you information related to the performance in advance.
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