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Receives FAME Award in Washington

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Miami City Ballet
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Miya Masaoka
Tradition meets Innovation

Recent Gifts & Acquisitions
New Pieces Unveiled

April/May 2004 > Miya Masaoka
Miya Masaoka
Tradition meets Innovation

 


Miya Masaoka, musician, composer and performance artist has created works for koto in the traditional and not so traditional form.

The koto is a Japanese instrument with moveable frets in the long zither family of Asian instruments. Its evolution reflects the continuum of change through the epochs of Japanese history, and includes ritual, sacred and secular folk and court forms. The full name, kami no nori koto, means literally, "Oracle of the gods" and was used in Shinto practices that continue in modern Japan. It is made of the rather soft kiri wood, and is over six feet long. The length of the vibrating part of the strings is determined by the placement of the moveable bridges (ji), each string having one bridge. Different placement of the ji produce different tunings. There are some 200 scales in Japanese music. The strings are plucked with ivory plectra (tsume) of varying shape. Miya Masaoka performs on the 17, 21 and 25 string koto. Her 25 string koto was made for her by Takashi Nakaji, and she is one of the few performers on this instrument.

Since forming and directing the San Francisco Gagaku Society, Masaoka has been creating new ways of thinking about and performing on the Japanese koto. She has developed a virtuosic and innovative approach, including improvising and expanding the instrument into a virtual space using computers, lasers, live sampling, and real time processing. At times using pedals, light sensors, motion sensors and ultrasound, and with the koto connected directly to her laptop, she records her playing live, and processes the samples in real time. This new koto is able to respond dynamically and interactively in a variety of musical environments, and improvise with the processed sounds. “I work with electronics,” explains Masaoka, “but it’s about extending the acoustic sounds and transforming them. It’s inspired from the sounds of everyday life and from the sounds of my instrument.”

In her past performances she has investigated the sound and movement of insects, as well as the physiological responses of plants, the human brain, and her own body. Within these varied context of sound, music and nature, her work emphasizes the interactive, and live nature of improvisation. Masaoka says, “I certainly don’t look for hybridity. But it ends up happening. I think it’s such a part of the American experience; it’s just part of contemporary life.” As a composer, her objective has long been what she calls “an inquiry into how to create new sounds andhow to reorganize the sounds in interesting ways.”

Miya Masaoka peforms a solo musical performance at the Augusta Savage Gallery on Wednesday, April 14th at 7 p.m.. The event is free to the public. For more information on the artist www.miyamasaoka.com.


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