Kunihiko Komori and Seitaro Ishikawa conducting the Japan Youth Philharmonic will be among the performers at a recital featuring marimba concertos composed since the 1990s. Scheduled for Friday, April 4 (beginning at 19:00) at the Suginami Koukaidou Main Hall in Tokyo, this kind of program is not often heard in Japan. The marimbist Mr. Komori is one of artists profiled on this site.
The program will consist of mixed ensemble works featuring the marimba. Mr. Komori has previously given premiere performances of Alejandro Vinao's "Marimba Concerto" (1993) and Martin Bresnick's concerto for two marimbas and orchestra, "Grace" (2000) in the Kansai region, but this will be the first time of their performance in Tokyo. These works reflect the long way marimba music has come since the days of the xylophone, when virtuosity and little more was expected of performances. They are examples of the multilayered charms that modern marimba music has acquired. Another work on the program, Steve Reich's "Sextet" (1985), uses two grand pianos, a synthesizer and a vibraphone.
There have been more opportunities to hear marimba performances in recent years. The early works were xylophone performances that mainly used two mallets and often imitated violin pieces. Musicians' techniques have evolved considerably since then and so have the instruments themselves. Performances that once leaned toward acrobatics have given way to greater emphasis on nuance and the instrument's deeper musical potential. The trend has advanced furthest in the United States, where composers have been influenced by the new techniques marimbists have developed. That is the music scene where Kunihiko Komori perfected his technique over many years. It has produced some true masterpieces of marimba concertos and large scale chamber music works that are recognized as such in the U.S. and Europe, but they still are not often heard in Japan. The way is open for this gap to be filled with ambitious performances by young artists.
Marimbist Kunihiko Komori 2008 with orchestra
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