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Project Website: http://slought.org/content/11380/
Slought Foundation and Soundfield NFP are pleased to announce an evening of traditional Japanese music, new compositions, and open form improvisations by Japanese musicians Ko Ishikawa (sho), Ryuko Mizutani (koto), and Kazuhisa Uchihashi (guitar), and other members of the Japan/USA-based Ensemble N_JP on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 from 8:00-9:30pm. This concert is part of the 2007-2008 Soundfield @ Slought series.
Ensemble N_JP is comprised of around 12 musicians who work with composer Gene Coleman on a project basis. The group unites outstanding Japanese musicians from the traditional, experimental and contemporary classical music communities along with guest artists and musicians from Europe and the USA. The group has performed works by Japanese composers including Yuji Takahashi and Otomo Yoshihide. Ensemble N_JP has performed in a number of important festivals and venues since it's inception in 2001 including the International House of Japan, Pitt Inn Shinjuku, Super Deluxe, Kidailack Art House (Tokyo), The Transonic Festival at the House of World Cultures Berlin, The Global Ear concert series at the Dresden Society Theater, The Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, Lake Forest College, The Chicago World Music Festival, Domicil in Dortmund, The Blurred Edges Festival in Hamburg and The Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago.
Ko Ishikawa is a professional "Sho" (Japanese bamboo mouth organ) player and is a member of the Gagaku ensemble "Reigakusha". He was born in Tokyo in 1963 and studied Sho and Gagaku music with masters Mayumi Miyata, Hideaki Bunno and Sukeyasu Shiba. He became a member of Reigakusha in 1987. He has made numerous appearances as a member of
Reigakusha and as a soloist in Europe, performing in major festivals. His performances of both classic and new music for Sho have been highly regarded in Vienna, London, Paris, Tokyo, Frankfurt and Berlin. Ko Ishikawa has worked frequently with Otomo Yoshihide in the group "Cathode" and he has played and recorded with Gene Coleman in Japan and Europe in 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004.
Ryuko Mizutani, a native of Japan, graduated from the NHK National Broadcasting School for Performers of Japanese Music in 1987 and began studying both classical and modern koto music under the world-renowned koto masters Tadao and Kazue Sawai, with whom she has toured in Germany, India, and Poland, and played in festivals like "Bang on a Can" in New York and the Moers Jazz Festival in Germany. In 1999, she received a fellowship from the Japanese Government Overseas Study Program for Artists to study with jazz great Anthony Braxton & experimental composer Alvin Lucier at Wesleyan University (CT) and has since continued to collaborate with musicians of diverse musical backgrounds. She is a member of Ensemble N_JP and the group "IIIz+".
Kazuhisa Uchihashi is a guitarist and composer from Japan. He currently lives in Vienna. He is well know in the area of improvised music for his collaborations with Elliot Sharp, Ned Rothenberg, Shelly Hirsch, Peter Kowald, Hans Reichel and many others. He was part of the seminal Japanese noise band Ground Zero with Otomo Yoshihide, as well as his own jazz-noise-rock group Altered States. He has released dozens of recordings on many labels and is the director of the Experimental music festival "FBI" in Osaka.
This program is made possible in part through the generous sponsorship or support of Sound Field NFP, grants from the Argosy Fund for Contemporary Music, the Philadelphia Music Project, a program of The Philadelphia Center for Arts and Heritage, funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and administered by The University of the Arts, and the Japan Foundation, with media support from Bowerbird.
 
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