Ken Ueno BMOP Interview
1. How do you feel your compositions have been influenced by the work of Toru Takemitsu? This work in particular?
My work has been inspired by the legacy of Toru Takemitsu both musically and sociologically.
A major focus of my work has been trying to reconcile the grammatological distance between transportable and non-transportable sounds. Transportable sounds are those elements that usually comprise the grammar of western music: rhythm, melody, and harmony. Non-transportable sounds are those sounds that have to be produced on a specific instrument in a specific way, which, in the West, have often been labeled as noise. These sounds include multiphonics, scratch tones, and breath sounds, as well as those sounds produced by found objects. Takemitsu’s compositions have helped to convince the world of the validity of non-transportable sounds, in that they are beautiful and worth listening to.
Takemitsu’s sociological and historical importance cannot be overstated. He is really the first and most important Asian composer to garner international respect. For me, more than any other composer, he has proved that it is possible for one to participate in the development of concert music even if one is not a member of the dominant culture.
Composing Kaze-no-Oka, the upcoming piece for BMOP, was a daunting task. Imagine writing for a genre in which previously there was only one piece, and that piece happened to be THE masterpiece by the THE Japanese master composer of the 20th century. I imagine it would be like composing a string quartet if one were German, and if the only string quartet that had previously existed was Beethoven’s Op. 131! I really had to spend some quality time studying Takemitsu’s November Steps to see how he wrote for the biwa and the shakuhachi. Mostly, I think my piece relates to Takemitsu’s in terms of affect. If you can keep a secret, I’ll tell you take there is even a quotation from November Steps, but it’s only the silence at the end of the piece. I made sure that the silence in my piece is notated like the silence at the end of Takemitsu’s piece: “Keep silence.” I thought it was apropos, being that my piece memorializes him ten years after his death. It is not only the literal silence - the world can only imagine what other pieces he might have produced, but it is also the most important element of his music, silence as expressive of the Japanese aesthetic principle of ma.
2. Tell about the title of the piece. How did you come up with it?
When I was commissioned to write this concerto for two traditional Japanese instruments, the biwa and the shakuhachi, I was informed that, besides the orchestral concert, there would be a chamber music recital featuring the biwa and shakuhachi players, and was encouraged to have a piece that these performers could play on that occasion. So I was presented with a compositional challenge: to create a piece that could be used for both orchestral and chamber music contexts. My solution was to create a modular form with an extractable cadenza. In the orchestral context, the biwa and shakuhachi only play in the cadenza, which can also be a stand-alone chamber piece. In thinking of this solution, I was inspired by an architectural work by Fumihiko Maki, one of Japan’s leading architects. Kaze-no-Oka (”Hill of the Wind”), his structure from which my piece borrows its name, is a crematorium consisting of three separate buildings, the grounds of which incorporate recently unearthed ancient burial mounds. I liked the separate-but-incorporated-ness of the ancient mounds with the modern buildings, and this became the structural impetus for my piece: the extractable cadenza for biwa and shakuhachi are poetically related to the ancient mounds. I also liked the image of the wind over the hills, two systems interacting together, but still remaining separate. The fact that Maki’s building complex is a crematorium fit perfectly with the memorial character of my piece.
3. What tools did you use while working on this piece? Pencil and paper? Piano? Computer? Or, like Mozart, was everything in your head before writing it down?
Whenever I compose, I use pencil, paper, and the computer. But the most important tool is my imagination. I like comparing my working method to that of contemporary architects. Some of my favorite architects, like Eric Owen Moss and Frank Gehry, might start with a scribble or a scrunched-up piece of paper, which somehow represents the gestalt of the initiating inspirational gesture. They then take this idea and do lots of calculations using sophisticated software. Then the building is actually built. I often start with some kind of initiating principle, and then I do lots of research. The research for this piece included recording a catalogue of multiphonics with these specific performers (Eric Hewitt, bass saxophone, and Michael Norsworthy, contrabass clarinet), transcribing and analyzing the multiphonics, and then using computer software to help me calculate harmonies that compress and expand the spectra derived from the frequencies and amplitudes present in the analysis of the multiphonics. Of course, I could do all the calculations by hand, but the software allows me to develop my ideas more freely, as well as help free up mental space to work on other aspects of my composition. I believe some of the best artists and architects today use the most advanced technology to help them create works that were not possible in the past. It’s a way of relating art to contemporary culture by updating the work method. And I believe the technology can actually help the contemporary artist create works that are even more organic and human.
4. This work incorporates two Japanese instruments, the biwa (lute), and shakuhachi. What challenges, if any, did you encounter through the composition process?
There were many challenges. I first had to learn about the performance practice of the instruments. The cosmology of performance practice is quite inflated with respect to both instruments. For example, the shakuhachi has seven main types of vibrato styles which have names. Secondly, since there is no standardized Western notation for the instruments, I had to design some shapes and fonts that I thought best represented the sounds I wanted in my piece. What made shakuhachi and biwa writing more esoteric in this piece was the fact that not only are they shakuhachi and biwa, but alto versions of those instruments. The shakuhachi used in this piece is a fourth lower than most shakuhachi. The biwa is lower too than most biwa as well. There are many possibilities for tuning the strings of the biwa. I based the tuning in my piece on Takemitsu’s tuning from November Steps.
5. When in the composition process did you think about the large form of the piece? Did this come first or did it emerge from the materials of the thematic or sound ideas?
Thomas Mann likened writing with facing the “marble block of words.” I think of composing in a similar fashion. I start with an overall impression, and as I begin to sculpt out the local moments, I learn more about what the piece needs to be, which often necessitates my adjusting the local structure. What I mean is like this: as I work on local moments, I might feel like the gestures need to be a bit longer or shorter, louder or softer, and I make those adjustments. My ideal would be to do what I feel Isamu Noguchi accomplished in his later works: to do just enough to a block of material to liberate what is already present in nature.
6. What should audiences be listening for when they hear this piece for the first time?
Everybody hears differently, so I wouldn’t ever want to say what one “should” listen for, but, that being said, I’ll say some things that one “might” listen for. The memorial and contemplative affect or character of the piece is maybe the most obvious thing. Other than that, maybe one can listen for the sounds produced by the different instrumental groups: the woodwinds, strings, and percussion. The bass saxophone and contrabass clarinet produce several classes of sounds: multiphonics, keyclicks, breath and humming through the instrument. Among the other sounds there are the stereo panning of the gongs and the microtonal harmonies in the strings. Once one can identify these sounds, then it is possible to listen for the different lengths of time between iterations of these like sounds. And further, it will be possible to compare similarities and differences in the iteration of each sound type. There are theatrical, visual elements to the experience of the piece too. Like watching two performers of ancient instruments, in traditional garb, sitting up front on either side of the conductor, not playing a single note for the first ten minutes! There is drama and tension in the waiting, an element that would be lost in an audio recording. I think of Samuel Beckett’s plays that use a similar effect in Catastrophe or Rockaby. By the time the biwa and shakuhachi play, I hope to have prepared the listener to focus on a wide rubric of timbres: the shakuhachi’s range of breath, vibrato, portamento, microtonal sounds; and the biwa‚ glisses, microtones, harmonics, scrapings, and plectrum hits to the body of the instrument.
