Miya Masaoka, musician, composer, performance artist, has created works for koto, laser interfaces, laptop and video and written scores for ensembles, chamber orchestras and mixed choirs. In her performance pieces 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 contexts of sound, music and nature, her performance work emphasizes the interactive, live nature of improvisation, and reflects an individual, contemporary expression of Japanese gagaku aural gesturalism.
Masaoka's work has been presented in Japan, Canada, Europe, Eastern Europe and she has toured to India six times. Venues include V2 in Rotterdam, Cybertheater in Brussels, Elektronisch Festival in Groningen, the Cleveland Performance Art Festival, The Electronik Body Festival in Bratislava, Slovakia, Radio Bremen, Germany, Festival of Lights, Hyberadad, India, and the London Musicians Collective.
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 improvisation and expanding the instrument into a virtual space using computer, lasers, live sampling, and real time processing.
Masaoka has been developing koto interfaces with midi controllers since the 1980's originally with Tom Zimmerman, co-inventor of the Body Glove. Since then, she has she has worked at STEIM, Amsterdam, CNMAT, and with Donald Swearingen to build interfaces with the computer and koto, at times using pedals, light sensors, motion sensors and ultrasound. 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.
Click to purchase Miya Masaoka's music:
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For more info on Miya Masaoka, please visit:
http://www.miyamasaoka.com/
Photos by: Lori Eanes
THE KOTO
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.
In addition to studying traditional koto with Seiko Shimaoka, Masaoka has studied with teachers of Chikushi, Sawai and Ikuta schools. The koto is one of the instruments in the gagaku orchestra, and Masaoka formed the San Francisco Gagaku Society in 1990 under the leadership of Suenobu Togi, an organization that was dedicated to studying, performing and preserving gagaku. Togi Sensei traces his family lineage in the gagaku tradition more than 1200 years to China. He was educated at the Japanese Imperial Court Music School where he studied Japanese court music and dance since boyhood. Members of the esteemed Togi family were the first Imperial Court musicians in history to teach gagaku to non-Imperial Court Japanese civilians, to non-Japanese and also to women, all prohibited from learning gagaku.
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