Ifukube Akira
伊福 部 昭
1914 - 2/8/2006
Composer
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Akira Ifukube was born in Hokkaido, Japan, in 1914, and first studied forestry at Hokkaido University. While serving as official forester in a small village at the eastern tip of Hokkaido, he composed his first orchestral work, Japanese Rhapsody (1935), which won first prize in the Tcherepnin Competition in Paris and was premiered by the Boston Symphony in the following year. This paved the way for his study under the tutelage of Alexander Tcherepnin, who was responsible for the premiere of Ifukube's first ballet, Bon Dance, in Vienna in 1938. The same year, a piano suite was played at the ISCM Festival in Venice. His orchestral works include Ballata Sinfimica (1943), Rhapsody for Violin and Orchestra (1951, an award-winning piece at the International Contest for Composers in Genoa), and Lauda Concertata (performed at Carnegie Hall by Keiko Abe in the 1981 Music From Japan concert). Although many of Ifukube's works are Japanese folk music-based (use of Japanese pentatonic scale, etc.), they have a largeness about them that is continental or cross-cultural in feeling. His Hokkaido upbringing and greater experiences with northern Asia and the Eurasian continent led him into a more expansive, pan-Asian style. In the period before World War II, Ifukube-as a scientist-was attracted to the more scientifically objective, serialist styles that were gaining ascendancy in western musical circles. But with the end of the war and the accompanying disillusionment, he returned to his earlier track and emerged as a leader in a new kind of Asian modernism. In addition to his work as a composer, Ifukube joined the faculty at the Tokyo College of Music in 1974, serving as president beginning in 1976. He has published Orchestration, a 1,OOO-page book on theory. The Japanese government has decorated him with the Order of Culture and the Order of the Sacred Treasure.
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Composed or Arranged
| Koto Compositions | |||
| Title | Kanji | Year | Alternate Title |
| Eglogue Symphonique | |||
| Rapsodia Concertante | |||
| Ritmica Ostinata | |||
| Kugo-Ka | 箜篌歌 |
1969 |
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| Chant de la Serinde | 胡哦 |
1997 |
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| Pipa Xing | 琵琶行 |
1999 |