World Music Institute Presents
ZEN MUSIC OF JAPAN
MARCO LIENHARD & MASAYO ISHIGURE
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2004 8:00 PM
Leonard Nimoy Thalia at Peter Norton Symphony Space
Broadway at 95th Street, NYC
$22; students $15 Box office (212) 864-5400
Info/charges (212) 545-7536 worldmusicinstitute.org
Marco Lienhard and Masayo Ishigure have collaborated since 1999, bringing
the entrancing sounds of the shakuhachi and koto to audiences throughout
Japan, Mexico and the U.S. Lienhard is one of the few Westerners to have
achieved mastery on the Japanese shakuhachi, a bamboo flute that has been
associated with religious practices since the 14th century and was
traditionally used by Zen monks for meditation. He studied with masters
Teruo Furuya and Katsuya Yokoyama and was a member of the famed taiko group
Ondekoza for 13 years. Ishigure, a virtuoso performer of the koto
(13-stringed plucked zither), studied with masters Tadao and Kazue Sawai.
Their program of solos and duets will feature traditional and contemporary
works.
Marco Lienhard, a native of Switzerland, was a member of the internationally
acclaimed taiko group Ondekoza from 1981-1994. While touring as a
professional taiko player in Japan, he studied the shakuhachi under masters
Teruo Furuya and Katsuya Yokoyama, quickly becoming a virtuoso solo artist.
He also studied the fue and the nohkan (Noh theater flute) with Masayuki
Isso. Lienhard has performed more than 3000 concerts in Europe, Asia and
North America with appearances at some of the world's most prestigious
venues including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Boston Symphony Hall, Osaka
Castle Hall, Hong Kong Cultural Center and Suntory Hall in Tokyo. He has
contributed to many movies, documentaries and CDs, and made several
recordings with Ondekoza and Taikoza, as well as two critically acclaimed
shakuhachi albums . He has appeared on many TV shows including the PBS
special A World of Performances (the 20th Anniversary Gala of Wolf Trap), a
documentary for Canadian National TV, and MTV. He was the featured
shakuhachi player in the American premiere of the Temple of the Golden
Pavilion with the New York City Opera at Lincoln Center. He currently
teaches the shakuhachi, taiko and fue in New York and at workshops
throughout the world.
Masayo Ishigure began playing the koto and jiuta shamisen at the age of five
in Gifu, Japan. After initial studies with Tadao and Kazue Sawai, she became
a special research student in 1986 at the Sawai Koto Academy of Music. The
aim of the academy was to shed new light on koto music by incorporating
everything from Bach to jazz and thus change the koto from being thought of
only as a traditional Japanese instrument into an instrument of universal
expressiveness. Later she became one of a small group of virtuoso disciples
of the Sawais and successfully completed the 33rd Ikusei-kai program
sponsored by NHK to foster and train aspiring artists in Japanese music. She
has performed all over the world, and appeared at the Bang On A Can Festival
in New York and major concert halls and museums, including Carnegie Hall,
the Guggenheim Museum, and the Smithsonian Institution. She appeared in two
public television broadcasts, Music Under New York and World of Music, and
recorded koto music for CBS MasterWork for use during the broadcast of the
1998 Nagano Winter Olympics. In 2002, she made her first solo recording. She
has taught at Wesleyan University and also offers private lessons as the
only Sawai Koto School instructor in the New York metropolitan area.
This program has been made possible in part with public support from the
New York State Council on the Arts, a State agency.
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