OKAMOTO SHINSUKE

7 August 1987

Japan

Calligraphy for Air and Ground

"It is a piece inspired by the climate and natural features of my hometown, a rural village on the coast of the Seto Naikai (Seto Inland Sea). The elements that make up this work derive from ground, wind, waves and more. This work, however, was not intended simply to describe a natural scene. By transforming and fusing ubiquitous natural phenomena in a variety ways, I made an effort to describe the inner world of the natural environment from a new perspective. Melodic elements based on Kobushi, which is a melisma characteristic of Japanese traditional folk song technique, gives this work an oriental character. The work utilizes a series based on the name “Bartók Béla”. This is meant to be a gesture of honor to Bartók, who contributed to the development of music. The series, which function along different axes from the above-mentioned elements, lead to a kind of stimulation to enrich the musical content."

Born in Okayama, Japan, Shinsuke Okamoto studied composition at Kyoto City University of Arts and musicology on a Kyoto City University of Arts postgraduate course, currently studying composition on a Kyoto City University of Arts doctoral course. He has studied composition with Noriko Nakamura, Kenji Sakai, Shuichi Maeda,

Masanori Kasai, Hiroyuki Ito, Sonoko Fujii and Shozo Aoki. He won the prize for the 12th TIAA All-Japan Composer Competition (chamber music), the Encouragement Prize in the 21st Century Japanese Music Project New Music Composition Contest for the YIS Japanese Music Ensembles, Giacomo Leopardi Special Award for International Composition Competition Forme Uniche di continuità nello spazio 2019. He received the Kyoto Mayor Prize with his master's thesis. He attended Takefu International Composition Workshop as a scholarship student in 2013.