Commissioned Composer
KUWABARA Yu
[ Composer , Japan ]
©︎Miyachi Takako
Yu Kuwabara, a winner of the 31st Yasushi Akutagawa Suntory Award for Music Composition, examines her sense of being and traces the origins of Japanese sound and language that define her as a being, tirelessly crafting a complex tapestry of the old and new, the East and West in cultures. Selected one of “Eight Women Composers to Watch in 2023” by the UK’s leading classical music review website, Bachtrack, she has received numerous commissions in Japan and abroad, and her works have been featured in prestigious international festivals and projects all over the world, including the National Theatre of Japan, Concert Hall Shizuoka AOI, Kanagawa Prefectural Music Hall, Yokohama Minato Mirai Hall, Minoh City Maple Hall, Lucerne Festival, Warsaw Autumn, ACHT BRÜCKEN|Musik für Köln, ZeitRäume (Basel), Transit Festival 20-21 (Leuven), I&I Foundation (Zurich).
Born in 1984, she studied composition and received her master’s degree from Tokyo University of the Arts. She is currently an associate professor at Kunitachi College of Music. She is also a part-time lecturer at Tokyo University of the Arts and Senzoku Gakuen College of Music, as well as a member of Awai-Za, a chamber unit mixed with contemporary music and Japanese Edo culture. Her music scores are available mainly from Edition Gravis (Berlin). In 2024, her first portrait album, “YU KUWABARA: Sounded Voice, Voiced Sound,” was released on Kairos (Vienna).
Official website : https://3shimai.com/yu/index_Eng.html