Tōru Takemitsu, born on 8 October 1930, freely admits that his first real composition teacher was the radio. Nursing an extended illness, he listened to as much Western music as possible, broadcast on Armed Forces Radio. His first mentor was

Tōru Takemitsu: Mori no naka de (In the Woods) German-born American painter Cornelia Foss (b. 1931) has works in the leading art museums in the US and specializes in paintings and portraits done around New York and Long Island. Her

When Emperor Hirohito ascended to the throne in 1927, he initiated a period known as the “Showa Restoration.” It advocated the revival of Shinto, and the so-called “State Shinto,” which had been developing over a period of time, came to

Commissioned by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) for the clarinetist Richard Stoltzman and the BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra, Fantasma/Cantos for clarinet and orchestra first sounded on 14 September 1991 in Cardiff. In this composition, Takemitsu imagined the orchestra as a

On 20 February 1996, while undergoing treatment for abdominal cancer, Tōru Takemitsu died at the age of sixty-five. He had been diagnosed mid-1995, and “by October the disfiguring side-effects of the medical treatments were pronounced.” Takemitsu became increasingly weak and

As a composer, Tōru Takemitsu (1930-1996) was essentially self-taught. In fact, as he freely admits, his first real teacher was the radio. During the post-war occupation of Japan, Takemitsu worked for the U.S. Armed Forces. He contracted tuberculosis and was

“My Music Is Like a Garden” Tōru Takemitsu (1930-1996), who was born in Tokyo 90 years ago, once likened his music to a walk through a garden. “I am the gardener,” he writes, “who experiences the changes in light, pattern

Tōru Takemitsu was a composer, but he was also a writer on aesthetics and musical theory. His music is delicate and refined, as beautiful as Hokusai print or a carved jade netsuke. Largely self-taught, his music combines elements of Japanese