Hisatada Otaka Explained

Hisatada Otaka
Birth Place:Tokyo, Japan[1]
Birth Date:26 September 1911
Death Place:Japan
Death Date: (aged 39)
Children:Tadaaki Otaka, Atsutada Otaka, Michiko Otaki
Occupation:Conductor, Composer
Native Name Lang:ja

Hisatada Otaka (Japanese: 尾高尚忠; 26 September 1911 – 16 February 1951) was a Japanese composer and conductor. He was the conductor of the NHK Symphony Orchestra from 1942 to 1951.

Otaka was born in Japan and studied in musical arts early, however he dropped out of high school and moved to Vienna for six years for conducting and composing, during his studies in Vienna he became friends with Andrzej Panufnik and started composing works. In 1940, Otaka moved back to Japan where he took the role as conductor for the NHK Symphony Orchestra, become a music teacher and compose most of his significant works such as his Symphony and Cello Concerto, however his life came to an abrupt end at the age of 39, leaving an unfinished Flute Concerto rewrite which one of his students, Hikaru Hayashi, would take on and complete.

When Otaka died he left behind three children, all of whom play his work regularly particularly the youngest son Tadaaki Otaka. In 1953, the NHK Symphony Orchestra created the Otaka Prize, which is named after Hisatada Otaka for his role in helping the orchestra. Otaka had written one of the first Japanese cello concertos and the first Japanese flute concerto, the latter being played regularly as Otaka's most famous work.

Life

Early life, studies in Vienna

Hisatada Otaka was born in Tokyo on 26 September 1911, the youngest of 11 children, he was the 6th son of, a Japanese banker, businessman, however Jiro Otaka would die in 1920, when Hisatada Otaka was 9 years old.[2] [3] Otaka studied at the Tokyo Prefectural Fifth Junior High School. After graduating there, Otaka decided to choose a career path in music and studied at the Seijo High School (which would become Seijo University), however he dropped out.[3] To continue his music studies Otaka moved to Vienna to study music briefly from 1931 to 1932, he studied under for piano, Richard Stehl for music theory. After the short stay, Otaka moved back to Japan to study composition with Klaus Pringsheim and piano with Leo Sirota. However, this too was short as he moved back to Vienna in 1934 to study composition with Joseph Marx, and conducting with Felix Weingartner, from his 6-year stay in Vienna (1934–1940), Otaka would be an active conductor and composer.[4] In 1937, Otaka won a Japanese-European music competition for his first Japanese Suite,[5] he was awarded by Felix Weingartner. In 1939, Otaka controversially conducted the Berlin Reichsorchester; as Otaka played Japanese pieces, this was seen as a symbol of Nazi–Japan relations,[6] [7] although Otaka never had an incident like this later on. At some point after 1936, Otaka and his wife Misao (who also played the piano) met and became friends with Andrzej Panufnik,[8] [9] who also came to Vienna to study conducting under Weingartner. The Panufnik and Otaka family would stay close and remain in contact, as Otaka's son, Tadaaki Otaka would perform Panufnik's works regularly.[8]

Return to Japan

See also: NHK Symphony Orchestra. In 1940, the Otakas left and moved to Japan, where Hisatada would live for the rest of his life. Initially he was assistant to Joseph Rosenstock, who was the conductor of the Japan Symphony Orchestra (also known at the time as the Nippon Symphony Orchestra, later known as the NHK Symphony Orchestra), and made his Japanese conducting debut in January 1941. In 1942 Otaka became a conductor of the orchestra, alongside Rosenstock, and Kazuo Yamada.[10] [1] Otaka was highly respected as a conductor until his sudden death in 1951,[1] [4] after which, he was succeeded by Kurt Wöss.[11]

Besides conducting, Otaka also composed prolifically, and had taught Hikaru Hayashi,[12] Kan Ishii, and Kikuko Kanai.[13] Among Otaka's compositions are his first symphony ("Society for the Construction of the Bell Tower of Peace"),[14] Cello Concerto (1944),[15] Flute Concerto, and Rhapsody for Piano and Orchestra (1943).[16]

Death and legacy

On 16 February 1951, Hisatada Otaka died at the age of 39, from what Andrzej Panufnik says was overwork.[9]

Due to his significant contributions to, and long stay with, the Japanese Symphony Orchestra, the Otaka Prize was created in his honour.[17] After his death, the orchestra's name changed to the NHK Symphony Orchestra because of funding received from NHK (Japanese Broadcasting Corporation).[18]

Hisatada Otaka's youngest son, Tadaaki Otaka, conducts his father's work regularly, along with the works of Andrzej Panufnik.[19] [8]

Hisatada's other children, Michiko Otaki and Atsutada Otaki, also play his work. Such as the piano duet piece Midare.[20]

Personal life

Hisatada Otaka married Misao Otaka sometime before 1940. According to Panufnik, they were already married when they would invite Panufnik to their house in Vienna, and they left Vienna for Japan in 1940.[21]

When the couple moved to Japan, they had a daughter and two sons. Michiko Otaki (in or after 1940), the daughter, is a pianist.[22] Atsutada Otaka (1944), the elder son, is a musicologist and a composer.[23] Tadaaki Otaka, (1947), the younger son, is a popular Japanese conductor, a permanent conductor of the NHK Symphony Orchestra since 2010, the first Japanese person to win the Elgar Medal, and musical director of the Osaka Philharmonic Orchestra.[24]

When Hisatada Otaka died in 1951, the couple's children were still very young (Tadaaki being only 4 years old), and therefore Misao was left as a widowed mother.

Selected compositions

The most popular of Otaka's work is his flute concerto, which is played and recorded commonly, and was supported among his peers.[32] [36]

Style

Otaka's style reflects much of his teachers in the 1930s, showing Viennese and German styles.[31] Although unlike his teacher Joseph Marx, Otaka stayed within the zone of tonality, going with more traditional later Romantic styles, rather than the growing atonal or modern styles.[19] Many of his pieces like the Cello Concerto, Midare, Symphony No. 1 – "The Construction of the Bell Tower of Peace" still keep in tune with his original Japanese-music style and culture.[28] As such, Otaka's pieces result in a combination between eastern Japanese styles, and older tonal Germanic-Viennese style, even during his early studies in Vienna, Otaka showed Japanese traditional music, such as in his Japanische Suites, where Otaka made his pieces deliberately to "find new means of expression for the Japanese spirit... into the western tonal language", which was different compared to some of his peers who wrote only focusing on the European musicality.[37] [38]

Flute concertoHowever, the flute concerto Op. 30 is written in a specific French romantic style, although with distinct sections Japanese themes, it is written differently than many other concert works by Otaka, seemingly independent from the style of his teachers from Germany and Vienna, The Guardian said the piece had a "jazzy inflection" during the slower movement of the concerto, due to the French style and structure many French flautists performed the piece such as Jean-Pierre Rampal and Emmanuel Pahud[39] and was popular in France.[19] [36]

References

NotesReferences

Further reading

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Otaka, Hisatada. encyclopedia.com.
  2. Web site: 『人事興信録 第5版』. 39. ja. National Diet Library.
  3. Book: 日本の作曲家. 120. 富樫康. 音楽之友社. 1956. ja. (From page 120: "尾高尚忠 Histada Otaka 渋沢栄一の外孫にあたる彼は,学者肌の銀行家を父に持ち, 11 人兄弟の末子として明治 44 年 9 月 26 日,東京に生れた。両親共義太夫をたしなむ程度であったが,父は彼が幼少の頃他界した。彼の兄朝雄は東大法律学教授 東京府立第五中学卒業後,成城高等学校文科に入学して開放的な生活に入った彼は 18 歳の時,単なる音楽愛好家たることに満足 ...")
  4. Book: Musical Entanglement between Germany and East Asia. 82. Joanne Miyang Cho. 978-3-030-78209-2. Springer International Publishing. 2021.
  5. Book: Japanisches Wien. 1989. Julia Krejsa. Peter Pantzer.

    de:Peter Pantzer

    . 978-3-7008-0384-3. Herold.
  6. Book: Germany and You. 1939. Stangen Verlag.
  7. Book: Sur les chemins de terre brune. Frédéric Sallée. 2017. Fayard. 978-2-213-70001-4. fr.
  8. Book: The Life and Works of Andrzej Panufnik. Beata Boles. 5 July 2017. 978-1-351-54291-3. Taylor & Francis.
  9. Book: Andrzej Panufnik. 1987. Composing Myself. Methuen. 978-0-413-58880-7.
  10. Book: Contemporary Japan. 3. 1942. This year, it was again renamed the Nippon Symphony Orchestra with Kazuo Yamada, Hisatada Otaka and Rosenstock selected as its conductors.. Nihon Gaiji Kyōkai. Foreign Affairs Association of Japan. (Volume 3; Part 3)
  11. Book: Musikleben in Japan in Geschichte und Gegenwart. 68. 1967 . Siegfried Borris. Detlef Foljanty . Bärenreiter. 978-3-7618-0160-4. de.
  12. Book: Guide to the Pianist's Repertoire, Fourth Edition. Maurice Hinston, Wesley Roberts. 3 December 2013. 978-0-253-01023-0. 480. Indiana University Press.
  13. Web site: Asian Symphonies – Discography. MusicWeb International. Michael Herman. Stephen Ellis.
  14. Book: ドン・ブラウン・コレクション書籍目錄. Don Brown Collection Book List. Otaka, Hisatada. 橫浜開港資料館 [Yokohama Archives of History Museum]. 2004. ja, en. 366. 橫浜開港資料館 [Yokohama Archives of History Museum].
  15. Book: Adventures of a Cello. 308. 978-1-4773-1786-0. April 2018. University of Texas Press. (Originally published February 2011, revised version (this version) April 2018)
  16. Book: Chronology of Western Classical Music. 1. Charles J. Hall. 2002. Routledge. 978-0-415-94216-4.
  17. Book: Wade, Bonnie C.. Composing Japanese Musical Modernity. 163. 13 January 2014. University of Chicago Press. 978-0-226-08549-4.
  18. Book: Kodansha International Staff. The Japan Book: A Comprehensive Pocket Guide. 2002. 4-7700-2847-4. Kodansha International. 147.
  19. Web site: Unpretentious Intelligence in Otaka's Conducting. Seen and Heard. 2 April 2013. Glyn Pursglove.
  20. Book: Yogaku. 207. Luciana Galliano. November 2002. 978-1-4616-7455-9. Scarecrow Press. (Originally in Japanese, translation to English by Martin Mayes)
  21. In Andrzej Panufnik's autobiography Composing Myself (1987), he says on page 71, "... my closest friend was the Japanese Hisatada Otaka ... He and his enchanting wife, Misao, often invited me to their flat so that we could work together. Misao was a fine pianist, so she and I would play together from a piano reduction while Hisatada conducted us; then it would be my..."
  22. Web site: Michiko Otaki. Naxos.
  23. Web site: 作曲家の尾高惇忠氏死去. Composer Atsutada Odaka passes away. Sankei Digital Inc. February 21, 2021.
  24. Web site: Tadaaki Otaka. Nagoya Philharmonic Orchestra. 31 October 2021. 31 October 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20211031053310/https://www.nagoya-phil.or.jp/en/profile/profile7186. dead.
  25. Web site: Otaka – Japanische Suite for Orchestra.
  26. Book: Die Wiener Symphoniker. Manfred Permoser. 2000. 978-3-631-36827-5. Lang. 135.
  27. Book: Music for More than One Piano. Maurice Hinston. 2001. 1981. 978-0-253-11306-1. Indiana University Press.
  28. Book: Team Piano Repertoire. Frederic Ming Chang, Albert Faurot. 1976. 978-0-8108-0937-6. 86. Scarecrow Press.
  29. Niklaus Aeschbacher cond. NHK Symphony Orchestra (1957)
  30. [listing]]. 1986. 179. The New Schwann. 38. 3–4.
  31. Book: The Harvard Biographical Dictionary of Music. 657. Don Michael Randel. 978-0-674-37299-3. 1996. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  32. Book: NHK交響楽団50年史 1926-1977 – NHK Symphony Orchestra 50 Years History 1926-1977. NHK Symphony Orchestra. 日本放送出版協会 (Japan Broadcasting Corporation). 1977. (Originally Japanese, English translation most likely by the University of California on September 24, 2010)
  33. Web site: The 157th Subscription Concert in the NHK Hall – NSO 80th Anniversary Phamplet. dead. September 2006. https://web.archive.org/web/20091222054320/http://www.nhkso.or.jp/archive/pdf/backnumber/pamph06Sep.pdf. 22 December 2009. ja, en.
  34. Book: Daniel Ryan Gallagher. Flute Repertoire from Japan: An Analysis of Twentieth-Century Flute Sonatas. Ohio State University. 2019.
  35. [review]date=1994. Vietnam Economic Times. 108. 113–118. 2003. The book mentions the piano concerto being played in Ho Chi Minh City, conducted by Thanh Nam; the concert also featured Tran Vuong Thach's flute concerto and ballet.
  36. News: BBC National Orchestra of Wales/Otaka – review. The Guardian. 31 March 2013. Rian Evans.
  37. Book: SS und Samurai: Deutsch–japanische Kulturbeziehungen 1933–1945. Hans-Joachim Bieber.

    de:Hans-Joachim Bieber

    . 2014. 978-3-86205-043-7. Iudicium Verlag. de. Hisatada Otaka: Contemporary Japanese Musician. In 1937 Otaka had won a competition for the best Japanese composition, which was announced by Felix Weingartner after his tour of Japan, and had been Joseph Marx's student in Vienna since 1937. To promote contemporary Japanese music, a composition competition has been held in Japan every year since 1931, financed by Tokyo Nichi Nichi and Mainichi Shimbun and supported by the Ministry of Education. Some composers tried to compose entirely in the western way, others like Konoe and Otaka in European music, ... to find new means of expression for the Japanese spirit Otaka by transcribing old Japanese music into the western tonal language as it were, like Konoe in his arrangement of old Japanese court music, which was often on his program...".
  38. Book: History of the Violoncello. 1983. 978-0-87666-597-8. Paganiniana Publications. Herbert R. Axelrod. Tanya Tchistyakova. Lev Solomonovich Ginzburg. 4. 384. (Originally Russian, translated to English)
  39. Web site: Through the month with Emmanuel Pahud. Irem Çatı. October 2019. Concerti.