When/how did western classical music get to the Far East?

[IcedNote]

I must have missed this class in musicology.

So yeah...western classical music's arrival must have been in the 19th century, right? And if so, why aren't there more well-known Asian "classical" composers? Takemitsu is the only one that comes to mind, and he's as modern as modern gets. Well...he's dead now...so I guess there's more modern...

Preemptive defense: I don't listen to much 20th century music, so I'm only going by my what-I-learned-in-a-typical-musicology-course knowledge.

-G

[Ralph]

With the Meiji Restoration, Japan selectively turned to the West for military and naval training and law. In the process, much interest in Western culture developed, including music (and in the early 20th century, baseball).

China's reception of Western classical music was more diffused, depending to a certain extent on the colonies of foreigners as well as Chinese who studied in Europe.

NAXOS has been releasing significant Chinese and Japanese classical music from the twentieth century for quite a while and many of the works demonstrate a sophstictaed fusion of Asian and classical motifs.

[Opus132]

The Chinese were too busy smoking on that opium to care about classical music.

Wait, what?

[jbuck919]

It happened at about the time Japan had to be the only country ever attacked by nuclear weapons.

[piston]

composers before Toru Takemitsu:

Koscak Yamada (1886-1949);
Hidemaro Konoye (1898-1973);
Saburo Moroi (1903-1977);
Qunihiko Hashimoto (1904-1949);
Hisato Ohzawa (1907-1953);
Yoritsune Matsudaira (1907-2001);
Akira Ifukube (b.1914);
Kiyoshige Koyama (b.1914);
Hiroshi Ohguri (1918-1982);
Yasushi Akutagawa (1925-1989);
Akio Yashiro (1929-1976).

Biographies can be found at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:J ... _composers

[Opus132]

composers before Toru Takemitsu:

Yeah, but what about 'great' composers before Takemitsu?

[IcedNote]

Yeah, but what about 'great' composers before Takemitsu?

Exactly. There seems to be a distinct lack of them.

Same for Australia.

-G

[piston]

Your initial question was not about greatness, IcedNote. I offered what I thought was an appropriate answer. In any case, I have been vaccinated against the greatness virus.

[pizza]

Japanese conductor Takashi Asahina who died recently was one of the world's greatest Brucknerians. He conducted and recorded several complete Bruckner cycles with Japanese orchestras and his work is held in high esteem.

[IcedNote]

Your initial question was not about greatness, IcedNote. I offered what I thought was an appropriate answer. In any case, I have been vaccinated against the greatness virus.

Well-known...great....same thing!

-G

PS. I'm not being serious.

[Opus132]

In any case, I have been vaccinated against the greatness virus.

Which in newspeak translates as: i'm running on so much estrogen i can eschew all forms of objectivity and wallow in comfortable relativity.

[piston]

You need to find a musically argumentative type of composer, op. 132, 'cause you sound pretty desperate in your attempt to narrow the number of composers-worth-listening to. Wagner, perhaps?

[Opus132]

composers-worth-listening to

That's where i'm trying to narrow it down to.

[Febnyc]

[quote="Opus132]
Yeah, but what about 'great' composers before Takemitsu?[/quote]

Great? I'm not sure how to define that.

But I've heard a number of the Naxos discs - mostly from the list provided by piston. These are excellent works and very interesting to hear. Much of it is very western-sounding (in some cases, almost hard to distinguish from central European sounds). In the case of Yashiro, for example, we are treated to some exciting Stravinskyish/Bartokian music, which is exceedingly well crafted. The Hashimoto Symphony is beautiful, as is the one by Moroi.

For my taste these pre-Takemitsu composers have a lot to offer.