Kyoichi Ishimaru is sitting at the end of a conference table, in front of large photograph of the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra arranged in something like a grand défilé. Ishimaru gives the impression of being a kindly, grandfatherly figure, but as the orchestra’s senior executive trustee, his authority is total.
About midway through our conversation, which ranges over the history of the orchestra, and of Western music in Japan, I ask: who selects the conductors the Tokyo Philharmonic works with? He laughs: “In the end, I do.”
Earlier we’d touched on the often rather fractious business of conductors’ elections, which occur with some regularity in Europe and elsewhere. “I used to study in Germany, and I understand the system the orchestras have there. We don’t have the system of music directors in Japanese orchestras – if we left things with the musicians, things couldn’t be so clearly determined. As with so many orchestras here, the administration office plays a role in determining their plans.”
For a Brit, discovering Japan can be a bit like experiencing the past and the future simultaneously. A deferential, basically conservative society – both at the forefront of technological development while still fond of fax machines and oil heaters. Frequently observed comparisons between Japan and the United Kingdom are eerie, sometimes the marks of deliberate emulation.
It extends also to familiar-sounding complaints about a philistine lack of funding for cultural institutions. “In other countries, such as Germany, they certainly subsidise and support artistic organisations such as orchestras,” Ishimaru says, a little frustratedly. “But here we really don’t have it. It means that most Japanese classical orchestras have had much trouble surviving, as each of them (with a few exceptions) have had to support themselves. That is a big issue.”
The Tokyo Philharmonic is proud of being the oldest symphony orchestra in Japan, but its convoluted history is both bizarre and typical. In 1911 the Itō clothing store in Nagoya founded a youth band – one of many such department store bands founded around this time. When the department store changed its name to Matsuzakaya, so too did the band, eventually becoming the Matsuzakaya Symphony. In 1938 the orchestra moved its home base to Tokyo, becoming the Chuo Symphony Orchestra, finally refounding itself as the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra after 1945.
“There is no national orchestra in Japan,” Ishimaru tells me. “In Tokyo, we have one public orchestra [Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony], one owned by a broadcaster [NHK Symphony], and one owned by a major company.” The latter is the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony, owned by media conglomerate Yomiuri Shimbun, the holding company of one of Japan’s major newspapers. (They also own a fleet of broadcasters, two racecourses and a baseball team.) “But most of the rest are independent organisations, who own and manage themselves: about 30 independent orchestras across Japan.”
Like so many Japanese orchestras, the Tokyo Philharmonic has to be basically financially self-reliant, and is thus very hardworking. “How many concerts a season do you think we have?” Ishimaru asks. About a hundred? I offer. “Five times as much! Over 500.” More performances than there are days in the year, I say. “But are you aware that there is another orchestra that plays a greater number of performances? The Vienna Philharmonic, over 600 in a year. They perform opera as well, like we do. We have a similar way of working – the New National Theatre, Tokyo is the only national opera theatre in Japan. We are the main orchestra at the NNTT, giving the largest number of performances. We have as many musicians as Vienna Philharmonic and Staatsoper. That’s how we work.”
Vienna is a name to conjure with in Japan, having a connection to the beginnings of Western classical music in the country: Rudolf Dittrich, graduate of the Vienna Conservatory was appointed head of the Tokyo Academy of Music from 1888. While he did much to develop music education in Japan, he was a very strict figure, apparently once precipitating a strike by protesting music students. The promotion of Western music education was part of the Meiji government’s much wider campaign of Westernisation – a policy not without controversy. (For families of the old Samurai class, music was long regarded as a frivolous, women’s pursuit.)
Professionalisation of Western music in Japan came in earnest after the First World War. Russian musicians, many coming via Harbin in the Republic of China, were instrumental in this process. For instance Emmanuel Metter, a student of Rimsky-Korsakov and conductor of the Harbin Symphony Orchestra, settled in Japan in the 1920s, conducting Japanese orchestras and training many musicians. Among his students was conductor Asahina Takashi, later founder of the Osaka Philharmonic.
Given the financial challenges, and relatively limited government subsidy, the profusion of orchestras all across Japan is remarkable. Indeed, as historian Margaret Mehl has pointed out, “Nowhere was Western music adopted and assimilated as rapidly and thoroughly as in Japan; and in no other nation was a highly developed, diverse, and flourishing native musical culture marginalized to quite the same extent.”
For the Meiji government, as compared with traditional musical forms, Western classical music offered a distinct set of advantages: a standardised notation system, which facilitated classroom instruction; a harmonic and polyphonic structure that allowed for large-scale, mobilised performances with a mass of performers. Western music could be ‘modern’ in a way that court music (gagaku) and folk music (zokugaku) could never be. “In short,” Mehl writes, “it appeared highly suitable to the needs of the modern state they were in the process of building.”
It is perhaps no suprise, then, that Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony became such a phenomenon in Japan, with a profusion of performances around the New Year. (The Tokyo Philharmonic performs it 19th to 21st December this year.) Mahler, too, is exceedingly popular – and earlier this year the Tokyo Philharmonic joined forces with the South Korean KBS Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Mahler’s First Symphony under Myung-whun Chung.
Although as Ishimaru points out there is no designated national orchestra in Japan, occasions like this demonstrate that the Tokyo Philharmonic is apt to adopt this kind of role. “These concerts, in both Seoul and in Tokyo, were presented on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the normalisation of the relationship between South Korea and Japan. In fact, we had done a similar concert with the Seoul Philharmonic ten years before, on the 50th anniversary. It’s a series we’ve been working on, encouraging cultural exchange between the two countries.”
The occasions pose some challenges: “Each consisted of 50 Korean musicians and 50 Japanese musicians, something that is quite difficult to realise usually. But thanks to maestro Chung, we did it ten years ago and this year too. I really believe this contributed to cultural exchange.” The strained relationship between Korea and Japan owes much to Japan’s imperial expansionism – the Empire of Japan annexed and ruled the Korean peninsula from 1910 to 1945. But a figure like Myung-whun Chung, whose heritage is South Korean and has worked with the Tokyo Philharmonic for almost thirty years, represents a way in which culture can rebuild relationships between peoples despite deep historic injustices and colonisation.
Chung will conduct the Tokyo Philharmonic on their international tour this autumn, which sees the orchestra visit Berlin, Budapest, Barcelona, Vienna, Lugano, and elsewhere. They perform a mix of repertoire, including Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring and Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with Maxim Vengerov. Ishimaru is enthusiastic: “we’re really delighted to be making this tour. We really like to present a pure Western classical programme, as a world common heritage: that’s how we want to present our tour this time.”
Ishimaru mentions that the tour doesn’t feature music by Japanese composers (“not even the encores”), though does emphasise that the Tokyo Phil is still closely involved with performing and commissioning new music by composers in Japan. Earlier this year, the orchestra performed the winning works of this year’s Toru Takemitsu Competition, arguably the most prestigious composition competition in the world. The joint first prizes both went to Japanese composers.
Many of these works present advanced challenges for the orchestra, as composers from around the world try to dazzle the single judge (in this case, Austrian composer Georg Friedrich Haas) with new sonic combinations. “We work so hard to perform these almost-impossible pieces! It’s one of the climaxes of the year for us. The Tokyo Philharmonic, by far, is the orchestra who performed the largest number of contemporary pieces in Japan. More so than NHK Symphony Orchestra.” (There is a hint of a healthy rivalry between two of Tokyo’s major orchestras too.)
While the orchestra will tour to many prestigious venues in Europe, it won’t be visiting the impoverished UK. “Historically, when Japanese orchestras have toured overseas, usually they’ve done so with their own budget,” Ishimaru says. “But as the Japanese orchestra with the longest history, this time we are presenting concerts basically to whoever offers a good fee. Unfortunately, no such funding was coming from the UK, so we are not performing there!” We both laugh, a little bleakly.
The Tokyo Philharmonic are on tour with Myung-whun Chung from 28th October to 11th November.
See all upcoming performances by the Tokyo Philharmonic.
This article was sponsored by Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra.
