Cultures Connect in Guest Recital by Wu Man and Yoshio Kurahashi. Concert to Offer Traditional and Modern Works for Pipa and Shakuhachi, Sunday, April 30, 8 P.M. in Fairchild Chapel Story by Linda Shockley Instrument line drawings by Roderic Knight
	RELATED The Reunion of WYT		Andor Toth, professor of violoncello, says audience members need not be aficionados of pipa and shakuhachi to fully enjoy the recital given by Wu Man and Yoshio Kurahashi on Sunday, April 30, 8 p.m. in Fairchild Chapel. "It's in their nature to talk about the performance: the works and the instruments," says Toth. And he should know as he has performed internationally with Wu Man and Kurahachi as a member of the trio WYT. The concert is free and open to the public. Bios on the Artists Wu Man is one of China's most outstanding pipa virtuosos today. Born into an artistic family in the southern city of Hangzhou, she inherits the tradition of the prestigious Pudong school of pipa. In 1977, soon after the end of the Cultural Revolution, she entered the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, studying with Lin Shicheng, distinguished master of the Pudong school, with the well-known pipa soloist Liu Dehai, and with Kuang Yuzhong and Chen Zemin. In China Wu Man was the winner of the First National Academic Competition for Chinese Instruments, and the first recipient of the Master's degree in the pipa. She is currently resident in the USA. Apart from her mastery of the traditional repertoire, Wu Man is also recognized for her interpretations of contemporary pipa music. She took part in many ground-breaking first performances of the exciting new generation of composers in China. She has continued to champion new works in the USA and Europe, collaborating with the great orchestras and ensembles of the West such as The Boston Symphony and Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group, the BBC-Scotland Ensemble, the Nieuw Ensemble in Holland, the New York New Music Consort and the Kronos Quartet. These collaborations have resulted in commissioning many new works for the pipa and western instruments. She has performed and made radio and TV broadcasts throughout China, the US, Europe, and Japan. In 1999 Wu Man twice played at the White House and was awarded the prestigious Glenn Gould Protege award from Canada. She is also the Bunting Fellow at Radcliffe College of Harvard University Yoshio Kurahashi is well known to North American and European students and devotees of traditional shakuhachi music. An enthusiastic and energetic man with a keen sense of humor and a generous attitude toward foreigners interested in Japanese music, he often leaves his native Kyoto to present concerts and teach small enclaves of shakuhachi players scattered around the world. In a distinctly modern way he continues the old tradition of the kumoso - Buddhist monks who played shakuhachi as they wandered around begging alms. At the age of 10 he began studying shakuhachi with his father Yodo Kurahashi, a respected master himself and founder of the Mujuan shakuhachi school. The younger Kurahashi went on to study with Homei Matsumura of Nara, and in 1976 he presented his first solo concert in Osaka, winning the Osaka Cultural Festival Award. After becoming director of the Mujuan school in 1980, Yoshio Kurahashi embarked on an active touring schedule of teaching and performing throughout Asia, Europe, Israel, and the United States. In 1989 he became director of the Kyoto Sankyoku Association, and in 1990 director of the Kyoto Hogaku (traditional music) Group. In addition, he is a counselor to the Kyoto Artists Association and a musical director of Osaka City University. He is sought out by composers who wish to write non-traditional music for the shakuhachi because of his phenomenal technique. When called upon, he can play modern flute parts and has been known to sit down with string players and play Mozart flute quartets. He gave his first New York recital in 1981 and premiered A Flying Maiden for shakuhachi and brass by Tetsunosuke Kushida in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. He has served as director of the Kyoto Japanese Music Players' Association, director of the Kyoto Hagaku Group, and premiered works by such composers as Meir Mindel, Randall, Don Stein, and Fijumi Shimoyama. As a teacher he has started annual intensive shakuhachi classes in Dallas, TX, Boston, MA, New York, NY, Boulder, CO, Montreal, Canada and Paris, France. In 1999 Mr. Kurashi was given an award for his achievements in the arts by the Culture and Arts Association of Kyoto City and his CD Kyoto Spirit on the Sparkling Beatnik label was awarded Best World Music "CD OF THE YEAR" by New Age Magazine About the Instruments and Repertory The pipa (pronounced PEE pah) is a fairly large lute-like instrument with large frets and a broad finger-board. It was introduced into China from Central Asia prior to the T'ang Dynasty, and has both a "literary" and a "martial" repertory. The pipa is tuned A-D-E-a, with all the open strings sounding below middle C on the piano. Using various playing techniques, performers can imitate a wide variety of sounds - from flowing water, conversing geese and trotting horses to Chinese gongs and drums and sounds of battle. According to a Moonbridge Shakuhachi Web Site, which also offers significant links to other Japanese Traditional Music Sites, "the shakuhachi is a traditional Japanese vertical bamboo flute. It has unique tonal characteristics and a profound historical connection to Zen Buddhism. It was once played only by a particular sect of wandering monks known as Komuso as an instrument of devotion but, in modern times, has become a musical instrument available to all. "The shakuhachi repertory comes out of an oral traditional based on learning by example and imitation. In addition, it was originally a type of Buddhist devotional music practiced soley by monks belonging to the Fuke sect who were called Komuso, or 'Monks of Emptyness'. Their religious practice was based on the belief that ordinary reality was false in nature and that by emptying themselves of their preconceived notions and preconditioned perceptions they could directly connect into the innate nature of reality. Their primary tool for this was the shakuhachi."
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