Composers, musicians prepare for Asian Music Week 2000

By Slamet A.Sjukur

In anticipation of Asian Music Week 2000, The Japan Federation of Composers will organize two important concerts at Yokohama Minatomirai Hall next Aug. 4 and Aug. 5, presenting 14 composers from the Asian Composers League (ACL) and the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM).

JAKARTA (JP): A change of millennium is undoubtedly more important than the arrival of a new year. But it was clearly an exaggeration when Ma Shui-long, the chairman of the National Committee of ACL in Taipei, expressed a belief last year that the coming century would be the Age of Oriental Music.

For a long time, history has relegated non-western music to behind the scenes. The cause is of course colonialism, but it is not the only reason. One might compare Western music and oriental music as respectively one having an aggressive beauty and the other a reserved one.

Only very slowly has music from the East attracted Western composers. A figure no less than Debussy had a secret love affair with the gamelan. It was only at L'Exposition Universelle in 1889, when Paris commemorated the 100th year of the French revolution, that he and other European people enjoyed direct contact with Asian arts and cultures for the first time.

Twenty years after World War II there were two other notable events which marked more serious encounters.

An international conference, East meets West, was held in Tokyo 1961. It was the first meeting that brought to Asia the avant garde European music at that time. The music of Berio, Maderna, Staockhausen and Xenakis were introduced in Japan and consequently many Japanese and Korean composers were the first to be influenced by that school of thought.

In 1966, Unesco sponsored a symposium and festival The Music of Asia in Manila. The music of China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam were discussed by prominent musicologists from Asia, Europe and the U.S. The concert included European avant-garde music and many traditional music performances from Asia.

The need to propel Asian music from behind the scene is felt ever stronger by the region's composers.

As early as 1971, some of Asia's renowned composers -- Hsu Tsang-houei (Taiwan), Lin Sheng-shih (Hong Kong), Lo Yi-jung (Korea) and Yoshiro Irino (Japan) -- called the first preparatory meeting in Taipei of what was later known as The Asian Composers League (ACL). Two years passed before its next meeting in Hong Kong.

ACL was established as an independent noncommercial, not for profit, nonracial and nonpolitical organization. The objectives of the league are to promote, preserve and develop the musical cultures of the Asia-Pacific region, particularly in the field of music composition. It also aims to further the interests of composers from the region through presentation and negotiation, and to attain recognition of their rights in national and international laws.

The ACL runs a members program usually in one very jam packed week, with sessions held from morning to late at night. It is not always organized every year, however the lapse between two events is two years at the most.

It was Japan who took the initiative to organize the first ACL Conference-Festival in Kyoto in 1974. In following years, the conference-festival was held in the Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Korea. Japan will host the festival for the third time next year, which will be the 21st festival. The second one held in Japan was in Sendai in 1990.

As we might expect, ACL's theme emphasizes the identity of Asian music. The 18th ACL in Manila 1997 focused on Theories of Music Composition from Music Ensembles in Asia. In Taipei last year, the 19th ACL had the theme Discovery of Asian Music: Discovering the Significance of Oriental Philosophy in Music.

It was Indonesia who first considered that it is better not to let ourselves be engulfed in an endless East-West dichotomy. It is time to live with a whole mind. And the theme chosen by Indonesia is Maha-Swara which means The Deep Sound or the sound emanating from the depths.

It is significant that Rejoicing Sounds will mark the Asian Music Week 2000, which will coincide with the 21st ACL Conference-Festival. In addition to providing a perfect meeting place for composers, performers, musicologist and music lovers, the organizer hopes that it will also act as a musical bridge into the 21st century.

In anticipating the ACL programs, The Japan Federation of Composers (JFC) will host next week the ACL Executive Committee Meeting in order to discuss the Maha-Swara/the 20th ACL Conference-Festival in Indonesia (Sept. 2 to Sept. 9) and the 21st ACL in Japan next year.

At the same time, the JFC will organize two concerts representing ACL composers and the ISCM (International Society for Contemporary Music).

Ten composers from Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Korea, New Zealand Philippines, Sweden, Taiwan and Thailand will present their music together with four composers from the host country.

Using traditional music instruments, contemporary music of the ACL composers will be performed on Aug. 4. Some of the composers will play the instruments themselves.

The following day, ISCM composers will present music specifically composed For the Children of 21st Century.

Indonesia will be represented by composer Slamet A.Sjukur, the author of this article, and member of the ACL Executive Committee, chairman of the 20th ACL in Indonesia and chairman of Asosiasi Komponis Indonesia (Association of Indonesian Composers).

He will also perform his work Gelandangan (Vagabond) for a female voice sighing 1001 pleasures and a genggong-bambu, a kind of Jew's harp made of bamboo.

One may ask why the 21st ACL in Japan next year has attracted more attention than the one to be held in this country next month. Is it because Japan has the experience needed for such an important event? The success of the triennial festival Art Summit Indonesia in 1995 and 1998, that is, the international festival of contemporary arts with its comprehensive one month program, has proved our success in putting on such festivals. In addition, more than one hundred years ago, our artists were successful at L'Exposition Universelle in Paris because they concentrated on their arts, not on the organization.

However, submerged in financial problems, Indonesian composers can hardly grasp the importance of time management, although it is the essence of all the performing arts.