Yuji Takahashi

Tip! At the time, Yuji Takahashi was known internationally primarily as a pianist. Yet the decade from Phonogène (1962) to Tadori (1972) reveals another essential side of his work: an exploration of electronic sound, mathematics, and computers in composition, and of their changing relationship with human performance. One of the starting points was his encounter with Iannis Xenakis. Takahashi studied probability theory and set theory, and in Phonogène developed his own probabilistic approach to organizing electronic sounds and instrumental performance. 

In the United States, he later moved on to composition using large-scale computers. By Tadori in 1972, computer-generated structures, magnetic tape, instrumental performance, tape delay, and feedback intersected, bringing his music closer to what we would now call live electronics and improvisation. Through two works preserved at the NHK Electronic Music Studio, this release traces Takahashi’s remarkable transition from music organized through calculation toward a more open relationship between sound and human performance. At a time when the relationship between computers and music is once again being reconsidered, these experiments from more than half a century ago sound strikingly fresh.