Kikuko Kanai
Kikuko Kanai was a Japanese composer.Biography
Kikuko Kawahira was born on the Ryukyu island of Miyako-jima, Okinawa, and studied voice at the Nihon Music School and composition at the Tokyo Academy of Music with Kanichi Shimofusa and Kishio Hirao. Working as a composer, she produced songs and orchestral music using the Ryukyuan pentatonic scale.
In 1954 she studied the dodecaphonic method in Brazil with Hans-Joachim Koellreutter, and incorporated atonal composition into her work. She was awarded the Mainichi Prize for Cultural Publication in 1955, and a prize by the Okinawan government for her opera Okinawa monogatari in 1968. She died in Tokyo.Works
Selected works include:
- Ryūkyū no min’yō 1954
- Okinawa monogatari opera
- Miyako-jima engi , 1949
- Ryūkyū hiwa , 1951
- Hiren Karafune , 1960
- Okinawa monogatari, 1997
- Symphony, no.1, 1938
- Okinawa buyō kumikyoku : no.1, 1940, no.2, 1946
- Ryūkyū kyōsōkyoku no.1, 1946
- Symphony, no.2, 1946
- Uruma no shi, 1952
- Festival Overture ‘Hishō’, 1972
- Ryūkyū kyōsōkyoku no.2, pianoforte octet, 1950
- Ryūkyū Ballade, pianoforte, 1951
- Sonata, violin, pianoforte, 1952
- Brazil Rhapsody, pianoforte, 1955
- Hamachidori hensōkyoku, koto, Electone, percussion, 1970
- Okinawa min'yō niyoru gasshōkyoku-shū, 1953–60
- Haha to ko no Okinawa no uta, 1965
Her work has been recorded and issued on CD, including:
