Conference Agenda

Kikuko Kanai (1906-1986) was among the first Japanese women to compose symphonies, yet her prolific oeuvre is not well known in Japan and almost completely unknown in the West. This lack of recognition does not reflect the magnitude of her achievement. I believe there are compelling reasons why Kanai’s work should be better known. She created a unique compositional style remarkable for its innovative synthesis of Okinawan folk music, European classical music, and American jazz. In doing so, she challenged existing conceptions of the composer’s role in modern Japan – against considerable professional barriers as a woman in an androcentric society and as an Okinawan in an ‘ethnically homogenous’ nation. This presentation, from a monograph currently in progress, shows how and why Kanai combined indigenous music and Western techniques in her symphonic poem Ryūkyū where the Deigo flowers bloom (1946). My musical analysis reveals for the first time how Kanai treated folk melodies thematically, harmonically, contrapuntally and orchestrally to ‘construct Okinawa musically’. I read the piece as exemplifying Kanai’s belief that notating folk melodies on staves ‘elevated’ them and made them ‘universal’; as a dynamic site of historical memory in the aftermath of World War II, which devastated Okinawa; and as the meeting point of overlapping cultural ideologies. I read her achievement as countervailing the social and political marginalization (or ‘feminization’) of Okinawa by Japan and the U.S. To recognize fully the power of Kanai’s music thus carries implications for revisionist music historiography, canon diversification, and studies of music and identity.

This report focuses on the educational and cultural situation in modern Japan before WWII. The start of modernism in Okinawa prefecture was the abolition of the Ryukyu-Kingdom and the establishment of prefectures by Japanese government. This is why lots of studies about history of modern Okinawa tended to have a victim's perspective. The modernization of Japan was carried out in two steps. In case of educational policy, the former step (-1927) was standardization of all areas in Japan, including colonies as Taiwan and Korea. The latter step (1928-45) was to focus on regional characteristics all over Japan, in order to find folklore culture and to create the spirits of Japan as a national country. The ministry of education had been promoting a policy named ‘Kyoudo-Kyouiku (Local Education)’ since 1928, in order to re-evaluate the importance of local cultures. Okinawan culture was no exception, and lots of Okinawan traditional music (e.g. folk songs, work songs, lullabies, children's songs etc.) were focused and introduced into education. Kanai's musical philosophy and much of her musical works based on Okinawan musicality might be influenced more or less by the pre-war educational and cultural situation in Japan. This is why we need to understand the context of how Okinawan culture and music was valued in the modern Japan society.

Modern music education in Japan began in the late 19th century. In 1879, the Music Investigation Committee, Japan’s first specialized music institution, was established within the Ministry of Education and it was reorganized into the Tokyo Academy of Music in 1887. Systematic composition education began in earnest at the academy in the 1930s. Kikuko Kanai, the focus of this panel, was one of the students who studied in the academy’s elective course during that decade. The actual state of education in the elective course at the Tokyo Academy of Music has not yet been fully elucidated. However, it was in fact a gathering place for people from diverse backgrounds, including students from various parts of Japan—such as Kanai, who was from Okinawa—as well as international students from Thailand and Taiwan. Graduates were assigned to various regions, paving the way for the academy’s music education to spread to the provinces. This presentation focuses on so-called "ethnic minority" students who attended the academy, examining the diversity of the academy's educational environment and its influence, particularly through enrollment and activity records from the first half of the 20th century. Furthermore, by referencing primary sources such as Kanai's research notes, it illustrates the actual state of composition and music theory education at that time. This presentation aims to clarify the educational and historical background of composition and music theory in modern Japan, thereby laying the groundwork for research on individual composers.

While recent scholarship has increasingly embraced a global history of music theory, research specifically addressing the reception of Western music theory in Japan remains limited. Previous studies have examined the domestic assimilation of functional harmony—notably Hugo Riemann’s theories—alongside the translation of technical terminology and the evolution of notation, such as figured bass, Roman numerals, and functional symbols (Nishida 2023; Nishida & Nakatsuji 2025). However, these investigations have primarily focused on the core canon, often marginalizing modern harmonic developments, such as quartal harmony, and indigenous scale theories. This presentation analyzes how modern theoretical constructs were integrated into Japanese harmony textbooks from the Taisho to the post-war Showa periods. Central to this inquiry is Waseigaku (Harmony; published 1935, revised and enlarged 1937) by Shimofusa Kan’ichi, a prominent theorist at the Tokyo Academy of Music and mentor to the composer Kanai Kikuko. By examining how Japanese publications centered on Western music theory treated quartal harmony and Japanese scales—specifically the Ryukyuan scale—this study elucidates the positioning of these “peripheral” concepts. Furthermore, I examine Kanai’s 1954 publication, Ryukyu no Minyo (Folk Songs of Ryukyu), to explore how she theorized the Ryukyuan scale in dialogue with Shimofusa’s pedagogical framework and how her work was evaluated by established academic authorities. Ultimately, this presentation discusses the theorization, peripherality, and legitimacy of quartal harmony and the Ryukyuan scale, offering a minority perspective on the localized transformation of Western music theory in Japan.

This presentation examines how Kikuko Kanai composed Western-style works incorporating elements of Okinawan music through her interactions with other composers, such as Kiyoshige Koyama (1914–2009) and Hans-Joachim Koellreutter (1915–2005). In the first part of my presentation, I illustrate a context in which Kanai and Koyama, as members of Hakuto Kai (白涛会), a group of composers formed in 1950, shared similar aesthetics, and Kanai negotiated her identity as an Okinawan to develop her own creative voice. This is mainly explored by reviewing Koyama’s Japanese harmonic theory book compiled in his later years in 1998, as well as some publications by Kanai. From this standpoint, the second part of my presentation focuses on her interaction with a German immigrant Brazilian Composer, Koellreutter, who taught Kanai the basics of twelve-tone technique in Brazil. Comparing twelve-tone works by Koellreutter and Kanai in addition to related texts that Koellreutter referred to, I clarify a process in which Kanai crystallized her own creativity in her modernist compositions. Through these explorations, I argue that Kanai’s attempt to develop Okinawan music is aligned with an intercultural perspective. Furthermore, interestingly, Koellreutter was a student of Hindemith, as was Kan’ichi Shimofusa, one of Kanai’s teachers at the Tokyo Academy of Music. This offers a possibility to explore dynamic transmissions and transformations of music theoretical technique when a focus is placed on quartal harmonic use across all the composers, providing a global perspective.