As described in Chapter 1, Western music was introduced into Japan with Western culture. Considering the status of Western music in Japan, it is important to recognize the key motivation for the adoption of Western culture and technology: it was not a project of internationalization, but of nationalism—a means to turn Japan into a powerful nation-state and secure its global interests (Morley 1971).20 Japan strived to become a superpower in the global context, and was fast to industrialize and build up a modern military.
The country’s success in this respect was proved in its triumphs in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895), the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905), the annexation of Korea (1910), and World War I (1914–1918).21 This was also the context in which Western music was adopted in Japan: it was originally a tool to foster the adoption of Western culture rather than something to be enjoyed aesthetically (e.g. Galliano 2002, 33; Chiba 2007).
20 For more on the early adoption of Western culture to Japan, see, for example, the ten-volume series Japanese Culture in the Meiji Era (Tokyo: Ōbunsha, 1956–1958) or Takii (2014).
21 Japan’s fast modernization, long considered a phenomenal success, has since then been viewed in more critical terms as a cause of the rise of militarism in the 1930s (Havens 2015, 13).
Mapping out the future of music culture and education in Japan under Western influence was entrusted to Isawa Shūji (伊沢修二, 1851–1917). The Music Inspection Committee (Ongaku torishirabe gakari), an institution to train musicians and survey how to adopt Western music to Japan, was founded under his direction in 1879. Most teachers of the school were from Europe, mainly Germany. It was renamed the Tokyo Academy of Music (Tōkyō ongaku gakkō)22 in 1887 and later became—and is still today—the Faculty of Music of the Tokyo University of the Arts (Tōkyō geijutsu daigaku). Isawa claimed to favor the synthesis of the “best elements” of Western and Japanese music (see Eppstein 1994, 50–52), or their “compromise” (see Akiyama 1976, 19).
Although Japanese music was officially included in the curriculum of the new school, however, Isawa heavily emphasized instruction in Western music.23
This alignment—a trend evident in the society of the time in general—was also present in the musical approach that Isawa proposed to combine the “best elements” of both cultures: the pentatonic yonanuki scale. Yonanuki literally means “omission of the fourth and seventh,” and, as the name suggests, it refers to Western diatonic scales with the fourth and seventh degrees omitted.
Isawa’s idea was that using it would result in melodies that resemble traditional music but could be accompanied by Western harmony. Therefore, music adopting yonanuki is in a major or minor key, and despite certain similarities with the scales of traditional Japanese music, it is fundamentally based on Western tonality.24 The influential musicologist Koizumi Fumio (1985, 19), for example, later deemed yonanuki as “neither Western nor Japanese.”
It did not take long for the first Japanese composers of Western-style music to debut after this, signifying that the new culture had rooted to the level that musicians could already approach it creatively. As the Tokyo Academy of Music did not have a curriculum for composition, early Japanese composers were mostly self-taught. The first Japanese work of Western-style art music was Kōda Nobu’s (幸田延, 1870–1946) Sonata for Violin and Piano in E♭ Major (1895). She was soon followed by her pupil, Taki Rentarō (瀧廉太郎, 1879–
1903), who is best recognized for his songs, but also wrote the first Japanese solo piano pieces Menuetto (1900) and Grudge (Urami, 1903). Whereas these works represent German Romantic-style composition, the adoption of the yonanuki scale is more apparent in songs of the time (Lehtonen 2010a, 17).25 One of the best-known examples is Taki’s Moon over a Ruined Castle (荒城の
22 Literally, Tōkyō ongaku gakkō translates as “Tokyo Music School”—a translation used also by The Tokyo University of the Arts (2017). However, many documents of the time in English refer to it as “academy,” which is why also this study uses that form.
23 For a more detailed account of Isawa’s policies and the role of traditional music in Meiji-era Japan, see Nomura (1956), Akiyama (1976), Eppstein (1994), or Chiba (2007).
24 Theories of traditional Japanese music and their relation with the yonanuki scale are discussed in more detail in Chapter 3.4. For more on Isawa and the use of the yonanuki scale, see Eppstein (1994).
25 This applied to various types of songs: school songs, military songs, art songs, and popular songs alike.
月; Kōjō no tsuki, 1901), which adopts the minor yonanuki scale. Songs with piano accompaniment were, in general, the most common type of composition.
According to Kojima’s (1976, 65) view, this was largely due to the early composers’ inexperience with larger ensembles, but also for practical reasons, since large orchestras were yet to be founded in Japan.
There were, however, exceptions to this rule. One of the most prominent composers and a notable developer of music culture in the early twentieth century was Yamada Kōsaku [or Kôsçak26] (山 田 耕 筰, 1886–1965), who demonstrated a profound understanding of Western music at an early age and was acknowledged as the leading composer of his time (Galliano 2002, 103).
After graduating from the Tokyo Academy of Music, Yamada studied at the Royal Academy of the Arts in Berlin (Königliche Akademie der Künste) from 1910 to 1913, where he became the first Japanese to compose a symphony in 1912. Upon his return to Japan, he was active in conducting Western works in Japan, and founding new orchestras and music magazines. While Yamada’s early works resemble nineteenth-century German Romanticism, he soon became influenced by the Late Romantic idiom of Richard Strauss, and was even said to have regretted his studies in Germany after encountering the music of Alexander Scriabin (Kiyose 1963a, 16).27
These new influences in Yamada’s work notwithstanding, most Japanese composers of the time were absorbed in the pursuit of assimilating and understanding classical German music theory and composition. This is reflected in the work of notable early composers such as Nobutoki Kiyoshi (信時潔, 1887–1965) and Komatsu Kōsuke (小松耕輔, 1884–1966), who, like most Japanese composers of the time, focused on learning from the example of their foreign counterparts (Kojima 1976). Although the adoption of Western culture was famously launched with the slogan “Western knowledge with Japanese spirit” (wakon yōsai), an emphasis on foreign culture over Japanese characterized the decades after the Meiji restoration in general: aside from minor opposition, it was approached with enthusiasm and respect. This is well reflected in writings of the influential musicologist Tanabe Hisao (田辺尚雄, 1883–1984), who even tried to point out similarities in form between traditional Japanese music and Western composition (Tanabe 1919, 580).
Although initiated as a nationalist project of the state, the adoption of Western culture was eventually embraced by the public—a development also apparent in music (Yamazumi 1976; Chiba 2007). Yamada’s career and understanding of different musical styles, for example, reflected gradual changes and developments in Japanese composition, which was to follow the same rapid pace of progress as the modernization in general (Galliano 2002,
26 “Kôsçak” was the form of his name that Yamada used in the West. This was a typical practice among Japanese composers. For instance, Hashimoto Kunihiko romanized his forename as “Qunihico,” while Sugawara Meirō (菅原明朗, 1897–1988) used the form
“Meireau Sœgaharat.”
27 For more on Yamada and his influence on Japanese music, see, for example, Galliano (2002, 43–51). See also the compiled edition of Yamada’s own writings in three volumes:
Yamada Kōsaku chosaku zenshū (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 2001).
65). The trend of following the West, however, started to be questioned in the 1920s.