Masayo Ishigure: Koto, Bass Koto, and Shamisen

Thursday, April 6 at 7:30 p.m.

Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall – 57th Street and 7th Avenue

Admission: $40 to $50

Masayo Ishigure will perform a koto and shamisen recital to commemorate the 30th anniversary of her professional career in the United States. This program offers a glimpse into the history of Japanese music and can be enjoyed by a wide range of audiences.

Performers

• Masayo Ishigure: Koto, Bass Koto, and Shamisen

• Zac Zinger: Shakuhachi

• Nathan Koci: Piano

• Noriko Tsuboi: Koto and Bass Koto

• Miyabi Koto and Shamisen Ensemble

Program

• Tadao Sawai – "Sakura Sakura"

• Tadao Sawai – "Ginga" ("Galaxy")

• Zac Zinger – Untitled

• Hikaru Sawai – "Gin-yu-ka" ("Minstrel Song")

• Hideaki Matsumoto – "Chizuru / Whereabouts of the Wind"

• Tadao Sawai – "Flying like a Bird"

To purchase tickets, please visit Carnegie Hall’s website.

Masayo Ishigure

About Masayo Ishigure

Masayo Ishigure began playing koto and jiuta shamisen at the age of five in Gifu Prefecture and later studied under Tadao and Kazue Sawai. In 1986 she became a special research student at Sawai Koto Institute. She moved to the U.S. in 1992 to teach koto and shamisen classes at Wesleyan University in Connecticut.

In 2005 she was invited to play the koto on the soundtrack of the Academy Award-winning film Memoirs of a Geisha with music by John Williams, Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, and others. Newsweek nominated Ishigure in the magazine’s 2007 issue of 100 Japanese People the World Respects. Late prime minister Shinzo Abe recognized her as one of five Japanese women active in New York. Ishigure taught koto classes at Columbia University from 2010 through 2021, and she gives private lessons in New York City.

About the Miyabi Koto and Shamisen Ensemble

Classical and contemporary Japanese koto and shamisen ensemble “MIYABI” was founded in 1996 in New York City as a branch of the Sawai Koto Academy of Japan. Led by Ishigure, repertoire ranges from classical to contemporary koto music. The founder of Sawai Koto Academy, Tadao Sawai, is known as one of the greatest players and composers of koto music in the 20th century.

The ensemble dedicates itself to playing Tadao Sawai‘s koto music. It has played many concerts in the New York Metropolitan area, the eastern United States, Hawaii, Australia, South America, and Japan.