Toru Takemitsu Composition Award

The Toru Takemitsu Composition Award is a unique and prestigious institution. I am honored to follow as the judge my esteemed colleagues whom I admire. I have been also especially happy to share my music this week with Japanese musicians and audiences.
I thank the Tokyo Opera City Cultural Foundation for the confidence and all the organization and help concerning the conditions of my work as a judge.

151 orchestral scores were sent to the competition this year, and it was a demanding task to study all of them. But it gave me also a clear idea of the musical interests of younger composer generations worldwide.

Four works were asked for this final concert. My selection principles were clear: I was looking for skillfully realized and imaginative orchestral pieces, which would reveal something fresh concerning the orchestral writing.
I was especially interested in the realization of musical form, as well as the solutions concerning harmony and the use of the orchestral instruments. I hoped to find pieces which would bring us personal views of orchestral music today. I was glad to recognize that many more than four works filled my criteria, and to eliminate scores was the most difficult part of my task.

I realized once again that I don't really believe in hierarchy in art competitions. Who has the right to decide whether Claude Debussy had more genius than Jean Sibelius, or that Leonardo da Vinci was a greater painter than Katsushika Hokusai? Every artist is a unique individual, and as such incomparable.

But finally only four works stayed on my table. I didn't know the names of the composers or their origins, but I believed to have recognized some national styles. When I received information about the chosen composers, I could see that in all cases but one – the Spanish composer – I was wrong! This reveals how international the music life is today, and how much also the young composers travel already during their studies.

I was happy to understand that music can cross cultural borders, In today's difficult world, we artists and art lovers should actively use our international connections to advance the ideas and causes we believe in, to speak for the importance of generosity, equality and peace; we should be attentive to share the planetary resources and protect them, and act for freedom and access to dignity of living conditions for everybody.

I will now mention shortly some characteristics of the four finalist works, in the order we heard them in tonight's concert.

Reachings by Sebastian Hilli struck me by its sense of formal plan and its realization. The music is directional, yet surprising. The range of different musical characters is large and emotionally fulfilling. The fresh quality of music reaches the very end of the piece.

Fabià Santcovsky has found in cuadro de presencia an original and coherent orchestral universe. The piece is carefully planned, and also realized with patience and sensitive sonic imagination. The delicate, immaterial cells grow skillfully into strong orchestral tutti.

[difeʁãs] by Yiğit Kolat impressed me by its unusual and daring format and musical conception. This piece is notated in great detail to express the composer's ideas, and it advances in graphic gestures rather than measured music, even if the time is carefully notated.

loop-fantasy by Thomas Wally is like an obsessive and inventive series of variations on the musical idea exposed in the beginning of the piece. This work has much physical energy, and is realized with efficient and realistic knowledge of the orchestral instruments.

Having chosen myself all four works, it means I strongly believe in all of them. All these four composers are immensely talented. They all have different strengths, they are together complementary and these works open doors for the future of orchestral music.
Until the very last moment, the decision was really difficult to take. This year, there are no fourth or third prizes. The shared second prize goes to Fabià Santcovsky and Thomas Wally. The shared first prize goes to Sebastian Hilli and Yiğit Kolat. The sum of three million yen will be shared equally among the four winners.

Edited by Tokyo Opera City Cultural Foundation