DEPARTMENT OF COMPOSITION
Department/course summary
Since its establishment in the Tokyo Music School, the predecessor of the Faculty of Music at Tokyo Geijutsu Daigaku, the Department of Composition has explored and provided instruction in methods and techniques associated with musical composition in modern Western music.
Since its migration to the new university in 1949, the department has also engaged in educational and research activities involving the study of traditional European music theory and the synthesis of new creative forms in the postwar period, serving as a center of excellence for musical creation in Japan.
Curriculum
Curriculum (undergraduate education)
Composition I, a required subject, requires students to create and submit pieces of their own including duet works, vocal works, chamber works, and orchestra works. A concert given in the university concert hall provides students with the opportunity to perform their own works.
Selected chamber-music and orchestra works submitted by students are performed in Thursday concerts (held in the university's older concert hall) and in the Geidai Philharmonia's Morning Concerts series (held in Sogakudo Concert Hall). The Geidai Philharmonia performs a single selected graduation-project work (a wind and string work) at a concert in which new graduates are the featured soloists (held in the concert hall).
Composition II, another requirement, involves practical training in compositional analysis and in the traditional Western musical techniques of harmony, fugue, and orchestration.
Other required subjects include solfege, foreign languages, and general education. Electives including research of music grammar, techniques of a contemporary composition, and computer music are also taught.
Curriculum (graduate education and research)
The graduate composition program provides students with opportunities for both creative freedom and the continuing study of composition techniques.
In the "Sozo no mori" concert series held in the concert hall, the Geidai Philharmonia plays selected orchestra works written by graduate students.
Other information
Based on its position as a point of contact between traditional Japanese music and modern and contemporary European music, the Department of Composition is currently seeking to identify future directions in international exchange and the acceptance of international students.
Graduates with undergraduate and graduate degrees from the Department of Composition are active across a wide range of fields both in Japan and around the world, and make important contributions to the Japanese music world.
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