MIZUNO, Shuko

Born in Tokushima in 1923, Shuko Mizuno is one of Japan’s foremost contemporary composers. After studying in the College of Arts and Sciences at Chiba University he entered the Musicology Department in the Faculty of Music at the Tokyo National University of Arts in 1958, graduating from the non-degree graduate programme in 1963 and subsequently teaching in the Faculty of Education at Chiba University. Upon the invitation of the Rockefeller Foundation, he travelled to the United States where he was active as artist-in-residence in 1973 and 1974, living in New York and San Francisco and pursuing his interest in jazz and rock music.
In 1975 he was awarded the Prize for Excellence at the Arts Festival sponsored by the Agency for Cultural Affairs for Maboroshi, a work for mixed choir commissioned by the NHK, and his works Jazz Orchestra ’73 and Jazz Orchestra ’75, both of which appeared on TBK Records, were awarded third prize in the Jazz Disc Awards. His opera Tenshu Story, composed in 1977 in response to a commission from the NHK, has been frequently performed. In 1991 he was awarded the Chiba Prefectural Cultural Achievement Prize for his opera Minamo, which received its first performance at the National Culture Festival in Chiba ’91, and in 1997 he was awarded the Prize for Excellence at the Arts Festival sponsored by the Agency for Cultural Affairs for his Symphony No. 3, which was first performed at a concert organised by himself entitled ‘Orchestra Project ’97’.