IKENOUCHI, Tomojiro

Japanese composer, teacher and haiku poet (1906-91). A leading professor of composition at Tokyo University of the Arts (Tokyo Geidai), he taught number of composers such as Toshirō Mayuzumi, Akio Yashiro and Teizō Matsumura, contributing to the diffusion of the theory of composition he had learned at the Conservatoire de Paris.
The second son of Kyoshi Takahama, he was born in Tokyo and learned Noh as a young children. As a student at Kaisei Junior High School, he found pleasure in listening to classical music on vinyl, especially French music. After quitting Keio University to study composition in France, he arrived in Paris in March 1927, and in 1928 he entered the harmony class of Paul Fauchet at the Conservatoire de Paris. Though he stayed in Japan from April to October in 1930 then from December 1932 to March 1934, he obtained premier accesit (the third prize) then deuxième prix (the second prize) at Fauchet’s class. Since October 1934, his study continued at the fugue class of Georges Caussade and the composition class of Henri Büsser, but he returned definitively to Japan in August 1936. During his stay in Paris, he went to concerts where he saw Ravel, Schönberg, Richard Strauss, Prokofiev, etc. He also got acquaintance with Japanese musicians such as Chieko Hara, Kazuko Yasukawa, Tōroku Takagi, Kishio Hirao, Koji Taku, some of whom, like Ikenouchi, became active in performing or teaching French music in Japan.
In 1947 he became a professor of composition at Tokyo Geidai, and in 1955 he created a concert series ‘Shinshin-kai’ to promote works of his students. The considerable influence of his class led him to occupy administrative posts in and out of the university. He wrote several musical textbooks and translated those of d’Indy’ (Cours de composition) and Büsser. His works such as Yuya - trois pièces tirées de la pièce de nô Yuya pour soprano et orchestre (1942), shows his admiration for voice as well as for the strictness and brevity of form, as is A major trait of haiku. Active also as a haiku poet, he published an anthology of his works and served as a reviewer for Hototogisu, a Japanese leading haiku magazine. He was awarded Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres (1960), Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur (1961), The Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon (1977) and Person of Cultural Merit (1986). (Written by Takatoshi Hirano)