Yoshiaki Onishi - Works (2009–present)
All live recordings

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Tramespace, diptyque pour grand ensemble (2012~15)

0:00~15:12: Tramespace I (2012~2013)
15:12~32:58: Tramespace II (2013~2015)

Tramespace I:
Study Score: www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product…mespace-I.html

Asko|Schönberg Ensemble
Clark Rundell, cond.

Geertekerk, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Gaudeamus Muziekweek 2013, Opening Concert
September 2, 2013

Live recording made by Richard de Gruyl for Concertzender/VPRO during Gaudeamus Muziekweek 2013

Tramespace II:
Study Score: http://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2065_Tramespace-II.html

Ensemble Intercontemporain
Pablo Heras-Casado, cond.

Kölner Philharmonie, Köln (Cologne), Germany
Acht Brücken 2015
May 9, 2015
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Départ dans... (2010) for five players
Wet Ink Ensemble, Yoshiaki Onishi, cond. 
Recorded January 25, 2012 
Issue Project Room, New York 
Gaudeamus/New York Festival
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Parti... (2012~14, rev. 2015)
-- Linda Jankowska, violin

Score: http://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p1901_Parti---.html
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Culs-de-sac (en passacaille) (2009, rev. 2010)
JACK Quartet
Recorded July 23, 2010
Orangerie, Darmstadt, Germany
Internationale Ferienkurse für neue Musik Darmstadt

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Envoi II (2016) for string trio
Momenta Quartet
(Alex Shiozaki, violin; Stephanie Griffin, viola;  Michael Haas, violoncello)
February 19, 2017
Scandinavia House, New York

Remastered by Yoshiaki Onishi

Score: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2213_Envoi-II.html
Parts: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2278_Envoi-II.html
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Tr (épilogue) - for violoncello solo (2012, rev. 2014)
Recording of the new, definitive version

http://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p1903_Tr---pilogue-.html

Kevin McFarland, violoncello
Ryan Streber, recording engineer

Columbia Composers Concert
Cary Hall, DiMenna Center (New York)
April 14, 2014
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Gz - A Vuza Canon for tenor recorder and shakuhachi (2017)
Tosiya Suzuki, recorder
Tadashi Tajima, shakuhachi
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Envoi I - for violoncello solo (2015) 
Two diff. performances:
Kei Yamazawa, violoncello
Anssi Karttunen, violoncello

Score: http://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2062_Envoi-I.html
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Spargens (2012)
for trombone solo
William Lang, trombone

Score: http://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p1902_Spargens.html
December 12, 2012
Roulette (Brooklyn, New York)
Columbia Composers Concert
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Envoi III - twelve micro-strophes for ondes Martenot solo (2017)
Takashi Harada, ondes Martenot
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Palinody - for fourteen players (2010)
Wet Ink Ensemble
Yoshiaki Onishi, cond.
Recorded December 11, 2010
St. Peter’s Church Chelsea, New York, NY
Live Recording (Ryan Streber, recording engineer)

[Yoshiaki Onishi in nearly 3 hours]

for violin solo & chamber orchestra

performed live by Austin Wulliman at Defibrillator Gallery (09/2013)
with Aurelien Pederzoli, Doyle Armbrust, Russell Rolen, Mark Buchner, Andrew Nogal, Katherine Young, Ryan Muncy, Kevin Marchuk, Tom Curry , Sean Connors, Robert Dillon & Michael Lewanski

recorded by Daniel Dehaan

Diligence Is to Magic As Progress Is to Flight

Score: http://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?language=en&info=p1903_Tr--epilogue-.html

Recording of the new, definitive version

Kevin McFarland, violoncello
Ryan Streber, recording engineer

Columbia Composers Concert
Cary Hall, DiMenna Center (New York)
April 14, 2014
======
When I wrote my Culs-de-sac (en passacaille) for string quartet in 2009, it was evident to me that I should develop the sonic soundscape that I have created in that piece. I have decided that I write a cycle of compositions for string quartet and its subsets.

Tr (épilogue) marks the second piece that I completed in this cycle. Its title has a precursor; Tr for violoncello and piano, of which I took the formal scheme as a point of reference for the solo piece. I took the duo piece, stripped away the piano part, and enlarged the piece by adding musical commentaries.

As the title may suggest, I intend that this piece conclude the cycle. In the spirit of concluding the cycle, my focus in this piece was to illuminate the gestures and situations of ‘farewell,’ in the sense that the envelope of the phrases has the conscious trajectory of fade-out.

Many thanks to Patrick McGuire who, in the symposium Creative Dialogue V, premièred the work-in-progress version as a part of Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. Also thanks are due to Anssi Karttunen and Magnus Lindberg, whose commentaries and feedbacks were crucial to the development of the piece. For the revised version, a rather extended coda (Coda (à Séverine)) was added. I am indebted to Séverine Ballon, who kindly demonstrated a technique utilized in this coda.

Tr (épilogue) is dedicated to Pierre Morlet and Mark Andre.

- Yoshiaki Onishi

Tr (épilogue) - for violoncello solo (2012, rev. 2014)

amplified quintet for TAK ensemble, recording DiMenna Center for Classical Music 2014.

due to the sensitivity of this piece (and its assortment of extremely quiet hums and very low sounds), please use headphones with ample bass response when listening.

hull not continent [2013-14]

NOTE: The work "Tramespace" as a diptych has not yet been performed, but the two works that make up the diptych have now been performed. I have put the two recordings together, so as to form an impression of the diptych. 

Many excuses for the drop in the quality of the sound recording in "Tramespace II," as the sound becomes monophonic.
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0:00~15:12: Tramespace I (2012~2013)
15:12~32:58: Tramespace II (2013~2015)
==========
Tramespace I:
Study Score: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p1918_Tramespace-I.html

Asko|Schönberg Ensemble
Clark Rundell, cond.

Geertekerk, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Gaudeamus Muziekweek 2013, Opening Concert
September 2, 2013

Live recording made by Richard de Gruyl for Concertzender/VPRO during Gaudeamus Muziekweek 2013
==========
Tramespace II:
Study Score: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2065_Tramespace-II.html

Ensemble Intercontemporain
Pablo Heras-Casado, cond.

Kölner Philharmonie, Köln (Cologne), Germany
Acht Brücken 2015
May 9, 2015

Tramespace, diptych for large ensemble (2012~2015)

IMPORTANT: Please listen at a LOUD comfortable volume that makes your ear parts move a little. You should hear a lot of air shifting. (Ideally headphones or biggish bass-friendly speakers.) 


Written in close collaboration with Distractfold Ensemble, featuring: 


Rocío Bolaños - bass clarinet (w transposition pedals)
Daniel Brew - electric guitar
Linda Jankowska -  bowed kick + snare drums (drums outfitted with bridges + strings)
Christian Smith - bowed kick drum (as above)+ other percussion
Alice Purton - cello (w transposition pedals)
Sabrina Schroeder - transducers (playing bass drum, floor tom, and plywood cubes via live-manipulated sound waves through transducers).

Transducer performance interface developed with programming and design support from Josiah Oberholtzer, and from Michael Acker of the Experimentalstudio de SWR Freiburg. 

This live-performance recording was made at the 48th Internationale Ferienkurse in Darmstadt (Aug. 7th, 2016)

BONE GAMES (2016) for amplified ensemble

Distractfold live at Kammer Klang, Café Oto, October 4, 2016.
Instrumental performance, expressive signal processing, looping and live track mixing by Linda Jankowska, Emma Richards and Alice Purton. 
Recorded by Shaun Crook.
Mixed by Mauricio Pauly.
Mastered by Richard Scott.

Charred Edifice Shining, for amplified string trio

Reliq Ens | 2016-2017 (recorded on 11.03.17 for BBC Radio 3's Hear and Now)

Momenta Quartet
(Alex Shiozaki, violin; Stephanie Griffin, viola;  Michael Haas, violoncello)
February 19, 2017
Scandinavia House, New York

Remastered by Yoshiaki Onishi

Score: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2213_Envoi-II.html
Parts: https://www.editiongravis.de/verlag/product_info.php?info=p2278_Envoi-II.html

============
Commissioned by Music From Japan (New York).

When I wrote my Culs-de-sac (en passacaille) for string quartet in 2009, it was evident to me that I should develop the sonic soundscape that I have created in that piece. I have decided that I write Les six aspects du néant, a cycle of compositions for string quartet and its subsets.

Envoi II marks the fourth piece that I completed in this cycle. Envoi is another series of pieces I have been working on since 2015. In this piece, these two cycles intersect in their compositional and affective senses.

This piece relates itself to the cycle Les six aspects du néant, for its compositional materials are taken from the pieces within that cycle that I have already written. These materials have been then worked out once again in order to compose this piece.

In its literary sense, an envoi (or envoy) is an author’s concluding words, or a short stanza that concludes a ballade. In modern French, it is a word frequently used to denote the action of “sending off” (packages or letters) or simply “sending” (one’s best wishes, etc.). While its author is specific, the recipient could be, depending on the context, open-ended. It may be to someone alive, or it may be to a fictional character, or someone deceased.

As I started to write this piece, I received the news that James Deitz, percussionist whom I have been privileged to know since my time during the graduate studies at Yale University, departed from this world. This piece is dedicated to his memory.

Many thanks are due to Prof. Fuyuko Fukunaka, musicologist at Tokyo University of the Arts who extended the opportunity to write this work for the Music From Japan Festival 2017, Mr. Naoyuki Miura and Ms. Mari Ono, organizers of Music From Japan (New York), and the members of Momenta Quartet.

- Yoshiaki Onishi

Envoi II - for string trio (2016)

Ulenflucht

(British premiere)

Linda Jankowska, violin
University of Huddersfield (Huddersfield, England)
September 15, 2017

Parti… for violin solo (2012~14, rev. 2015)

Tierra y Centro de la Tierra (2018)
for Bb clarinet, violin, viola, violoncello, surface transducers & resonant space (in this case a Roman water deposit located under the cloister of the Academy of Spain in Rome), midi controller (keyboard).
-Performed by Distractfold (Rocío Bolaños, Linda Jankowska, Emma Richards, Alice Purton) & Haize Lizarazu.
-Live recording at the Royal Academy of Spain in Rome. 26-06-2018.
-Unwanted birds from 14' on.

Tierra Y Centro De La Tierra (2018)

28/78 New Music Ensemble
	Andrew Lu, flute
	Scott Pastor, clarinet
	Thomas Hubel, trumpet
	Joshua Dunsford, trombone
	Tyler Golding, percussion
	Diego Bustamante, piano
	Sabrina Boggs and Micah Vogel, violins
	Anne Plescia, viola
	Malcolm King, violoncello
	Tristen Collinsworth, electronics

Yoshiaki Onishi, cond. 

February 2, 2019
Stockton, California, United States

28/78 New Music Festival
Conservatory of Music, University of the Pacific

Live Recording by Jeffrey D. Crawford (Owen Hall Recording & Video Studio)
Remastered by the composer

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I: L'antienne acoustique 1
II: Mouvements
III: L'antienne acoustique 2
===
Antefenas is a spelling variant of an Old English word, antefn, meaning an “antiphon,” “anthem,” or a “hymn song sung in alternate parts.” No religious connotation is intended in this piece; however, throughout the piece I focus on the physicality of alternating sounds. In particular, I am interested in the kinetics of one sound responding to another, eventually forming the perception of a dialogue. Throughout the piece, dialogue is implied in various ways.

In the first part, L’antienne acoustique I (The acoustic dialogue I), an exchange between real and virtual acoustics takes place: the live musicians play short sounds through their instruments that would highlight the acoustics of the room or the hall where the piece is being played. The electronic part responds to these live instrumental sounds with sounds that are passed through impulse responses, artificially generated reverberations that simulate a “virtual” room. In the second part, Mouvements (movements), the electronic part is absent, and the focus is on the activities on the instrumental parts. “Movements” here refer not only to the fast passages that dominate this part, but also to the movements of the sounds that are exchanged from one instrumental group to another. The last part, L’antienne acoustique II, is essentially an inverse of the first part, where the live instrumental parts simulate the acoustics that the electronics produced in L’antienne acoustique I by producing the airy and hissing sounds that quickly decay in volume. The electronic part predominantly produces sounds with dry acoustics. New to the revised version, fast delays are added to the electronic sounds that bounce off left and right. Such sounds are put together with the live instrumental sounds to create a more immersive experience. The electronic part also plays a series of bell-like chords, which come from the residues of compositional materials that did not make their ways into the second part, Mouvements. I think of them as a signifier of the irreconcilable past. I find them particularly poignant, considering how turbulent the world has been for the past few years. Indeed, working on a now two-year-old piece makes the passing of time so visceral and palpable.

Antefenas-Studies was commissioned by and written for University of the Pacific’s 28/78 New Music Ensemble and Andrew Lu, in partnership with the Conservatory of Music. I dedicate this piece to Robert Coburn, in gratitude for introducing me to the world of Max/MSP while I was an undergraduate at the university, which has proven essential for creating the electronics component of this piece.

  --- Yoshiaki Onishi

Antefenas-Studies, for ensemble and electronics (2018)

Yoshiaki Onishi - Envoi II (2016) for string trio

live recording from 2018 Trieste Prima Festival
performed by Distractfold Ensemble:
Linda Jankowska - violin
Emma Richards - viola
Alice Purton - cello

Yoshiaki Onishi - Envoi II (2016) for string trio

Work commissioned by the Sheldon Arts Foundation in St. Louis, Missouri

Yoshiaki Onishi, bass clarinet
Leigh Muñoz, bassoon

March 6, 2020
The Sheldon Concert Hall
St. Louis Classical All-Stars

Yoshiaki Onishi - Gz III (2019-20) for bass clarinet and bassoon

Yoshiaki Onishi is a Japanese-American composer, conductor, and clarinetist. As a composer, he is interested in exploring a wide range of instrumental timbres and finding ways to incorporate them in musical syntaxes and forms that disrupt the sense of expectation. He has worked on commissions that have come from such festivals and organizations as Klangwerkstatt Berlin, Philharmonie Luxembourg, Takefu International Music Festival, and Gaudeamus Muziekweek, and his music has been performed by ensembles worldwide, including New Japan Philharmonic, Asko|Schönberg Ensemble, Klangforum Wien, Nieuw Ensemble, Distractfold Ensemble, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Quatuor Diotima and JACK Quartet. He is the recipient of the 2018 Guggenheim Fellowship, the 2018 Fromm Commission, and the Gaudeamus Prize 2011. Edition Gravis in Berlin, Germany publishes his music. As a conductor deeply engaged in promoting the music of today, he is Co-Director for the Mizzou New Music Ensemble and was one of the founding members of Ensemble Exophonie Tokyo. Other ensembles he has worked with as a conductor include Nieuw Ensemble of Amsterdam, ECCE Ensemble, Wet Ink Ensemble, Columbia University Orchestra and the University Philharmonic Orchestra of the University of Missouri. Increasingly active as a clarinetist and improviser, he has collaborated with composers George Lewis, Carolina Heredia, Oswald Huỳnh, Bret Bohman, and Andrew Crossley. Together with Santiago Beis, he plays in the Onishi-Beis Duo, an electroacoustic improvisation duo. Onishi received his doctorate in music composition from Columbia University in 2015. He is currently Assistant Professor of Music Composition at the University of Delaware School of Music. 

Profile Photo © 2015 by Stefaren.

Yoshiaki Onishi - Envoi II (2016) for string trio

Distractfold

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