The Romantic era of classical music, famous for composers like Chopin and Tchaikovsky and known for its expressive melodies and gorgeous harmonies, ended in the early 20th century. Its successors, Modernism and Postmodernism, were distinctly more dissonant. This change reflected the rejection of traditionality seen in their corresponding movements in visual art, literature, and philosophy. As a young composer in the 1970s, Takashi Yoshimatsu subscribed to these new trends. His first piece to win a composition competition, “Dorian” for orchestra, was highly dissonant. However, as his compositional style developed over the 1980s and 1990s, he found himself more attracted to the consonant harmonies of the Romantic era. By the 2000s, he had established himself as one of Japan’s leading composers of the neo-romantic movement, his music representing a unique take on a traditional style.
Born in 1953 in Tokyo, Yoshimatsu was not always devoted to music. He initially enrolled in Keio University as an engineering student. However, he soon realized that engineering was not his true passion. After switching his major to music and briefly studying under classical composer and poet Teizo Matsumura, he dropped out of university in 1974 to pursue his own musical path. Initially, he was fascinated by both the classical and popular music of his time. He joined several jazz and rock bands and was especially interested in progressive rock. However, after the 1981 release of his atonal serialist work “Threnody to Toki” propelled him to fame, he began to reject modern music, calling it “unmusical” and advocating for a “new lyricism” that soon came to define his neo-romantic compositions.
While Yoshimatsu’s music is heavily influenced by the Romantic era, its instrumentation and contemporary incorporations make it refreshingly unique. Much of his music is for solo piano, but his numerous orchestral works take advantage of an incredible variety of instruments not often found in an orchestral context. His concertos feature eight different solo instruments: piano, cello, bassoon, trombone, alto saxophone, soprano saxophone, guitar, and marimba. Additionally, he wrote several pieces for traditional Japanese instruments, such as the koto (a plucked string instrument) and the shakuhachi (a type of flute). While he rejected the atonalism characteristic of many contemporary classical composers, he was significantly influenced by popular music composers of the time. For example, his two “Atom Hearts Club Suites” for string orchestra, composed in the late 1990s, took major inspiration from similarly named albums by the Beatles and Pink Floyd.
Yoshimatsu also took great inspiration from nature. The five movements of his Symphony No. 1, “Kamui-Chikap Symphony” (1988-1990) reflect the influence of five different natural elements: ground, water, fire, air, and rainbow. His peaceful “White Landscapes” for flute, cello, harp, and string orchestra (1991) is intended to illustrate the falling, settling, and melting of snow. Especially noteworthy is his obsession with birds. Yoshimatsu titles many of his works after them, including his 2024 alto saxophone concerto “Cyber Bird,” his 2010 marimba concerto “Bird Rhythmics,” and his electrifying sixth symphony “Birds and Angels.” Even his early atonal piece “Threnody to Toki” is bird-themed, lamenting the extinction of the Japanese toki bird in the wild (the toki, also known as a crested ibis, has since been reintroduced from captivity).
One piece that showcases Yoshimatsu’s style exceptionally well is the last movement of his “Memo Flora” piano concerto, titled “Bloom.” Opening with a series of ecstatic piano flourishes, it settles into a rhythmic triplet theme in alternating measures of 4/8 and 5/8 meter that calls to mind hummingbirds flitting between flowers in a springtime forest. This theme builds in intensity as it is repeated and developed by different sections of the orchestra. After several minutes, it backs off to reveal a free and lyrical piano solo, illustrating the forest at night as moonlight ripples through the branches. Suddenly, the original theme is back, still as a quiet piano solo but now distinctly rhythmic. The theme intensifies as the orchestra returns, building to a dramatic peak. A flourish leading into a staccato major seventh chord signals the piece’s abrupt yet satisfying ending. Yoshimatsu’s use of alternating time signatures throughout the piece is a hallmark of his style. He employs this technique often in final movements of larger works, such as the finales of his sixth symphony and his cello concerto, and the themes he creates with this technique are uniquely catchy.
In great contrast to Yoshimatsu’s asymmetrical rhythmic themes are the introspective melodies found in many of his works for string orchestra, such as “Dream Colored Mobile II.” The piece, which features harp and oboe alongside the four standard string instruments, begins with a soft repeating sixteenth-note figure in the harp. While technically in 3/4, the harp’s rhythm is offset in a way that makes the piece feel almost as if it has no time signature. The strings enter with a series of quiet chords that set the scene for the entrance of the heart-wrenching oboe melody. Alone, the melody is fairly simple and repetitive, but the ever-changing string harmonies underneath give it a beautiful depth. After a brief interlude in which the harp takes over the melody, the oboe returns, pushing the harp back into its original sixteenth-note role with a melody that gradually becomes more insistent. While the orchestra’s tempo stays constant, the harp ostinato begins to accelerate. Soon, the harp is playing sweeping glissandi as the oboe struggles to keep the piece under control. Eventually, the piece fades back into its original tranquility, ending with one final repetition of the first harp figure at a slower tempo as the oboe fades into nothing. “Dream Colored Mobile II” features a harmonic motif in which a major seventh chord changes to an augmented seventh, creating a mild tension that evokes the stirring of the mind during a dream.
Yoshimatsu has not published any music since 2015, and while he is still active on his blog it appears that he has retired from music composition. However, listeners should not despair; his extensive oeuvre will keep anyone entertained for weeks. Whether due to their metric intricacies, breathtaking melodies, or intriguing harmonies, all of Yoshimatsu’s compositions are astoundingly expressive. Yoshimatsu describes music as “a kind of fantasy that sometimes seems more real than reality.” His own works certainly live up to that description.