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Nature and Music Translated by Yoshiko Kakudo and Glenn Glasow i This summer [1962], walking through the fields of Hokkaido, I could not help thinking that my own thoughts have come to resemble the sidewalks of a city: rigid and calculated. Standing there in a field with an uninterrupted view for forty kilometers, I thought that the city, because of its very nature, would someday be outmoded and abandoned as a passing phenomenon. The unnatural quality of city life results from an abnormal swelling of the nerve endings. In this way, though, seemingly active, hasn’t it also become helpless? A lifestyle out of balance with nature is frightening. As long as we live, we aspire to harmonize with nature. It is this harmony in which the arts originate and to which they will eventually return. Harmony, or balance, in this sense does not mean regulation or control by ready-made rules. It is beyond functionalism . I believe what we call “expression” in art is really discovery, by one’s own mode, of something new in this world. There is something about this word “expression,” however, that alienates me: no matter how dedicated to the truth we may be, in the end when we see that what we have produced is artificial, it is false. I have never doubted that the love of art is the love of unreality. Facing the silence of the old trees I could not help thinking about my own work. My truth, however, is found only in the act of creation. And it is in that act that self-criticism arises and I feel alive. There is nothing profound about that. Although I think constantly about the relationship of music to nature, for me music does not exist to describe natural scenery. While it is true that I am sometimes impressed by natural scenery devoid of human life, and that may motivate my own composing, at the same time I cannot forget the tawdry and seamy side of human existence. I cannot conceive of nature and human beings as opposing elements, but prefer to emphasize living harmoniously, which I like to call naturalness. To be sure, this contradicts fleeing to “the narrow road [ 183 ] toru takemitsu ⢇ to the deep north.” In my own creation naturalness is nothing but relating to reality. It is from the boiling pot of reality that art is born. In Hokkaido I met some tourist Ainu who continue to wear their traditional garb—not by choice, but out of their own weariness from resisting outside forces. I also talked to some young white-shirted Ainu who looked down on the tourist Ainu. These young people held as an ideal the preservation of their culture in a pure state. They regarded the carved wooden bears and arti- ficial crafts produced by the tourist Ainu as distortions of their culture. That may be true, but I was irritated and frustrated by the distance between the reality of the tourist Ainu and the ideals of those youths. Listening to their talk I despaired and felt like letting the whole Ainu culture die. But there at the deserted lake, enchanted by the deep blue of the water, I could not forget those strong impressions that nearly caused me to lose my own identity: the Ainu woman crouching by the roadside with averted face, the shabby and somewhat smelly village. No, I do not underestimate the value of preserving a tradition. But those Ainu youths and I must remember one thing: as long as we live we must produce something. That is the natural thing to do. I wish to free sounds from the trite rules of music, rules that are in turn stifled by formulas and calculations. I want to give sounds the freedom to breathe. Rather than on the ideology of self-expression, music should be based on a profound relationship to nature—sometimes gentle, sometimes harsh. When sounds are possessed by ideas instead of having their own identity, music suVers. This would be my basic rule, but it is only an idea and naturally I must develop a practical method. One way might be through an ethnological approach. There may be folk music with strength and beauty, but I cannot be completely honest in this kind of music. I want a more active relationship to the present. (Folk music in a “contemporary style” is nothing but a deception.) Because the writer of popular tunes looks at his world with too much...

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