The Japanese pianist Kenji Miura rose to prominence in 2019 as winner of the Long-Thibaud-Crespin Competition in Paris, endorsed by Martha Argerich, chair of the jury, and her vice-chair Bertrand Chamayou. Born in Kobe in 1993, Miura began playing the piano at the age of four and subsequently studied in the UK – at the Purcell School of Music and Royal Academy of Music – and then in Berlin at the Universität der Künste and Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler.
Identity, Kenji Miura’s new album reflects his status as a ‘citizen of the world’. In tribute to the Long-Thibaud-Crespin Competition it favours works by French composers – Franck (born in Belgium), Debussy, Ravel and Benjamin Godard (1849-1895) – but complements them with two pieces by the Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu. As a consequence of events in World War II, Takemitsu struggled for a time with his national identity and he espoused a wholly Western musical aesthetic – notably drawing on Debussy, Messiaen and the Second Viennese School. Partly through the influence of the American composer John Cage, who found inspiration in Zen ideology, Takemitsu went on to reconcile himself with Japanese culture from the early 60s onwards. The main works on Identity are Franck’s Prélude, Fugue et Variation, Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales and Debussy’s Six épigraphes antiques.
“The concept of identity – national, sexual, religious – has been an issue in many fields in recent years,” writes Kenji Miura. “Composers and their works have always been intertwined with the cultural and political landscape of their time – so why shouldn’t we, as artists (performers) choose works or themes that reflect the issues of our time?
“This album is a reflection of my own personal struggle with identity. I’m writing this from my home in Berlin as someone who was born in Japan, went to school in Dubai and spent his teenage years in London. I lived everywhere, but nowhere is my home. I have spent all my adult years here in Berlin, where I met and married my wife, and where our daughter was born. And yet I often feel like I don’t belong.
