Sayo Biography
Sayo Kosugi is a composer from Japan, currently residing in New York, pursuing a master of music degree in Composition at The Juilliard School. She has released five CDs of her own compositions, each of which have sold more than 10,000 copies, an extremely rare achievement for releases of instrumental music. Two of her CDs have become the best-sellers on the sales chart of the leading CD companies in Japan. They have soared to top in four categories, including “New Age Music” and “Music for Healing”. She has also scored many DVD films, and her music has been played daily on numerous national television and radio programs.
As highly acclaimed young artists of “New Age Music” in Japan, her ensemble of which she is the composer and pianist, has been invited to perform at many international events and shows, including the award ceremonies of the International Figure Skating Championships, FIFA World Cup, and the World Baseball Classics, the fashion shows of Cartier, Dior, Vivianne Westwood, and Shiseido. From 2003 to 2008, her ensemble gave over two hundred live performances a year throughout Japan, covering all major cities. The CDs of her ensemble are available as “MODEA” at the iTunes store in both Japan and the U.S..
Born and raised in Tokyo, she has had more than twenty years of intensive training in classical piano music. She holds a bachelor of music degree from Kunitachi Music University in Tokyo. While pursuing her major study in piano performance, she has also been passionate about composition as well as the aesthetics and culture of Japan. She has long been a fervent exponent of the Tea Ceremony and the “Ritual of Kimono Costuming”. Moreover, she has become well versed in “world ethnic music” as well as electronic technique. Her background, interests and experiences have distinguished her as a musician of “extraordinary sensibility and universal appeal.”
Since 2006, she has been besieged by offers of collaboration and commissions from the Imperial Household Agency, artists and experts on the forefront of their respective fields for their top-priority projects.
Her recent works include “Kiba Dakyu” (2009) commissioned by the Imperial Household Agency and produced by Kasumi Kaikan, Emperor Akihito was so pleased with its success in promoting and preserving the millennium-year-old traditions and rituals of the Imperial Court that a sequel, “Kemari” was immediately commissioned. The latter soon led to what would eventually constitute an entire series of related projects on the Imperial Court, beginning with “Yabusame”. Moreover, “Yoru Momiji”(2007), commissioned by the National Fuji Television, was such a great success that it launched a sequel, “A Promenade through Kyoto in Bloom”, celebrating the natural beauty of the ancient capital. These DVDs are scheduled to be released within two years.
In addition to these projects, she has been pursuing the study of contemporary classical composition under Robert Beaser, Daniel Ott and Conrad Cummings.
She has also been very active on the music and theatre scene in New York. To name a couple, her work as the composer, arranger and pianist for the Glass Menagerie at the Schapiro Theatre has received high acclaim. Her latest honor was her being selected to participate as a composer and pianist in the Columbia University New Music Concert. Her compositions were chosen for performance at their concerts both in the spring and the fall of 2010. Moreover, she was awarded second prize for her latest composition at the J. Dorfman Memorial Composer Competition in Germany.
