DAVID SYLVIAN BOOK

A new career-spanning book, Hypergraphia: The Writings of David Sylvian 1980-2014, will be published in early November. From the press release: "Spanning a duration of over thirty years, Hypergraphia includes previously unpublished material, as well as conversations with the influential improvisational guitarist and founding member of the group AMM, Keith Rowe and the ever-insightful writer and musicologist Marcus Boon. The volume includes aspects of Sylvian's own photographic work as well as selections by some of the most reputable and innovative artists working today and its design celebrate the longstanding collaboration between Sylvian and acclaimed designer Chris Bigg (below). English singer-songwriter and musician David Sylvian came to prominence in the late 1970s as the lead vocalist and main songwriter in the group Japan. Their hits included Ghosts and a cover version of I Second That Emotion. His subsequent solo work is described as 'a far-ranging and esoteric career that encompassed not only solo projects but also a series of fascinating collaborative efforts'." Pre-order at AmazonUK and Amazon.

FRANZ WRIGHT R.I.P.

Pulitzer Prize-winnig poet, Franz Wright, passed away this week. He was the son of James Wright, who won the Pulitzer for poetry in 1972. Franz wrote bluntly about addiction and illness, and his recent collaboration with composer/musician David Sylvian (of Japan fame) captured a raw, human quality that managed, like an Uta Barth photograph, to find beauty in the small observations of the body and mind from moment to moment. Wright won the Pulitzer in 2004. He was working on a new book at the time of his death. Learn more about Franz Wright at the Washington Post, Poetry Foundation, David Sylvian, Below: preview of There's a Light That Enters Houses With no Other House in Sight by Franz Wright and David Sylvian, with contributions by Christian Fennesz and John Tilbury. The album is available at Amazon here. Album website here. 

NEW HAYAO MIYAZAKI DOC

New release: A beautiful new documentary film was released on DVD in January that offers an intimate visit with Japanese artist/director Hayao Miyazaki. From the editorial review on Amazon: "Granted near-unfettered access to the notoriously insular Studio Ghibli, director Mami Sunada follows the three men who are the lifeblood of Ghibli the eminent director Hayao Miyazaki, the producer Toshio Suzuki, and the elusive and influential other director Isao Takahata over the course of a year as the studio rushes to complete two films, Miyazaki s The Wind Rises and Takahata s The Tale of The Princess Kaguya. The result is a rare fly on the wall glimpse of the inner workings of one of the world s most celebrated animation studios creators of successful films including Princess Mononoke and the Oscar winning Spirited Away, the highest-grossing Japanese film of all time and an insight into the dreams, passion and singular dedication of these remarkable creators." US readers can now stream the film on Netflix. Enjoy!

AKIRA KUROSAWA

An interesting little tribute to Akira Kurosawa made on his 99th birthday in 2011. American directors Lucas, Spielberg, and Scorsese speak warmly about his influence and the group congratulates a new Kurosawa film school in Anaheim. Enjoy!

HAYAO MIYAZAKI

Happy Birthday to Hayao Miyazaki. Born on this day in 1941, Miyazaki has become one of the most respected artists in Japan. The film director and comic creator has an unparalleled gift at writing strong female characters and his ability to weave magic realism (and often environmentalism) into deep coming-of-age stories has made him the most beloved storyteller around the world. Suggested viewing: My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away, Kiki's Delivery Service, Howls Moving Castle. Collage below: key female characters from Miyazaki's most celebrated projects. Learn more: Studio Ghibli Museum, Starting Point, Turning Point, author page. Enjoy!

NEW MURAKAMI BOOK

The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami was published this week by Knopf in the US and by Harvill Secker in the UK. Released in collaboration with Chip Kidd, who provided illustrations and design, the book is only the first in a number of older Murakami projects scheduled to finally see English-language releases. From my conversation with translator Ted Goossen in October, it sounds like fans of Japan's master of surreal mystery can expect to see a few more works published in English in the next year or two. Can't wait! The Strange Library has been listed as Amazon's Best Book of the Month and Neal Thompson has posted this intriguing review: "What an odd and oddly beautiful little book. A little boy enters a quiet library -- “even more hushed than usual,” we’re told in the opening line -- and is sent to Room 107, where he meets a creepy old librarian who leads him deep into a maze of dark catacombs beneath the library. There, we learn of the librarian’s ghoulish designs and the boy encounters a small man wearing the skin of a sheep and a pretty young girl pushing a teacart, their worlds now “all jumbled together.” Not even fresh-made doughnuts can sweeten the boy’s nightmarish predicament as the librarian’s prisoner. The Strange Library was designed and illustrated by famed book jacket designer (and frequent Murakami collaborator) Chip Kidd, whose moody and mysterious depictions of a child’s (and a parent’s) darkest dream match Murakami’s surreal imagination. It’s hard to discern the message. Maybe something about knowledge being free or the value of libraries. No matter. This is vintage Murakami and, at the same time, something entirely fresh. No one puts animal skins on humans like Murakami. No one would dare." Images: From the Art Pioneers Murakami Design image archive on Pinterest- new book designs and photographs of Murakami's own office space. Note the large record collection! The novelist once owned a jazz club in Tokyo called Peter Cat! Cool to see he is a Glenn Gould fan. Murakami has published many pieces about music, including a new book with conductor Seiji Ozawa (Japanese edition here). The Strange Library is available at local bookshops and at Amazon US and Amazon UK.

CLIVE BELL ON BIWA

Composer/writer Clive Bell contributed an interesting piece in The Wire recently that explores the biwa (medieval Japanese lute) and its role in avant-garde pieces by Toru Takemitsu and in the epic (and tragic!) songs of the Heike. I first heard the biwa in High School, when a teacher gave me Kabuki and Other Traditional Music by the Ensemble Nipponia (Nonesuch 1980). I then became fascinated by Takemitsu's scores for classic films like Kwaidan and Seppuku. There is an urgency and depth in biwa music that seems to echo that human experience of grief, when the throat closes up in gaps of silence and parcels out our urgent sounds in passionate spurts. More below.

Bell's article touches on an interesting note that the biwa performer, as a conduit for the epic, does not only address the living audience, but the dead as well. He quotes a Dubin student of biwa, Thomas Charles Marshall, who explains the music's haunting function: "The tradition of the lament in Japan, as I’ve come to perceive it, is a kind of requiem to appease spirits. So the Heike biwa is all about telling the story to quieten spirits that had died in a very difficult manner. Biwa hoshi [players], many of them blind, were described as living on the border line between life and death. Traditionally people who couldn’t see were regarded as dwelling between the land of the living and the land of the dead. So there’s this idea of the biwa being able to communicate with both worlds.” Read more at The Wire here. Below: The first biwa piece I heard as a young student, The Death of Atsumori, performed masterfully by Ayako Handa. Learn more: Guide to Toru Takemitsu at The Guardian, Clive Bell, Japan Society UK, Japan Society US, Christopher Yohmei Blasdel (shakuhachi), Music in Japan (Bonnie Wade), Composing Japanese Musical Modernity (Bonnie Wade), Japanese Music and Musical Instruments (William Malm).

MEMORY

Laurie Anderson's The Beginning of Memory, from the album Homeland (2010). I recently saw her perform the piece in an intimate theater designed like the interior of a Japanese temple. She covered the stage with small candles and the low-light against wood really brought me back to the years I lived in northern Japan. Anderson's story held such a mythological quality that, combined with the atmosphere of the room, created a mesmerizing, almost ecstatic experience. It felt like I was listening to a creation tale told around a primal campfire. Homeland was produced by Anderson, Lou Reed, and Roma Baran, and featured contributions by Lou Reed, Omar Hakim, John Zorn, Eyvind Kang, and others. Enjoy!