Japan Philharmonic Orchestra has started its brand-new era during its 2008-09 season, collaborating with the chief conductor from Russia, Maestro Alexander LAZAREV, and the principal guest conductor from Finland, young prominent maestro Pietari INKINEN. JPO has reinforced its musical excellence through the concert cycle of all 7 symphonies of PROKOFIEV with Maestro LAZAREV, and Mahler symphony series with Maestro INKINEN, and well acclaimed by both the Japanese audience and critics. Now JPO has launched the new series of Russian composers, starting with RACHMANINOV in 2011-12 season, which will further enrich the quality of its sound.
Japan Philharmonic Orchestra's 54 year-history began in Tokyo in 1956. Akeo WATANABE played an important role in founding the orchestra and became its first principal conductor. Soon with the wide repertoire and its unique performing style, JPO has become one of the leading orchestras in Japan, along with NHK Symphony Orchestra. Igor MARKEVITCH, Charles MUNCH, Jean FOURNET, Neeme JÄRVI, Jiří BĔLOHLÁVEK, Seiji OZAWA, and other many world-class conductors have conducted JPO. Especially under the guidance of its founding conductor WATANABE, whose mother was a Finish singer, JPO has had a great reputation for introducing Jean SYBELIUS' music to the Japanese audience. The orchestra recorded full series of SIBELIUS' symphonies under the baton of Maestro WATANABE in 1962 for the first time in the world. JPO also implemented the concert series of all SIBELIUS' symphonies with Maestro Neeme JÄRVI in June 2001. JPO, meanwhile, has contributed to the contemporary music. The orchestra has kept the project Japan Philharmonic Series since 1958, which is to commission new works of music to Japanese composers, including Toru TAKEMITSU, Akira MIYOSHI, Akira NISHIMURA, and Toshio HOSOKAWA. 39 works has been created so far and every one of them has been praised as a masterpiece of contemporary music. The Japan premiere of Tan Dun's opera Marco Polo was also done by JPO in 1998 with a great success and was one of the epoch-making events for the contemporary music scene in Japan.
JPO has had many international tours in its history including Europe and North America. The performances in Estonia in 2002 and in Hawaii in 2004 were both the Japanese orchestra's first appearances in those places, so that they were especially well accepted by the media. In March 2011, right after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in east Japan, JPO made it to participate the acclaimed Hong Kong Arts Festival with the chief conductor Alexander LAZAREV. JPO has held the mission "We send out the culture through music", which is supported by three m ajor pillars: "Orchestra Concerts"", Educational Programs" and" Regional Activities". JPO has been very successful in its education programs. The orchestra has held family concerts in every summer since 1975, and has done many performances for school students, outreach programs and various workshops. JPO also has focused on the activities with local communities, having concerts and other programs all around in Japan, and now heading to the other Asian countries, just had some good workshops with local secondary school students in Hong Kong in March 2011. The members of JPO has visited Tohoku region voluntarily to perform for the people in the earthquake/tsunami striken area since the disaster occurred, and this program" Music for Tohoku" will be kept on going for a while.
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