Takehisa Kosugi was a Japanese composer, violinist and artist associated with the Fluxus movement.
15 Facts About Takehisa Kosugi
1.
2.
Takehisa Kosugi first became drawn to music listening to his father play harmonica and listening to violin recordings of Mischa Elman and Joseph Szigeti while as a child in post-war Japan.
3.
Takehisa Kosugi started Tokyo-based seven-member ensemble Group Ongaku with his first improvisation partner Shuku Mizuno, which was active from 1958 to 1962.
4.
Takehisa Kosugi performed in the Yomiyuri Independent Exhibition in 1962 and 1963, its final iteration.
5.
Takehisa Kosugi is probably best known for the experimental music that he created from 1960 until 1975.
6.
In 1963, Takehisa Kosugi composed for Fluxus 1 a musical piece called Theatre Music in the form of a rectangle of cardstock that bore the trace of a spiral of moving feet.
7.
One collaborative work was "Instrumental Music" in which Takehisa Kosugi attempted to cut out the silhouette of Moorman projected onto a screen by a spotlight.
8.
In 1999, Takehisa Kosugi worked with Sonic Youth on their album SYR4: Goodbye 20th Century.
9.
Takehisa Kosugi received grants from The JDR 3rd Fund in 1966 and 1977.
10.
Takehisa Kosugi received a DAAD fellowship grant to reside in West Berlin in 1981.
11.
In 1975, Takehisa Kosugi released the solo album Catch-wave, which has been reissued multiple times on both CD and vinyl.
12.
Takehisa Kosugi received a John Cage Award for Music from Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts in 1994.
13.
In 2015, the Whitney Museum of American Art opened a performance retrospective of Kosugi's work titled, "Takehisa Kosugi: Music Expanded" referencing the 1967 Town Hall event.
14.
Takehisa Kosugi died October 12,2018, in Ashiya, Japan from esophageal cancer.
15.
At the time of his death, Takehisa Kosugi was survived by his longtime partner and manager, Takako Okamoto, and three brothers.