The renowned Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe vividly recalls gifts he received as a young boy growing up in 1930s rural Tasmania, given to him by family friends on return from Japan. One gift was a much-thumbed children's version of the "Tale of Genji," the other a cardboard-cutout castle.
Sculthorpe, who turns 70 this year, recalls these childhood gifts as the beginning of a lifelong association with Japanese culture and music that has influenced his composition over more than 40 years of creation.
"Usually, I employ Japanese aesthetic and musical ideas when they're related to my own, or when they can be easily incorporated into my musical language," Sculthorpe says. "The melodies of saibara [an early vocal form of Japanese court music] for instance, are very similar to the melodies that I fashion myself."