ABSTRACT
This chapter reflects on the history of avant-garde works by Japanese composers that utilise traditional musical ideas. First, it traces methodological changes brought about by successive generations of Japanese composers as revealed by a survey of reports in Ongaku Geijutsu [Art of Music], one of the most important music journals in Japan. Then, we turn to Metamorphosis on Saibara for orchestra (1953) by Matsudaira Yoritsune (1907–2001) which is based upon gagaku, one of the genres inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The chapter includes a detailed analysis of Matsudaira’s work and demonstrates that the composer’s profound comprehension of the gagaku genre has made his music highly original, culturally valuable, and aesthetically important. It then argues that even if Matsudaira himself never aimed directly to 'preserve' Japan's musical heritage, his work provides new evidence for the rich potential of cross-cultural artistic encounters by giving the gagaku genre a new cultural status and a renewed artistic meaning. This is the safeguarding of musical heritage in action.
