Emi Maeda M

B. 1973 in Tokyo. Lives in Helsinki.

Started to play harp in 1991. 1996 studies at the Barbican, London. 1999-2001 studies in composition, arrangement, and live electronics at the Sibelus Academy in Helsinki, Finland.

Maeda works in two different fields, as a harpist in orchestras and as an experimental musician. Maeda’s approach to her works could be an “all in one a harpist as an electro acoustic musician”-crossover between Japanese digital noise and classical harpist. She uses Supercollider’s program for most of her compositions. In live electronic performances, she often uses different types of mics, and effects. Electronic sound manipulation techniques are easily applied to the harp, and it is involved in most of Maeda’s computer-processed sound material. She has also investigated the possibilities in other instruments such as the kantele, a traditional Finnish harp-like instrument.

It might be difficult to hear a connection between the rather aggressive computer compositions and the traditional harp music Maeda plays. Nonetheless, the noise composed by Maeda is not nihilistic aggression, but an open invitation to joyful ecstasy.

Discography

V/A Electronic Leak - The North of It CD, leak 1, The Nordic Pavillion Exhibition, 2003

(a CD released in conjunction with Venice Biennale 2003)

V/A Avantoscore 2003 CD, AAAAA-2003, Avanto Recordings, 2003

(Avanto 2003 festival CD

/LARM

http://webusers.siba.fi/~emaeda/