{"id":13323,"date":"2018-10-29T15:53:20","date_gmt":"2018-10-29T15:53:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stuartbuchanan.com\/?p=13323"},"modified":"2021-01-31T05:07:44","modified_gmt":"2021-01-31T05:07:44","slug":"review-ryuichi-sakomoto-alva-noto-sydney-opera-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/2018\/10\/29\/review-ryuichi-sakomoto-alva-noto-sydney-opera-house\/","title":{"rendered":"REVIEW. Ryuichi Sakomoto and Alva Noto at Sydney Opera House"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>
\nThis week’s Ryuichi Sakamoto<\/strong> and Alvo Noto<\/strong>\u2019s show at Sydney Opera House<\/strong> was challenging yet beautiful, and the perfect music for our times. Read my review below, originally published at the Double J website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ryuichi Sakomoto and Alva Noto’s Sydney Opera House show was brilliantly uncomfortable<\/h1>\n

The first of many things that surprised me at\u00a0Ryuichi Sakamoto<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Alva Noto<\/strong>\u2019s Sydney Opera House show is the age diversity.
\nI did stop for a moment and ask myself \u201cam I in the right place?\u201d But given Sakamoto\u2019s backstory, it shouldn\u2019t have been that surprising. His career spans over 40 years, with genres, collaborations and alliances shifting continually along the way.
\nWith so many jumping-on points, the impetus for attending would have varied wildly from person to person.
\nI first came to Sakamoto through the 1983 film,\u00a0Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence<\/em>, in which he plays a Second World War military officer opposite\u00a0David Bowie<\/strong>. Sakamoto also wrote the soundtrack, including the exceptional David Sylvian collaboration, \u2018Forbidden Colours\u2019.<\/em>
\nIt was only later that I discovered Sakamoto\u2019s profound influence on electronic music, as co-founder of Yellow Magic Orchestra. The late \u201870s and early \u201880s trio took Kraftwerk\u2019s blueprint and ran with it, redefining the zeitgeist through a hybrid of technology, wit and captivating aesthetics.
\nThese brushes with mainstream pop are however the exceptions that prove the rule.
\nSakamoto is first and foremost a composer; and a highly experimental one at that. His ongoing collaboration with German musician Alva Noto is testament to this.
\nThroughout his career, Noto has forcibly bent electronics towards art, presenting work at renowned international exhibitions such as Documenta and the Venice Biennale.
\nWhen the duo appears, they are separated on the far extremes of the stage; the gulf between them filled with hypnotic generative visuals, looping geometric shapes that weave and pulse around the music.
\nThey spend the first section facing away from one another, Sakamoto picking alien, broken notes and Noto playing a series of tiny cymbals with a violin bow.
\nThey don\u2019t need to look each other in the eye; they understand each other\u2019s moves implicitly. Forged for an award-winning 2002 album,\u00a0Vrioon<\/em>, their 16-year partnership spans across six studio albums; cemented with the innovative score for Alejandro Gonz\u00e1lez I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s film,\u00a0The Revenant.<\/em>
\nWhilst Sakamoto sorts through some papers during the breaks between pieces, nodding to some form of pre-determined structure, the performance appears to be predominantly improvised.
\nSakamoto moves from synth to piano to guitar, but none of them produce their customary tones. The piano has been altered (or \u2018prepared\u2019) to shift the timbre and pitch, and the guitar is played by picking at the bridge with a metal tool.
\nIn exchange, Noto delivers a combination of drones and textures that act as the support mechanism; it\u2019s only when his output shifts into crisp, upfront drum patterns that the balance between the two evens out.
\nOccasionally, Sakamoto floats in short yet beautiful piano pieces; a move that feels luxurious in the overall minimalism.
\nAcross 90 minutes, it\u2019s often a difficult performance to grab hold of or settle into, but I adore it all the same.
\nSakamoto and Noto never allow us to get comfortable, instead they force us to question what\u2019s in front of us, to think twice about what we are hearing; and in this day and age, that\u2019s the greatest gift that music can offer.
\nImage:\u00a0Prudence Upton<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week’s Ryuichi Sakamoto and Alvo Noto\u2019s show at Sydney Opera House was challenging yet beautiful, and the perfect music for our times. Read my review below, originally published at the Double J website.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444,453],"tags":[503,1305,1610,1405],"class_list":["post-13323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fat-planet","category-writing","tag-alvo-noto","tag-ryuichi-sakamoto","tag-stuartbuchanan-blog","tag-sydney-opera-house","missing-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15267,"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13323\/revisions\/15267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stuartbuchanan.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}